“Heavy sports calendar in H2, strong impact properties to buoy festive ad spends”

Industry experts are confident of a sharp recovery in the second half of the year, despite a slight lag in H1 of 2021. The sentiments are buoyed by the upcoming festive season as well as a sports heavy calendar in H2 of 2021.

Speaking to Adgully, Mansi Datta, Chief Client Officer & Head – North & East, Wavemaker India, pointed out, “A look at the macro picture shows 2021 bouncing back, albeit with a slight limp due the COVID-19 second wave. But the bounce-back still has a spring in the step, with most sources projecting Indian economy growth in the range of 9-10%, with Goldman Sachs at 11%, CRISIL at 9.5%, RBI at 9.5% and Moody’s at 9.3%. While the global economy is projected to grow 6% in 2021.

This economic recovery also reflects in the Adex in India, with an expected growth rate of 20% in 2021 vis-a-vis 2020. What boosts this growth is a full H2 sports calendar of Olympics, India bilateral series, remainder IPL matches and the ICC T-20 World Cup.

The degrowth in 2020 over 2019 of 21.5% is expected to be covered up in 2021, but with still a 6% shortfall, according to Datta.

The festive season sees consumer durables, autos getting active and this trend will continue and be even more aggressive for the auto category. Datta added that there is a buoyancy around autos, with a rise in demand for personal mobility solutions and also a lot of launches expected in H2. With the cluster of FMCG, BFSI, Consumer durables, education accounting for 40% share of the spends, is expected to grow at 16% in 2021, compared to 2020. “Auto, E-commerce, Tech/ Telco, real estate, accounting for the next big chunk of approximately 37% will see growth of 30%,” Datta observed.

With a heavy sports calendar in H2 seeing IPL and ICC T20 World Cup happening back-to-back, it’s a dream run for sports enthusiasts and also the broadcasters. The sports genre is likely to capture almost a quarter of the viewership share, she conjectured.

“For most of the advertisers getting active in festive, the decision would be to either choose IPL or the World Cup. For those who want to stay away from sports because of the huge entry barrier also have an option to select a bevy of strong impact properties lined up in the festive season like ‘The Kapil Sharma Show’, ‘KBC’, ‘Bigg Boss’, ‘Big Picture’, etc.,” Datta concluded.