Amitabh Pande, chief consumer planning, strategy and digital officer at Diageo India talks to Storyboard18 about the future of India's creative industry and his message to Storyboard YoungGuns and YoungGuns all around the world. 

Pande shares that he is bullish on India's creative industry and that India as a country has always been super creative. He shares his thoughts on how various impactful moments are leading to the country"s creative talent and industry flourishing. From winning at the Oscars, to Bollywood bouncing back, South-Indian cinema, OTT platforms, India is going through a great creative revolution. 

Watch here. 

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India is going through a phase of creative confidence: Diageo's Amitabh Pande

Amitabh Pande, chief consumer planning, strategy and digital officer at Diageo India shares his bullish views on India's creative industry, Storyboard18's YoungGuns, YoungGuns all around the globe and more.

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The Podcast Pulse, a comprehensive report on podcast consumption in India developed by UNPAC Research (OPC) Pvt. Ltd. with the support of Ideabrew Studios, offers unprecedented insights into the evolving landscape of podcasting in India.

Despite the gradual adoption of podcasts into daily media consumption routines, a lack of comprehensive data on consumption patterns has hindered its recognition as a powerful platform for connecting with consumers.

India has surged to become the third-largest market for podcast listeners globally, yet only 12 percent of Indians are currently engaged, leaving a vast untapped audience waiting to be explored. The Podcast Pulse addresses this gap by offering actionable insights into consumer preferences, content choices, favored hosts, and preferred platforms.

The methodology behind The Podcast Pulse involved a meticulous blend of quantitative and qualitative research techniques. Engaging 2,170 individuals across 10 cities in India, including Mumbai, Delhi, Chennai, Bengaluru, Kolkata, Ahmedabad, Lucknow, Indore, Patna, and Jaipur, the report gauged awareness and listenership statistics. Additionally, detailed interviews with 1,800 active listeners provided invaluable insights into their behavior and preferences.

Key findings from the report include:

•       82 percent of respondents were initially unaware of podcasts, highlighting a significant opportunity for awareness-building efforts.

•       78 percent of consumers discovered podcasts less than a year ago, indicating a recent surge in interest.

•       Authenticity and vulnerability in podcast conversations are highly valued by listeners, fostering a deeper connection with hosts and content.

The report also explores consumption patterns, including weekday vs. weekend trends, preferred episode lengths, and the rise of regional language content. Regional podcasts are identified as a driving force in shaping the industry's future, offering audiences a more relatable and culturally resonant listening experience.

Furthermore, The Podcast Pulse profiles the Aware listener – detailing gender, occupation, age, and level of education – and conducts a deep dive into genre dynamics and explores the nuances between audio and video podcasts.  It charts the four stages of podcast enthusiasts’ journey, from their curious Exploration and Discovery phase to Advocacy as they actively promote and champion their favorite podcasts.

Sheetal Choksi, Director, UNPAC Research says, "We believe The Podcast Pulse is a game-changer, providing insights into India’s podcast consumption and offering a roadmap for creators and platforms to navigate the evolving preferences of Indian audiences, empowering industry professionals and stakeholders to unlock its full potential. As a podcaster myself, I experienced firsthand the challenges in accessing comprehensive data about our audience. Beyond some basic data, no one was able to answer questions like who was listening to podcasts, when, why certain genres did well, etc. This realization was the genesis of The Podcast Pulse – an earnest attempt to fill the void and provide actionable insights for the entire industry."

Aditya Kuber, CEO, Ideabrew Studios says, “At Ideabrew Studios, we are passionate about fostering innovation in audio storytelling. The Podcast Pulse not only showcases the immense potential of podcasts in India but also underscores the importance of diverse and authentic narratives in shaping the future of audio entertainment. This report will be a definitive look into podcast consumption data for advertising agencies, brands and everyone looking to meaningfully engage with a large audience.”



India third-largest market for podcast listeners globally; yet only 12 percent Indians currently engaged

GOZOOP HAWK, and online reputation management and customer support agency under the GOZOOP Group, has bagged the listening and digital response management duties for Amazon miniTV, a leading free entertainment service in India.


As part of the mandate, GOZOOP HAWK’s key responsibilities will include handling digital customer support, monitoring online brand chatter, amplifying positive stories, measuring sentiments, providing timely resolutions and deriving actionable business insights for the brand by understanding and tracking valuable web conversations to delight customers. 


Amazon miniTV offers a large library of popular web series, movies, reality shows, dubbed international content, in multiple genres like comedy, romance, slice of life, thriller and more.


