Axis My India Pradeep Gupta’s decodes measuring consumer insights in pandemic times

Pradeep Gupta, Chairman and Managing Director, Axis My India, has more than two decades of hands-on experience in the industry – right from printing to advertising, publishing to on-ground activations and market research.

Gupta is a stalwart who has consistently been associated with the leading brands of high profile organisations, with innovation, quality and commitment as his driving mantras. He has played a key role in setting up Axis My India, which is India’s foremost consumer data intelligence consultancy that has revolutionised the field of election polling in the country, with an accuracy rate of ~95% spread across 36 states and 2 national elections. 

In an exclusive video interview with Adgully, Pradeep Gupta, Chairman & Managing Director of Axis My India, speaks about how Consumer Trust Index has helped brands rework their strategies amid the pandemic, the process and method for sampling, steps taken to ensure the authentic findings and more.  

On the transformation during the pandemic period

The entire organisation has transformed itself during the lockdown period. Almost 90% of the team – we call them AMIT (Axis My India Team) and not employees – are below the age of 30 years. We are associated with major media companies like the India Today Group. Being part of the essential operations, there is hardly any scope of work from home in our business. Therefore, we have been successfully working from our office, of course, while following all COVID-19 protocols to ensure safety of our team. 

On the business & services in these challenging times

Regardless of the challenges, we have been striving to provide the complete marketing solutions to the industry, including CMI (consumer market insights), product development opportunities, promotions, advertising, distribution, supply chain management, complete ‘Know How’ or information about the products which is factual and authentic.

We also present the Consumer Trust Index (CTI), which is a significant research wherein we try and connect to a sample size of 1 million respondents in one year’s time. The reporting is done district wise on a quarterly basis. The two basic things that we report about are what people consume today and what would be the future purchase intent. We broadly report across 41 categories, which we call necessities. There is not much from the luxury category perspective except for the passenger vehicle segment. The data validation is done by E&Y.

We also come out with a Media Measurement Study, which covers all media. For print there are the ABC and IRS industry measurements, for the television industry there is BARC measurement. However, there is no organised measurement for media like OTT, Digital, Social Media, Outdoor, even wall paintings in rural areas. For all these media measurements, we are trying to come out with a tool where all the advertisers, brands and customers can get to know the media consumption patterns across all media, across all demographics and across all geographies. This product that we are offering on all India basis, will have the representation of all the districts of the country. 

On how CTI is helping brands rethink and plan their strategies

CTI has served multiple interests of the clients, and the most important thing is to know the consumers’ insights, which include their needs and demands across geographies and demographic areas. In the olden days when there was no Internet in rural areas, particularly, India was then known as a homogeneous country – with 70% of the population residing in rural areas and 30% of the population residing in urban areas, which included 6,000 cities. The villages – which largely saw the same kind of consumer behaviour in terms of what they wore, the level of education – it was difficult to reach such areas. Thanks to technology and the Internet, today consumers’ demands and needs are totally checked and fulfilled.

For any business to function properly, the most important thing is to know the consumers’ insights for competition, distribution and supply chain, local trades, communication channel which is the biggest dilemma, and communication engagement which is a top most priority. These are the needs of every business and brand that CTI will cater to and provide appropriate solutions to all those tools. 

Watch the entire interview here: