Driven by market reality, stories will become more valuable: Parull Gossain

The start of a new year is seen as bringing in new operational efficiencies, stronger strategies, a far greater emphasis on building deep bonds with various stakeholders and consumers. In keeping with the current market ecosystem, technology and a human approach are seen as going hand in hand.

As 2023 kicks off, Adgully has approached key industry leaders to Crystal Gaze into 2023, as part of our annual Trending Now series, to highlight the major trends and developments that they see dominating the industry in the year ahead.

Film publicist Parull Gossain sheds light on the key trends in Media and Enertainment that will be seen dominating this year. She also speaks about film promotion trends, the decline in entertainment content on news channels, and more.

Key trends that will dominate M&E in 2023

The trends of 2022 will become more defined this year. PR will use online media more effectively, paying influencers will see a decline, and online reviews management won't help much.

Read More: 2023 will see shifts in how consumers shop online D2C & retail space: Kaushik Mukherjee

Stories and content will become more valuable. Not ethics, but market reality will drive this, with news stories that are interesting and crisp.

Promotions will be intense, but shorter, with a premium on ideas that are out of the box.

Major expectations

Work will continue to come to PR professionals from films, OTT and television. But PR designed for the theatrical release of film versus release amount will be very different and become more defined. PR campaign duration has become shorter in the last few years and that will continue.

Key focus areas

I want to focus on just about two campaigns in a year that are clutter-breaking, apart from the bread-and-butter projects.

Rewind 2022

Overall M&E ecosystem in 2022

Post Covid, 2022 was a year of coming to terms with a very different ecosystem. OTT platforms insist on theatrical release before buying a film and that kind of changed dynamics again for films, OTT and PR.

Key trends & developments in 2022

Media and the way the entertainment PR machinery deals with media has transformed over the last few years and the shift from print to online was inevitable, but Covid has hastened the process.

The last few years have seen a decline in entertainment content on news channels, with entertainment shifting to their online portals, and news channels’ sharp focus on politics and other stories. Those days when a Bollywood anecdotal story was top news doesn’t happen now. Only select stories make the cut. With the Lok Sabha Elections in 2024, we can be sure that 2023 will be less hospitable.

There is no more one media house or platform that is in a dominant position like a Bombay Times or a Mumbai Mirror. Now, news breaks are wider and exciting stories replicate very fast. But there is no one platform that can ensure visibility. You have to share your news wide.

Social media has become the source of authentication as stars use it to correct or clarify any fake news. People avoid writing stories without cross checking, unless it’s a blind without a byline. But from Twitter, the game has shifted to Instagram completely.

Along with gossip, interesting pictures work – gimmicks worked visually. Media rehashes social media celeb posts. And the paparazzi had a field day. You paid more money to the paparazzi than to The Times of India!

The celeb horizon has widened with South actors also becoming familiar names.

Performance in 2022

The year 2022 brought many learnings. Primarily in understanding the mechanics of online PR push. For example, how far the paid stories can weigh in on stories with content that flies. Where do the paparazzi fit in? How much do trade stories add to the positioning? What kind of stories will make the cut versus even good stories that won’t be picked up? Do large interviews work at all?

The content is still the undisputed king. But we need to give stories in smaller formats.

Until mid-last year, films were being made and released to reach out to the platforms directly, but now the platforms insist on a theatrical release before buying it. And that has changed how promotion is viewed by the producer. Just a buzz to reach OTT bosses or now do we engage the consumer?