The Hindu Business Line : Surf, sand and Goafest

Plunged in darkness, medieval India wakes up to light ... thanks to this `teeth whitening' chewing gum. As men chew on it, their smiles set the place ablaze with radiance. Catchy `Indian' music, near perfect ambience and teasing suspense. Maybe a tad too long, but the advertisement does work.

With its tongue-in-cheek yet sincere TV commercial for Happy Dent (for client Perfetti Van Melle), McCann Erickson seems to have got the formula right. Bagging the `Grand Prix' in the television category at the Goafest advertising awards, sweeping along quite a few other awards, the efforts put in by Prasoon Joshi and his team didn't go unnoticed.

Can this be taken as a signal of things to come? Is Indian advertising realising that it does pay to be Indian? As Trevor Beattie, who owns the ad agency BMB, London, and one of the international speakers at Goafest, puts it: "The Happy Dent commercial is not pretence. Similarly, the Coca Cola ad (with Aamir Khan in the train) is so Indian ... so charming. Don't dress up your advertising as American. Drop the clichés ... Be true to yourself, your time has arrived."

Yes, the time seems to have arrived for Indian advertising. It's also time for some soul-searching. Because all is not hunky dory in the ad industry.

For days leading up to the Goafest and till the Sunday night when the winners were announced, the awards were the obvious talking point. All ears and eyes were trained on who would win what. One discordant note at this year's awards: There were no Grand Prix awards in the press and radio categories. And although there were several Silver and Bronze winners, there were very few Gold winners. Obviously, the industry needs to put some zing back in its creatives.

Goafest brought to light the fact that the ad world is pretty much divided. The absence of leading ad agency Ogilvy & Mather from the Goa awards was a sore point. But that did not take away from the fact that some sincere attempts were made during the fest to address issues that ail the advertising industry.

Whether Goa, with its pristine beaches (never mind the sweltering heat!) and bottomless beer glasses, is the most perfect setting to discuss serious subjects can be debatable. Maybe one does need a fun break to look forward to at the end of the day. This apart, the advertising conclave and the seminars prior to the awards night did raise and debate some valid points. Goafest 2007 tried to put a mirror in front of the ad industry and have it face the truth.

That the industry will one day touch the Rs 50,000-crore landmark from Rs 15,000 crore today is a "no-brainer" as Sam Balsara, Chairman, Madison Media, said. The way forward is not about mathematical milestones. It's about addressing and overcoming core issues of lack of commitment, accountability and dynamic leadership and talent crunch. One point of agreement is that the advertising industry needs to strive harder to justify its `industry' tag. It needs to start behaving like one!

Said Harish Bijoor, CEO, Harish Bijoor Consults, moderator of some discussions at Goafest, "The advertising industry is not an industry as yet and that is a worry. The morale is low. Working on the margin portions of a business is not exciting anymore."

Advertising has evolved a great deal over the years. Obsession with awards and creating advertisements for the sake of competition seem to be the order of the day. Somewhere down the line, the advertising community seems to have forgotten its fundamental objective. That of selling. As Balsara pointed out: "Advertising has moved on and today it is all about entertaining. Yes, advertising needs to entertain but it has to sell as well. We often forget this basic fact."

And let's not overlook the fact that the consumer still drives the market, caution the advertising experts. Balsara says advertising must be crafted carefully based on consumer insight and behaviour. "Consumer demand is the source of revenue for advertising," said V. Shantakumar, CEO, Saatchi and Saatchi. "15 to 50 (the topic of discussion at the conclave) sounds like a nice tagline. But when will we reach it, how will it happen and to whom is it meaningful? Are we ad film-makers or advisors? These questions must be answered. Advertising must look at content creation rather than media buying. Advertising is the business of creating demand. But we are far too focussed on what we need to say instead of what we need to do. Adding value and moving up the value chain are key."

Prasoon Joshi, creative director, McCann Erickson, says agencies do not merely provide advertisements. He believes they partner the clients in providing solutions to marketing problems.

Fragmentation of the advertising industry into "cottage industries" worries strategist Bijoor. "There is no full service agency today. What we have are niche service agencies - rather than mergers of core competencies, we see different centres of excellence fighting each other."

Meenakshi Madhvani, Managing Partner of Spatial Access Solutions, a media audit firm, is not unduly concerned about fragmentation as she believes ad agencies are still the "custodians of the brand." She says no matter how many splinter agencies there are in the middle, advertising agencies are still the champions of brands, they change behaviour, create opinion. Why then should they settle for less?

Says Madhvani: "Marketers are amazed that ad agencies are willing to work for less. If we don't value ourselves, how can you expect advertisers to value us? We have to see ourselves as agents of change. But we have become commission agents and as commission agents we have no future. Everybody is shying away from the fact that we are in it for the money. Let's not be coy."

Talent crunch and attrition are making matters worse. Said Srinivasan Swamy, President, Advertising Agencies Association of India - the organiser of Goafest (AAAI): "Like in every industry, we also have a dearth of talent which gets compounded by other industries like entertainment, telecom and financial services poaching people from our industry. It has become therefore a challenge to encourage and nurture young talent to join our industry and look at this as a long-term vocation."

Adds Madhvani: "The industry is turning away talent due to its inability to charge advertisers. And there is no leadership of stature too, to inspire. The ad industry needs to be more accountable for it to grow, attract new talent and charge a fair fee."

It is often brushed aside as `below-the-line' and not `mainstream.' But the success of below-the-line (BTL) advertising cannot be denied. It may not be as glamorous as mass media advertising, but it is crying for its share of attention.

Madhvani says if one were to include revenues from BTL advertising, the ad industry would be worth Rs 25,000 crore today (vis-à-vis Rs 15,000 crore from above-the-line advertising). Agencies always tend to forget that BTL contributes significantly too. Ultimately, advertising has to consumer focussed and media-neutral, explains Madhvani.

No matter how gloomy the picture looks, the advertising industry is still a great place to be in for many. It is buoyant and is growing at about 18 per cent per annum, as per AAAI estimates. Said Swamy: "Going forward, Indian economy would see a sustained phase of growth which augurs well for the advertising industry. We expect to grow at a faster pace in the next 3-5 years which will help us to become a Rs 50,000-crore industry in the next five years."

What the industry needs is an evangelist who will take it forward. It requires solutions ... a mandate so that the industry does not talk about these issues at the next Goa panel! And a mandate was indeed put forth - to set up by next year a unified body - Indian Advertising Forum - that will address all issues of the industry as a whole. To borrow the words of Bijoor: "This body will be as process-centric as it is creativity-centric, merge all cottage voices into one ... speak like one and charge like one, be transparent in action and invest in media insight."