OOH campaign for Sprite Xpress

Coca-Cola is using eye catching outdoor creatives for the product communication. This includes innovative 3D graphics on various outdoor structures.

• A sticker on a glass door looks like a Sprite Xpress bottle is breaking through the door
• Another like the bottle is breaking through the building
• Stickers on escalators look like people coming down the escalator are holding bottles of Sprite Xpress
• On truck backs, the 3D graphics make it seem like Sprite bottles are falling off the back of the truck
• On conveyor belts, a 3D sticker seems like a crate of Sprite Xpress is moving on the belt.
• Sprite Xpress Crate handbags make it look like a person is carrying a crate of Sprite Xpress when they hold the handbag.

The tagline for the campaign is: ‘Sprite Xpress Ghumo Ghumao?!’




“The mobility factor of the product is the big idea behind Sprite Xpress. It’s more of a ‘package’ communication, focusing on the new packaging. In the tagline, ‘Ghumo Ghumao’, the word ‘Ghumo’ represents the take it anywhere quality of the product, and ‘Ghumao’ is an attribute of today’s go-getter youth, which symbolises clarity of thought and smartness.”

The Sprite Xpress 350 ml pack will also be made available in Coca-Cola, Diet Coke, Thums Up, Maaza and Kinley Club Soda in the first phase. In the second phase, Fanta, Limca and Minute Maid Pulpy Orange will also be available in this packaging.

Agency : O& M

ASIA BRAND CONGRESS 2008 - SNIPPETS

Earlier, brands followed this relationship pattern: You→Your Brand→Consumer. But ideally, they should follow this: You→Consumer→Their Brand. “Lovemarks are not purchased, they are owned. If you take a brand away from a consumer, he will replace it. If you take a Lovemark away, he will protest.”

Brands that command high respect (performance, trust and reputation) and great love (mystery, sensuality, intimacy) achieve Lovemark status. Even some people such as Mother Teresa or Sachin Tendulkar are Lovemarks. In the brands context, some Indian Lovemarks include Amul, Britannia, Cadbury, Horlicks and Vicks.

“Brooke Bond Red Label tea is a Lovemark that faded away, It is relatively easy to get people to fall in love with you… it’s tougher to get them to stay in love.”

A brand such as Starbucks is an international Lovemark, all because of its approach. Starbucks believes it is in the people business, serving coffee, and not in the coffee business, serving people.

This is a complete antonym to the 360 degree communication jargon. “That is all bullshit,”. “360 is all about surrounding people and attacking them from all sides… let’s not forget that we are in the attraction economy and not just the attention economy any more.”

Further, things are moving away from return on investment to return on involvement, from product performance to total experience. Marketers are to generate emotion, rather than get people to listen to reason because “emotions lead to actions, while reasoning only leads to a conclusion”.

“If your spouse tells you that he loves you a million times in a day, chances are that at some point, you will get irritated. Advertising is becoming like that. Let’s not forget, love is about doing, not saying.”

“In order to connect with the mindsets of people around the world, you must learn what their aspirations are, what their psyche is, what their outlook is. You must know about their lifestyle so that you can connect with them on the same wavelength,”

India post and the new logo

Creative agency: O & M
Management consultant McKinsey is behind the restructuring of the Department of Posts.

The new logo is designed in red and yellow. At first glance, it appears to be an envelope. A closer look reveals the bold strokes which give the impression of a flying bird. Though there has been a departure from the straight lines in the earlier logo, a certain element of continuity can be seen. The wings, which act as the anchoring element, have been retained, but the treatment is different.

Red has been chosen for its traditional association with the postal service. The colour also embodies passion, power and commitment. Yellow communicates hope, joy and happiness. India Post embraces a change to present itself as a vibrant and dynamic organisation with a modern approach.
“Hopes, dreams and aspirations are the basis of this logo. When they soar, anything can be achieved. That’s why the wings have been added to the new logo of India Post.

The line, ‘Giving Wings to Your Dreams’, summarises the philosophy of India Post.
The modernisation of post offices is a part of Project Arrow.

Bindass hangs a cab in the sky

Bindass, the youth entertainment channel from UTV, has launched a game show on wheels, Airtel Bindass Cash Cab, which went on air on September 15 at 7.30 pm. To promote the show, the channel actually put up a cab on a hoarding in Mumbai's prime advertising location, Mahim Causeway.

To win the money, the passenger must give the right answers to the questions asked by the ‘Cash Cab Haryanvi Jat driver-cum-anchor’, Munish 'Munna' Makhija.

The questions get progressively challenging and the cash increases apace. Incorrect answers get a strike and three such strikes get the passenger out of the cab, irrespective of the distance remaining to his destination.The passenger also gets two lifelines to help him when he doesn’t know the answer to a particular question. He can either call a friend or stop the cab and pose the question to someone on the road. Currently, the cab is running in Mumbai and Delhi, but will be taken to Kolkata and Bengaluru soon. The international format of the show has won an Emmy award.

OOH Media offers Flexicast to advertisers

What - Flexicasting as “the ability or flexibility to telecast brand communication on Out Of Home Media’s LCD and plasma screens as per the advertisers’ choice of city, location, target audience, frequency of exposures, creative and language”.

Why - “The need for a tool like Flexicast was felt due to heavy media fragmentation, less time spent on traditional media, and more opportunities and time spent out of home,”

Advantages - Flexicast are that it maximises exposure and media value to the advertiser’s target group, minimises media spillage, adds frequency to a TV campaign, adds audiovisual to a print campaign and the visual element to a radio campaign, and adds dynamism to an outdoor campaign.

“In a nutshell, Flexicast will make OOH TV media planning simple and maximise advertisers’ returns on investment.”

How does Flexicasting work?

OOH Media has a huge network from which the advertiser can slice and dice his communication according to his choice.

With Flexicast, advertisers can also practise proximity or vicinity marketing, where a client can advertise his brand or service in the area of his location for a multiplier effect.

Web 2 and why?

Tim O'Reilly, who is credited with coining the term way back in 2004 says: "Web 2.0 is the business revolution in the computer industry caused by the move to the Internet as platform".

Examples. Sites like eBay, Wikipedia and Google Adsense derive their effectiveness from the inter-human connections.

Bart Decrem, founder of Flock, calls Web 2.0 the "participatory Web".

The technologies encompassed by Web 2.0 include blogs, tags, RSS, social bookmarking and wikis. With Web 2.0 type-sites, it is possible to combine data from various sources, even sources that you don't own control or even exist, and turn that into data that people can use.

Web 2.0 is not just about technology. It's really about the users, the people.

Corporate Benefits:

Web 2.0 lets you share and incorporate multiple voices— your customers, your service reps, your employees—who quickly take the product, service, or idea in a direction that you could not alone.

Web 2.0 can help build your brands, reach out to the users, engage them with your brand, and help establish loyalty.

EXAMPLE - Infogain, says: "We expect to leverage the power of collaboration by getting innovative ideas from individuals, who are free to send theirtechnology/business ideas to the our CTO office directly."

Risks - Data privacy, application security, information integrity and information silos. There is a chance that inaccurate, or occasionally even offensive, information may get out.

How viable would it be to make the newspaper free in India?

Hormusji N Cama, director, Bombay Samachar,

In that scenario, the costs of a newspaper would have to be covered by the advertiser. He said that newspapers will have to ask themselves what they are selling – an advertorial or news. “A free newspaper is nothing more than an advertorial,” he said.

Sunil Mutreja, president, Amar Ujala,

For any business house to come up with a free newspaper, it had to start with free newsprint. “Will anybody give me that?” However, he added that free newspapers could work if they were also niche targeted. For example, there could be a paper catering to the youth and backed by advertisers from youth brands, which could be distributed free at places such as McDonald's, Barista and Cafe Coffee Day.

Mutreja raised the issue of advertisers’ perceptions of a free newspaper. “Advertisers felt that a Re 1 daily would be read only by rickshawalas. Just imagine what the perception of a free newspaper would be!”

Rajiv Jaitley, president, marketing and ad sales, Dainik Bhaskar -

Stressed that there are no free lunches. The real question, he said, was whether the free newspaper would be going to the right segment and whether the advertiser would be getting the right value. “If you are going mass, it will be just wasted.”

Paulomi Dhawan, vice-president, media and corporate communication, Raymonds - dispelled the myth that a free newspaper is funded by the advertiser and said, “The advertiser is not paying for the editorial. The advertiser is paying for the value he gets. He is paying for segmentation and the response he gets.”

HOW WAS IT DONE IN SINGAPORE?

PN Balji, editorial director of MediaCorp, which runs the free daily, Today, in Singapore, disagreed with Dhawan. The eight year old Today, which has a print run of 300,000 copies, has been making a profit for the last four years.

Balji gave five reasons for the success of Today’s business model.

The first, was that it was competing with The Straits Times, which had been in existence for more than 160 years and which controlled the entire vendor market.

The second reason, he said, was to provide quality content that “had the look and feel of paid content”.

The third reason, he said, was to put up a double agent model at the top level. “A person who is the editor should be the publisher/chief executive officer as well, so that one knows where to draw the line in the marketing and editorial pull.”

The fourth reason, he said, was “while other newspapers gave the ‘what’ of news, Today decided to give the ‘why’ of news”.

The fifth reason, he said, was the distribution, which went beyond the underground train system. “We decided to go to universities, offices and homes.” Today created its own distribution network.

Asked how they prevented people from taking copies in bulk -

They had their own men giving away copies at strategic points. These men worked on a salary basis, rather than on a commission basis.

Summary : “paid model going free would not work. Business houses would have to find niches.”

An Idea

Advertisementindia.com - Through this portal, one can book ads in Indian dailies from anywhere in the world.

A unique web portal tries to bridge this geographical distance through a virtual gateway, offering a dedicated platform to those seeking to book their ads in Indian national and regional dailies from anywhere in the world.

Advertisementindia.com has collaboration with almost all the leading Indian dailies and vernacular newspapers to offer customised advertisement solutions to people across the continents.

"Our portal books all kinds of ads viz matrimonial, display, appointment, tenders/notices, financial etc and offers all options to pay over Internet, including credit/debit cards, net banking, PayPal and offline payment modes for booking ads online in regional and national newspapers," Agarwal added. It takes about five days for the ad to get published in the selected newspaper(s) after the payment is received by the company in Lucknow.

The portal also has the option for the user to create his ad on the website after the client has registered himself with the portal, he informed.

Whether there is still an audience for newspapers?? .

“As per Madison’s study last year, print improved its ad revenue share by 0.4 per cent, whereas television lost by more than 1.4 per cent”.

With more brands coming in, the advertiser can reach his target audience by going with two papers, say, DNA and Mid-Day (In Mumbai), at half the cost. The literacy wave had just begun and, in rural areas, newspapers are a good medium for advertisers “to look beyond wall paintings”.

Also raised the point that while in the 1970s, a litre of petrol cost Rs 1.30, a newspaper cost Rs 1.50. While the prices of petrol have gone up beyond Rs 45, the cost of the newspaper has remained static. The consumers were not ready to pay more, & newspapers had to depend on advertising to survive.

“No newspaper today will pull a story on a corporate as it runs on corporate advertising.... The core value of the newspaper is not to carry an ad. We need not lament the death of the newspaper. Instead, we need to lament the death of the ethics of a newspaper,”

Taking strong objection - The newspaper houses were themselves to be blamed for the situation, and not the readers or the advertisers. “For a long time, all had an unwritten rule to have 50-50 revenue from circulation and advertising. It’s newspapers who decided to price the paper at Rs 2 – the advertiser has not told you to change the equation. As for ad pricing, it has to be based on the value the advertiser gets and not on the basis of printing costs.”

Rajdeep Sardesai, editor, CNN-IBN, and Vinay Chhajlani, CEO, NaiDunia, agreed with Tejpal that at times, they had to work in tandem with the marketing team. Chhajlani even revealed that often, he received calls from the marketing team to stop a story or else he would lose an advertiser.

At the same time, quoting figures from the Indian Readership Survey (IRS), readership had dropped by 20 per cent and “the biggest fall seems to be in the 15-34 years’ age group. The group has lost more than two crore readers.”

Taking strong exception to the IRS figures - “Is the survey being done in the smaller towns? How are these surveys quantifying readership in these towns? Are the marketers looking at these towns?”

“Your first entry into literacy is not the e-paper. It is the written word. So, the newspaper is not dead as yet. It’s just the beginning,”
.

Class divide in BRANDS too in India?

Karisma Kapur’s story from low-grade flicks to big time tells us that a ‘mass’ brand can go ‘class’ if the right changes are made to all the elements of the mix. Viewers – who are celebrity consumers – are willing to make the change. Can it happen in the product or service brand world?

The Deccan saga shows clearly that it is critical for a product to be continuously upgraded and delivered to consumers if one wants to sustain it, even at the lower end of the pyramid. The market is ruthless – there are no sympathy purchases available.

But one question, albeit academic, is worth pondering: Could branding have saved Deccan? Given that Deccan as a brand has high awareness and created enough emotional equity, could rejigging of the price-value equation have helped its business viability? Could the brand equity built by Deccan have broken the shackles of its discount imagery and been used to provide an alternative to the mass class airline travellers in the Indian market? These are questions worth pondering.

The Karisma Kapur example shows that brands can be moved up, if managed well. However, the history of Indian branding in the product space reveals that what happens with people brands is not true about product brands. Products have successfully managed to move from class to mass. Yet, there are few examples of product brands that began by playing the ‘mass discount’ (or price warrior) game and later managed to climb up and become ‘premium and aspirational’.

Let’s look across product categories.
While brands have managed to upgrade their image and evolve together with their consumers – Lifebuoy is a great example, having moved from a carbolic, sweaty association to a desirable health imagery.

Brands in consumer durables have acted similarly. The discount segment has been often left to local and regional players who offer basic price driven products that give the lower income segment ‘category’ status rather than ‘brand’ status. LG and Samsung, two late entrants in the market, used pretty much the P&G principle – came in at the top and then expanded their footprint by offering lower priced products or by dropping prices to become more accessible.

Titan, which falls somewhere between FMCG and durables, has always been premium in imagery to the mass market. To keep its integrity intact, it has tapped into the lower income segment by introducing a new brand, Sonata.

So, what does this say about branding in India...

– Brands have historically addressed the middle class market because that is the group which has the spending power and yet offers great volumes.

– New entrants into categories have come in from the top, offering strong value propositions, and then extended into the middle market.

– While there have been cases of brands upgrading their image, a shift from the bottom to the top has not happened.

...and about Indian consumers?

– There is a strong price-quality equation in the consumer’s mind. Higher price means high quality and if the product delivers, brands can create desirability – and then extend down. Consumers buy into the brand values even if the product is not as good. The bottom market is always handled separately.

– In categories that drive status through label value, consumers like to leave behind their past as they move up. And the middle-lower class divide is quite well defined. Even FMCG marketers have subliminally recognised this. There is an unconscious yet clear caste divide in brand purchases and associations, too!

Branding in services, especially airlines, is distinct from the product branding of the 20th century. In the manufacturing world, brands are product plus advertising. In the service world, it’s the sum of product, advertising and experience.
India is a class-conscious society. And interestingly, this is acceptable to the classes. Observe the reaction of a middle class Indian tourist in London or Paris, if his tourist bus driver were to come and sit with him at his table: He would become uncomfortable. Yet, ask your driver in India to come and share a table with you in a restaurant and he would be reluctant.

Till then, the verdict remains that in a class-conscious India, there is a caste divide in brands too and upgrading has its limits. We remain a brand unequal society. Sounds hard, but seems true.

Cultural movement as a tool...

What - These are strategies designed for clients, where, instead of developing a brand idea and then communication and then taking it outside to the consumer, you first identify or look outside for a big social change and use that to develop an idea.

These are strategies designed for clients, where, instead of developing a brand idea and then communication and then taking it outside to the consumer, you first identify or look outside for a big social change and use that to develop an idea.

Example : Brand Toyota’s Scion cars, which targeted Generation Y. They asked Scion owners to play with the basic Scion logo and create their own logos to represent their lifestyles. The Scion owners could get a sticker of the logo they had created, or paint it onto their cars.

How to do cultural movements – by aligning with a powerful idea on the rise to define a culture, then by creating actions/ events/ communication to draw people into the idea. “Now this idea already exists, historically advertising has fabricated something. This is something that is true, it is something people already believe in. It is something that is already out there in the world, we are not creating it. It is an authentic experience.” You then use mass media to amplify this and also activate it through word of mouth, brand PR and content placement.

Convergance - Bane for the media professionals ??

Telecom companies in India will soon start buying over media companies. Convergence is a reality. Two things that are important in the media business to get the audience that ‘matters’ are brand and content. The line between telecom and media companies will blur and the former, with their soaring valuations, will try and buy into and buy over media and content companies.
We live in a digital convergence age and India is fast catching up with the world in digital social availability. Telecom Regulatory Authority of India (TRAI) has proposed a hike in the foreign investment limit for cable networks from 49 per cent to 74 per cent. The TRAI estimates that Rs15,000 crore will be needed to upgrade cable networks to a basic digital format and an investment up to Rs64,000 crore would be needed to shift to the high-tech platform prevalent in developed countries.
The stage is set for major players to roll out triple play carpet.
As increasing bandwidth allows richer technology outlays, more and more content will find its way over the ubiquitous copper line into the smart phone, handheld or portable Internet device. But with wires horribly crossed, the auction of the 3G spectrum and the future of mobile telephony hang in the balance.

All this is fine but here are some implications for our media, entertainment and telecom industry in India:
• English and Indian language newspapers in the next 10 years will grow tremendously. The Indian language ones will grow faster. The twin reasons are increase in literacy and rise in affluence levels.
• Free newspapers will be launched next year and become a dominant player in the next five years.
• Media rates or advertisement yields will go up, as they are almost one-third of what they are in the world. Yes, the larger players will benefit.
• Indian media organisations will become multi-media and survive.
• There will be mergers and consolidation, and players who embrace and infuse capital and international best practices will survive.
• The professionals in this sector will cross from content platforms to digital distribution platforms.
• The industry will move away from dependence on advertising revenues to subscription fee-based revenues.
• Newer entrants such as Moser Baer, which is neither a media nor a telecom company, will emerge as large players in the domain of content and entertainment.
Telecom companies in India are likely to become bigger than media companies and then the following maxim for media companies would be true: “I started at the top and worked my way down”. I hope and pray for my media baron friends.

COURTESY: Anurag Batra , co-founder and editor- in-chief of the exchange4media group.

The art of tailor-made in-store commercials

Future Advertisement

What - “Just as radio jingles cannot be adapted to TV, TV ads also cannot be adapted to in-store TV. There is a need to create spots specifically for in-store TV for better effectiveness.”

How - You have to build interactivity; the more the interaction, the more the conversion. You have to create ideas which attract attention.” He added, “You have to understand the sensitivities of the medium and what it can and cannot do.”

Why - “It is a marketer’s delight since it is closest to the moment of truth,”

Challenges - It is an audio-less medium and can arrest the attention of passers by for only a short span.
“It is more consumer entrapment or consumer enticement because the consumer is already in the store and ready to make a purchase. So, no lengthy commercials.”

Examples –

Using multiple screens put up alongside an escalator where the same loop was played at different timings across the screens so that it looked as if Stallone was running up the escalator in the movie.

Mobile dealer in Canada, Fido, which put up digital billboards that interacted with each other across the street. To celebrate the holiday season and promote wireless video calling on Fido’s 3G High Speed Experience, the billboards featured a man and a woman each projected onto separate buildings or side by side on a single building. The two interact, throwing snowballs and making faces at each other.

How to adapt existing campaigns for in-store TV.

Plan A to turn an ad into retail branding is to cut out all the conventional elements of an ad like the opening, plot, product window, pack reveal, comeback and parent company logo. Instead use iconic messages, use arresting images, forget sound and dialogues as the only language in-store is ‘noise’, keep to a minimum length for the ad and make the brand visible early on, but again, sublime branding, because if there’s a big logo, people will know it’s an ad and they’ll walk away.”

Plan B was to “create a poster that moves”. If one has an interesting print campaign, they have the option of bringing it to life. One can create a moving poster as opposed to TV communication being adapted. Example - Cox & Kings print campaign created by Saatchi & Saatchi, where parts of the ad were zoomed into, nuances were brought out and a moving poster effect was created.

Good activation is “content in context”.

Advertising 1.0 was a one way push, ‘I talk you listen’, while Advertising 2.0 was the element of interaction, the digital revolution. But Advertising 3.0 enables consumers to play a role in the creation of content. “Interaction is about giving people the cues to find and engage with your brand with the tools they prefer to use.”

Example - Sony Bravia’s Color Tokyo Live Color Wall project, in which a live cam was set up to display the Sony building in Tokyo and Internet users could pick up colour from live feeds and commercials on screen using the dropper cursor and drop it on the building. The whole building would turn into the colour chosen by the user and this could be enjoyed live via the live cam.

SUMMARY

POP or point of purchase advertising is very important. This is the point wherein the consumer is nearest to the point of making a purchase decision and therefore, if the brand is present in the retail atmosphere and communicates to the consumer, it influences his/her decision making process. For e.g. in case of a new product launch, huge display banners inside a retail store helps people in noticing this new product and may generate inquiries.

Goafest – titbits and the ideas....

Consumers in the country, is classified broadly into three segments: the pay more, get more segment; the worth the price (‘paisa vasool’) segment; and the pay less get less segment. The third segment, is seen only in India. “These people are aware that if they pay less, they will get less. But still they tap into the section,”

Negatives: The markets are much more ruthless as they follow a fast cycle where brands die out as soon as they erupt. Strategic partners have now taken on the role of the agency as a consulting firm. A good one, is that the creative agency is the true CEO.

Among all that hasn’t changed, the investment that is put into training was topmost on the list. Salaries are still low; research is still the enemy of the creative idea and talk about rural India is still heard. The solution, is to bring together all the operations that are involved in the fields of marketing and agencies. The macro differentiations created within the region of marketing or agencies has resulted in low focus and thus loss of monies.

Tip: For the agency, being true to the brand and not the client will mark a big leap in building brand value. Being an active partner in addressing brand issues is equally important, he said. Finally and most importantly, he said, “Be accountable even if you are not responsible.”

Mudra : integrating media and creative...plus or minus?

By integrating creativity and media, Mudra Mumbai has made itself into a full service agency. In fact, through this move, Mudra is trying to push the thought behind its strategy, that in a fragmented media environment, brands will be better served if creative strategy and media thinking come together early in the campaign development process.

In other words, the idea is to strengthen both the strategic thinking and the creative product by giving media experts their rightful place at the brand strategy table.

Benefit of the knowledge of how our audiences are consuming media when we're developing communication for our brands

Why some say its negative:

Media anyway is a technical subject and no compromise can be made in this zone, or for that matter, any other area.

The way we work today, it is best to work with multiple specialist units. However, Mudra Mumbai's initiative will be beneficial for many clients with limited or small budgets."