Commenting on the partnership Aruna Daryanani, director and business head, Amazon miniTV said, “ORM is an important component of brand building and reputation management. With the right strategy, ideation and creative thinking we can further strengthen our brand presence. We are excited to partner with GOZOOP HAWK and look forward to their expertise to continue to raise the bar on customer experience.”


Commenting on the win, Premkumar Iyer, president, GOZOOP HAWK said, “HAWK has always demonstrated capability of delivering some of the most unconventional listening and online customer support solutions. This habit to push boundaries coupled with Amazon miniTV's disruptive approach towards the dynamic OTT space makes the relationship click. We have already done some stellar work e.g. during Amazon miniTV’s recent launch of dubbed K-dramas, we turned the whole response management strategy to Korean language generating shift in outreach. We look forward to doing more such unconventional work for them in times to come.”


GOZOOP HAWK bags listening and digital customer support mandate for Amazon miniTV

The marketing team within media giant Cox Media Group (CMG) claims it has the capability to listen to ambient conversations of consumers through embedded microphones in smartphones, smart TVs, and other devices to gather data and use it to target ads, according to a review of CMG marketing materials by 404 Media and details from a pitch given to an outside marketing professional. Called “Active Listening,” CMG claims the capability can identify potential customers “based on casual conversations in real time.”

The news signals that what a huge swath of the public has believed for years—that smartphones are listening to people in order to deliver ads—may finally be a reality in certain situations. Until now, there was no evidence that such a capability actually existed, but its myth permeated due to how sophisticated other ad tracking methods have become.

It is not immediately clear if the capability CMG is advertising and claims works is being used on devices in the market today, but the company notes it is “a marketing technique fit for the future. Available today.” 404 Media also found a representative of the company on LinkedIn explicitly asking interested parties to contact them about the product. One marketing professional pitched by CMG on the tech said a CMG representative explained the prices of the service to them.

“What would it mean for your business if you could target potential clients who are actively discussing their need for your services in their day-to-day conversations? No, it's not a Black Mirror episode—it's Voice Data, and CMG has the capabilities to use it to your business advantage,” CMG’s website reads.

The part of CMG advertising the capability is CMG Local Solutions. CMG itself is owned by Apollo Global Management and Cox Enterprises, which includes the ISP Cox Communications. CMG operates a wide array of local news television and radio stations.

With Active Listening, CMG claims to be able to “target your advertising to the EXACT people you are looking for.” The goal is to target potential clients or customers based on what they say in “their day to day conversations,” the website adds. Specifically, those could include:

Clients can “claim” a territory where they want to use CMG’s services, which are available in a 10 or 20 mile radius, the website says. After setup, “Active Listening begins and is analyzed via AI to detect pertinent conversations via smartphones, smart tvs and other devices,” the website adds. CMG also claims it installs a tracking pixel on its client’s website to monitor the return on investment (ROI).

With an audience created, CMG then delivers adverts to these people through streaming TV, streaming audio, display ads, YouTube, and Google and Bing search, the website says.

“The result? Unprecedented understanding of consumer behavior, so we can deliver personalized ads that make your target audience think: wow, they must be a mind reader,” another section of CMG’s website reads.

Claims about this capability raises obvious and immediate legal concerns; intercepting communications without proper consent can violate wiretapping laws. CMG’s website addresses this with a section that starts “We know what you are thinking…”

“Is this legal? YES- it is totally legal for phones and devices to listen to you. That's because consumers usually give consent when accepting terms and conditions of software updates or app downloads,” the website says.

Beyond CMG’s website, very little information is available about the capability, including how exactly the data is gathered, be that via a software development kit (SDK) bundled into apps, or via collection at another point. For its part, Apple does alert iPhone users when an app is accessing the device’s microphone with a small icon in the UI.

The marketing professional pitched by CMG told 404 Media that after a call with the company, they disabled microphone access on much of their own technology: “I immediately removed all my Amazon Echo devices and locked down microphone permissions on things like my phone as receiving confirmation they are doing things like this have confirmed my worst fears and I, for one, will not take part in it,” they said.

CMG says “the ROI is already impressive” and is actively soliciting potential customers, though. On LinkedIn, Chris Marxmiller, a senior sales consultant at CMG, invites people in his bio to “Ask me about our NEW product - ACTIVE LISTENING.” Marxmiller did not respond to a request for comment which asked for more information on the Active Listening product.

CMG lists a number of other companies as its partners and publishers. These include Amazon, Microsoft, and Google. Microsoft declined to comment. Google told 404 Media in a statement that “For years, Android has prevented apps from collecting audio  when they're not being actively used, and whenever an app activates a device’s microphone, there is a prominent icon displayed in the status bar.” Google did not answer 404 Media’s question in its statement.

Amazon said in a statement that “the advertising product being described would not be possible with Echo devices. We do not share voice recordings with third parties.”

CMG said in a statement that “CMG Local Solutions markets a wide range of advertising tools. Like other advertising companies, some of those tools include third-party vendor products powered by data sets sourced from users by various social media and other applications then packaged and resold to data servicers. Advertising data based on voice and other data is collected by these platforms and devices under the terms and conditions provided by those apps and accepted by their users, and can then be sold to third-party companies and converted into anonymized information for advertisers. This anonymized data then is resold by numerous advertising companies.”

“CMG businesses do not listen to any conversations or have access to anything beyond a third-party aggregated, anonymized and fully encrypted data set that can be used for ad placement. We regret any confusion and we are committed to ensuring our marketing is clear and transparent,” the statement added.

Cox Media Group claims to have capability to listen to ambient conversations of consumers for targeted ads

On June 1, 1945, Fritz Sennheiser, a German inventor and entrepreneur, founded the audio equipment manufacturing company that bears his name and went on to become a global brand. Today, Sennheiser has three business units: Pro Audio, Business Communication and Neumann.Berlin. 


In a conversation with Storyboard18, Andreas Sennheiser, the company’s chief executive officer, said, “The first thing is you have to hit a ‘need’. To not get complacent and to not be happy with what we've achieved, we have to keep listening to the customer and at the same time have a creative dissatisfaction with the status quo. So, the achievements of the past should always be seen as just the new standard. From there, we can iterate again.”


Edited excerpts:


Tell us more about Sennheiser’s India story.


We started bringing good audio to India in 2007. At the time, it was really hard to understand where the general public was with audio consumption. We found out that listening to music via headphones wasn’t a known principle. 


So, over the last 16 years, I think we've done quite well in developing the taste of enjoying music on the consumer side. For two years, we focused on the pro business only, along with business communication, and then our Neumann products also.


Particularly, in the last one-and-a-half years after the pandemic, we've seen very strong growth. On the live part, everyone wants to enjoy music, festivals, weddings and all kinds of corporate events. But on the business communication side, government, corporate and also higher education facilities are gearing up significantly for hybrid meetings, for remote lectures and also for a digital government.


Where do you see India in Sennheiser's growth map?


In the last two years, India has had one of the highest growth levels, with more than 50 percent annual growth.


As far as the general business globally is concerned, we could supply all our customers with products even during the pandemic. So, we were never really out of products.


From a product lens, what’s the focus? 


We have several focuses. There’s a general common focus that more and more of the technology that we’re using—it is highly advanced—is hidden behind very simple user interfaces. 


So, we want to make it as simple as possible, come up with seamless integration, plug and play with our installed business like ceiling microphones… This is so that an integrator, a consultant or the end user really doesn’t need to deal a lot with technology but actually can focus on the experience.



Many global CEOs are surprised by the way Indian consumers have evolved over the last few years. From a price-conscious market, we now are a value-conscious market. So, what are your observations and what is unique about Indian consumers?


Well, you just gave the right keywords. 


It has evolved from a price sensitive market of buying at the lowest possible level to now buying the highest possible value. So, with that, we are in an excellent position because we love competition. We love the direct comparison of our products with competitive products because usually this is when we win.


That's why value-based buying decisions are very much in our favour, because we provide superior audio quality. 


Globally, what are the trends in the audio space and do you see the adoption of those trends in India anytime soon? 


One of the big trends is that high–quality audio is being more and more appreciated. This is particularly when it comes to immersive audio and spatial audio. In the studios, we have more and more Atmos installations with our Neumann speakers. Also, on the playback side, we see a lot of venues now having full arrays of speakers for an immersive experience.


So, the whole appreciation for good audio has significantly increased over the last few years. At the same time, there’s also a strong trend of simplification of workflows. So, we try to focus on making the lives of our end users as simple as possible, particularly because there's also cost pressure on production, music production, news gathering etc. We want to give them the gear that they can operate with the least possible amount of people. 


What is the brand perception of Sennheiser? 


Sennheiser has a brand reputation of being extremely reliable, creating remarkable audio experience and being a highly innovative brand. 


