Firms increase spend on digital advertisements

Savvy brands are taking their social media campaigns to the next level. Though an integral part of the marketing mix of most brands, several corporates are leveraging social media to encourage customer loyalty, create brand impact, provide customer service and, in some cases, even as a quick dipstick to gather customer insights.

As Saurabh Gupta, founder and CEO of Phonethics Mobile Media, a network marketing company, states, trust in a company and a brand is no longer dependant on traditional, mass media channels. Rather, it is more on communities and peers through social media and other digital channels, he adds.

Phonethics helps brands communicate their message through short video clips published online as well as on mobiles.

Noting that a lot has changed in terms of deployment of campaigns from previous years, experts assert that while mobile ads have gained prominence, social ads have become mainstream in the digital media plan, with some even leveraging Vine and Instagram.

Take the case of Godrej. The main protagonists in the company's television advertisements now have their own social pages.

Shireesh Joshi, COO, Strategic Marketing, Godrej Group, emphasised that brands were now looking to participate in a dialogue with the customer, as opposed to the one dimensional marketing of the past.

The company's television advertisement includes a couple, Sam and Meera. Their many brand related stories are now on social network sites. ``As an execution, the campaign leaves behind 360 degree marketing to a level of cross media, one that is seamless,'' Joshi told Business Line.

Another unique initiative by the firm was `Tweet a Tune', a consumer engagement initiative that had the Godrej Group teaming up with professional musicians to create songs inspired by tweets posted by patrons. Each song was then attributed to the Godrej patron, and was marketed across multiple media platforms like radio and social media.

As Phonethics' Gupta told Business Line, ``In a digital world, you can create an atomic range of content pieces. The character may have a FB profile, a Twitter handle and also feature in videos. The conversation can carry on beyond the advertisement.''

Phonethics’ has created animated characters for Cadbury Bournville and Tata Indica that have outlived the campaigns, and taken on lives of their own on social media. Similarly, Phonethics worked with Nissan Europe and digital agency AKQA, to design a campaign to build a social media community around Nissan in India.

The campaign was billed as the `First ever Facebook auditioned Bollywood movie'. Phonethics has also helped DraftFCB Ulka reposition Tata Indica, and helped change the perception of the car from being a cab to a great option for consumers to upgrade in small car segment. The story was told through a comic, a FB app an animated viral film and an interactive game. Though the automobile digital campaign was a bit ahead of its time, as Gupta points out, it was a trend setter that many brands emulated.

Big budgets

Experts maintain that corporates are allocating significant percentages of their marketing budget to digital and social media marketing. Recently, market research firm EY conducted a survey to understand the maturity of the Indian digital scene.

The company found that 90 per cent of the companies surveyed, regularly spend up to 15 per cent of their annual marketing budget exclusively on social media. This is up from 78 per cent in 2013.

Mahindra Holidays, HDFC Bank, Idea Cellular, Tata Global Beverages, Bajaj Finserve, among other brands took part in the EY survey. There was an increase in brands that stated their social media budgets were Rs 10 lakh or less, from 20 per cent in 2013 to 23 per cent of respondents in 2014, the report noted, adding that 14 per cent of brands stated they spent Rs 1–2 crore in 2014, up from 11 per cent in 2013.

The report noted there was a decline in number of participants stating they had a social media marketing budget in excess of Rs 2 crore, `which could mean brands are learning to optimise their spends'.

While television accounts for 44 per cent of the overall marketing spend in India, with Rs 38,598 crore spent on advertising in 2013, the report emphasised that increasing internet penetration is set to increase digital advertisement spend in India.

At the end of 2014, digital marketing spends were expected to have reached Rs 2,750 crore, an increase of 30 per cent from 2013. Indian brands are expected to spend Rs 1,217 crore on social media marketing in 2014, up 74.3 per cent from 2013.

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