PwC-Ficci report says the industry may top Rs1.16 lakh cr in four years

Entertainment industry may double by 2012

Nirmal John. Mumbai

It could well be a case of ‘happily ever after’ for the country’s media and entertainment industry.
With the industry expected to grow at a cumulative annual growth rate (CAGR) of around 18% over the next five years, it is expected to more than double from an estimated size of Rs 51,260 crore last year, to Rs 1.16 lakh crore by 2012.
Further to showing steady growth, the industry also seems to be reaching a stage of maturity according to the report released by Ficci and PricewaterhouseCoopers (PwC) at the annual media convention Ficci-Frames.
While most sectors are showing buoyancy, newer ones like online advertising stand out with a growth of 69% in the past year. Such growth is expected to continue for the next few years and the size of the industry is expected to reach Rs 1,100 crore by 2012, up from its current levels of Rs 270 crore. Like in other media, an opportunity could arise when vernacular content increases on the internet. This could then reach out to all sections of society with the help of both mobile phones which experts say would be the carrier for internet in India more than computers.
For the movie industry, most of the positives came from the growth in additional revenue streams such as home video and merchandising. This is helping to de-risk the movie business, which further aid in attracting new investors in films.
Timmy S Khandhari, executive director, PwC said, “The entry of players like Moser Baer has changed the entire way of looking at the business for most of the production houses.” This coupled with the reduction in distribution costs as a result of digital screens, could help the industry grow at a CAGR of 13% to reach Rs 17,500 crore by 2012.
The big daddy of entertainment in India still remains the television. This segment is expected to touch Rs 60,000 crore by 2012, which would constitute more than half of the total media and entertainment business in the country. The plugging of loop holes in distribution should help the industry clear one of its major hurdles. The TV industry is expected to grow at 22% (CAGR), a massive figure considering the large base of Rs 22,590 crore in 2007.
India is one of the few countries in the world where print media has been growing. This is especially evident in magazines, where a plethora of international names have debuted. Many newspapers have also been launching several new editions. As literacy rates increase, the demand for print will also go north particularly in the vernacular. To make their offering more accessible, the online and mobile space is also being targeted by most established print publishers.
On the radio scene, PwC’s Khandhari said, “The face of FM Radio changed last year with phase II of FM licenses being handed out.” An additional 560 licences will be soon handed out, thus taking the total number of Private FM stations to over 800. Complaints about the similarity of content should be addressed once current affairs and news is made available on radio. Riding on the back of such initiatives, the industry should triple in size by 2012 to Rs 1,800 crore.
Other media and entertainment businesses like animation and gaming and OOH is expected to add to the growth of the sector. Music has not caught up with the heady growth rates in other sectors, as has been witnessed globally, particularly due to the rampant piracy.
One big story is the emergence of sports, more specifically cricket, as an entertainment option in India. With cricket leagues like Indian Premier League (IPL) and Indian Cricket League (ICL) hogging the limelight, more is to be expected from sports in the next few years.
Apart from different sectors, an interesting development is the creation of media conglomerates, led especially by television companies. Apart from established players like Star and Zee, newer channels like NDTV, UTV and Network 18 are developing offerings in different media in a bid to leverage synergies.

MOBILE 'N' INVERTISING

Excerpts from an interview with Rajesh Jain, the man who almost single handedly brought on the dotcom boom to India after selling off his Internet venture, IndiaWorld.com, to Satyam for Rs 499 crore in 1999.

Two aspects to the Internet – the PC and the mobile.

PC-based access is very much around the 'reference web'. The mobile has the opportunity to be the primary mode of access and interaction for the 'incremental web' and can be used to find directions.

The challenge is to figure out innovative services for the mobile and go beyond the current value added services.

There are life's empty moments and life's ‘know now’ moments. When you are waiting for someone, for example, you are in an empty moment and you can use your mobile to check stock quotes or text someone. In the ‘know now’ moments, you want to know something immediately instead of going and searching on the web.

On the mobile, there are multiple points of interaction such as SMS or an application. On the PC, it is ultimately the browser. On the mobile, information is push based, while on the Internet, it is pull based. So, I can subscribe to content on the mobile. Just like on the Internet, the search box has become the starting point for user interaction and monetisation of the web, my belief is that on the mobile phone, it’s going to be the SMS subscription with a brand of your choice.
So, if there’s a special on the mall in the neighbourhood, you want to know. It's called 'INVERTISING' – ADVERTISING THAT CONSUMERS INVITE INTO THEIR LIVES.

If you look at the macro picture, a vast majority of the people with the ability to spend have a mobile phone. The advertising and marketing industry is not yet recognising this fact. Now, they have to think of building user engagement.

The essence is that each one of us has a desire to create multiple relationships with the kirana store or the book shop in our locality. There are a lot of things in life where it’s more convenient to get things instead of going and looking for them. So, little bits of information are there, which companies need to integrate together. That's where invertising comes in.

Four new media which are coming up at the same time – OOH, FM, Internet and mobile. The mobile, because of its interactive nature, has the greatest potential.

There are five types of campaigns: The first is top of mind recall, which is the reinforcement of an existing campaign.

The second type of advertising is interactive: to drive a response.

The third type of campaign is voting,

The fourth type is where something can be downloaded. So, the ad can have a link which leads to a page or an application.

The fifth is where there can be serial or storyboard ads. We can have a sequential campaign, where there is a set of messages.

For urban India, it's mostly lifestyle and convenience services. For rural India, we have to look at services which bridge the information gap, which are more utility oriented and help in increasing income, and which are livelihood enhancing. For this, we could look at voice services, for one.

The few areas which have great potential going ahead are re-thinking education in India, not just by building another good school, but by using the digital infrastructure and giving mass education to 200 million people in India. That's the greatest contribution technology can make.

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