Festive Marketing: TV, Print, Radio, OOH look at 35-45% ad spends this year

The Media and Entertainment Industry is now on the road of recovery after facing a trough due to fallout of major regulatory interventions. According to recent KPMG Report, digital access to fuel M&E growth to 13.1 per cent over the next five years.

Media and Entertainment industry is in buoyant mood post the positive market sentiments during Raksha Bandhan. As per KPMG Report, Television is expected to grow at a CAGR of 12.6 per cent on the back of growing TV penetration, strong advertising demand, growth in domestic consumption and major events supported by better distribution realisations due to operationalization of TV digitisation. Radio industry is expected to grow at a 10.2 per cent CAGR over the next five years to FY23 followed by OOH which is The KPMG report pegs the OOH segment’s growth at 9.2 per cent CAGR over the next five years to FY23. 

Television 

Commenting on the positive market sentiment this year, Ashish Sehgal, COO, Zee Unimedia, observed, “With the festive period being long this year, higher boost in sales is expected. The GST impact on the industry has led to an increased transparency in business boosting the local players, especially Retail advertising. Second category to benefit is Consumer Durables, where a GST cut is expected to spur demand in the festive period and also in turn boost the NBFCs who provide consumer loans. Paint category will see growth in volumes with reduction in tax rates. FMCGs, Home & Auto Loan will see an uplift as well. Also, advertisers are expanding their base and going more hyperlocal in the regional space, coupled with growth in the Hindi GEC space.” 

He predicted that the share of broadcast would be around 45 per cent during the festive season this year. 

Commenting on the programming line-up, he further commented, “Influencers connecting with the relevant audience set will be used by advertisers at large. More IPs and AFPs will be the flavour of the season. To brighten the festive period, we have our musical shows across all regions/ genres. With family being at the core, we will be celebrating all festivals, starting with Ganesh Chaturthi, Dussehra and Diwali across most of our fiction shows and culminating it with the award show with our Zee Family – Zee Rishtey or Kutumbh, as the case may be, across genres.” 

Radio 

Reflecting similar views, Vineet Singh Hukmani, MD & CEO, Radio One, too, said that this year looks better than last year as GST issues have been settled. “However, the burst will be short but of high spend. In retail spends, the share of radio has jumped to around 6 per cent, while corporate spends is around 5 per cent,” he added. 

Hukmani further said that the prospects were good because sectors like e-commerce, automobile, finance and real estate treat radio as a primary medium during the festive period. Government spends are also expected to be high due to the upcoming elections in 2019. “We are looking at a large festival property from the Dussehra period in October to New Year, which includes Diwali and Christmas, etc., in between. It will bring out the unifying and lasting celebrations within our upscale audience across various festivals,” he noted. 

Print 

Speaking about print media’s expectations, Sivakumar Sundaram, President - Revenue, BCCL, said, “For us at Times Group, ad revenues have seen a steady growth over the last year. Unlike in the last couple of years, where the overall ad market was impacted due to the policy and regulatory environment, this year, businesses are a lot more positive and expect a robust performance. Festival season is a time where brands have to make a big impact, given the competition and clutter. Only print can provide that instant visibility and impact.” 

Highlighting the positive market sentiments, Krishna Menon, CMO, Sakal, said that the industry is looking forward to making the most of it. According to him, the share of ad spends in print for this festive season is expected to be around 30-35 per cent. 

Sundaram, meanwhile, noted that the print industry is estimated to grow at 5 per cent this year, taking the Print market close to Rs 20,000 crore. “Our ambition is to beat the industry growth number by a strong margin. The share of print advertising as part of the total industry revenue is as high as 35 per cent and in the festive period, print’s salience may move up to 45 per cent. That is simply because TV revenues are heavily FMCG dependent, while print users tend to come from higher involvement categories,” he pointed out. 

Innovations in campaigns 

Menon also noted that businesses are seeking multiple innovations, such as creating sampling opportunities, impact creation, recall creation, etc. He observed that most brands managed around 25 per cent of their annual sales during the festive season. “Brands are looking for prominent spaces to be visible to their customers. They are looking to create some space of their own or customise in order to create maximum impact. Last year was very challenging due to the effects of demonetisation and GST, so that cannot be our benchmark. We are looking at the business of FY 2016-17 and not FY 2017-18. We are looking ahead to achieve a growth over 2016,” Menon added. 

“Innovations overall have seen a huge jump this year. We as a company invest a lot of time and money in ideas and technology with the sole objective of being able to provide our advertisers multiple and optimal options to make an impact and create excitement for the consumer. This year is going to be no different,” said BCCL’s Sundaram. 

He further said, “Unlike last year, we are quite bullish on the festive period this year, especially with impact advertising. The Times Group has always been a pioneer in launching print innovations, and this year is no different. Our Innovation Newspaper has been a huge success. Innovations and solutions to suit the advertisers’ needs and budgets will drive our approach to the festive season. We have multiple teams, IPs and initiatives that help our partners leverage the best of every medium that we have to offer.”  

OOH 

Giving a perspective of the OOH players regarding festive season strategy, Atul Shrivastava, CEO, Laqshya Media, too, mentioned that consumer sentiment is expected to be buoyant after the subdued festive season on account of demonetisation followed by the implementation of the GST last year. According to him, the festive quarter this year looks promising as a lot of consumer driven industries like FMCG, automotive, retail, mobile handsets, etc., would open up their spending. 

Shrivastava further said, “Though Onam, which signals the onset of the festivities, suffered majorly this year because of the havoc created by the floods in Kerala, spends started picking up from the Ganpati festival and will reach its peak during Diwali and last till the New Year. Other than the traditional advertisers, OOH would also see spurt of action from categories like OTT, Mobile Apps, etc., where brands like Netflix, Amazon Prime, ZEE5, etc., are presenting a plethora of content for the consumers and are all at war for eyeballs, along with e-commerce players, who continue to dominate the OOH space with various discounts and offers.” 

He further informed that the festive season contributed the largest chunk to advertising expenditure every year, which happened across media. “OOH, too, gets 40 per cent of their contribution during the OND phase alone. Having said that, our contribution to the overall advertising continues to be around 7-8 per cent as the OOH sector is inventory dependent. Despite the demand, we suffer from media unavailability during the festive season, leading to advertisers diverting their allocated budgets to other media like Digital, Print, TV, etc. There are a lot of technologies and creative content-led innovation executed by brands this year and the festive quarter would witness many more brands experimenting with innovation to break the clutter. Our recent Jeep innovation, where we created India’s largest billboard were on those lines, and we would definitely see many more brands adopting innovative ways to reach their TG.”