The topmost factor is always reliability. In a meeting room, you don’t want to spend 20 minutes getting the system to work. An artist in front of 50,000 people, the only thing he or she can hold is a microphone, and that should not fail.


In terms of marketing, what are the big plans for India and what are the investments like? 

Our main investment is in people and education. So, it's people on our end and education on the customer side.

We see that the more there are highly talented technicians, audio engineers and people who know the difference between an okay system and a great system.

During the pandemic, we produced 200 tutorial videos: how to use our microphones, how to set up gear in general, and how to build a studio. A lot of things to just help the audio community do a better job.


In India, startups have been weaving a very different story in the last few years. As a family-owned company and one of the oldest startups in the audio space, do tell us what it takes to make a successful business and your advice for startups here. 

The first thing is you have to hit a ‘need’. This is not only true in a startup, but also when a company like ours gets older. Now, we’re closer to the 80th year of our existence. To not get complacent and to not be happy with what we've achieved, we have to keep listening to the customer and at the same time have a creative dissatisfaction with the status quo.

So, the achievements of the past should always be seen as just the new standard. From there, we can iterate again. 

There are a bunch of profitable startups in the audio space here in India. What impresses you about them and are there any lessons that you can pick from them? 

When startups have a platform economy in mind and then scale that up, they can very quickly cover a very broad demand, be it with fintech platforms or be it any other integration.


That is an approach that I find highly attractive because it's not product and gear oriented, but really platform oriented. And this is also a strategy that we're adopting more and more. We are not just selling gear to our customers, but we actually provide the control platform with it to make it as easy as possible. 


That has been a strategy for a couple of years—to have a lot of allies in the industry in order to allow a seamless integration for the end user. So, the platform is really the main focus. And, what we're selling in terms of gear is just an endpoint to the whole platform.

Has the target audience of Sennheiser evolved over time? 

Yes and no. Our target audience grows with us.

While there was an entry target audience a decade back that has now matured in age and in income, they are now being lifted to the next level.

I had a chance to meet with music composer duo Salim-Sulaiman. We had a chat about technology particularly, and they stressed upon how they started with simple gear and then moved to higher-grade gear.

Andreas Sennheiser: We have to keep listening to the customer and have a creative dissatisfaction with the status quo

Gen Z consumers are 50 percent more likely to take their friends' recommendation over an influencer or a celebrity when making a purchase decision, revealed a study from Yuvaa – the Indian Gen Z-driven youth media, impact, and research organization.

An Economic Times report states that the findings are based on a report titled 'Not All Gen Z'. The findings are based on responses from over 900 Gen Z participants, spanning over 20 cities across tier I, II, and III cities and towns of the country. Gen Z represents people born between 1997 and 2012 who show distinctive behavior in their lifestyle and shopping habits. At over two billion, Gen Z forms roughly 25 percent of the global population. It makes up for over 35 percent of India's population, according to Yuvaa.

Their estimated spending power is in excess of €235 billion, according to BCG. 

Influencers provide brand visibility

Karthik Srinivasan, a communications strategy consultant, believes that we trust the references and recommendations of the people we trust the most within our family or friends circle. However, influencers have a different role to play.

"They have come to usurp the role of mainstream media and advertising to a large extent and have become predictable sources of visibility more than influence. In other words, influencers (along with mainstream media and advertising) are sources of introducing products or services, use-cases, and giving them visibility, but they may not necessarily persuade people to make the purchase. That's where friends and family (known peers, colleagues too) would come into play," he explains.

Srinivasan tells Storyboard18 that influencers are merely shilling a product for a fee and have long stopped pretending to be actual users of a product to offer use-based/experience-based content/information.

"Even if they claim to offer personal experience-based recommendations, if viewers/followers see the disclaimer about paid content, they'd automatically discount that factor and take that recommendation with a pinch of salt," he adds.

Yuvaa's report findings also highlight a few key aspects of a Gen Z consumer who is not only willing to support brands that support social causes but also cares about sustainability. Around 63 percent of Gen Z shoppers surveyed said they prefer brands that support social causes. 

71 percent of Gen Z prioritize brands that are environment-friendly, and 77 percent consider price when buying something, even if it's not sustainable. Gen Zs are split equally between feminist and non-feminist brands, but 60 percent of women prefer them.

<a href="https://www.storyboard18.com/quantum-brief/amazon-vs-myntra-who-will-win-over-more-gen-z-shoppers-in-india-8247.htm">Read more: Amazon vs Myntra: Who will win over more Gen Z shoppers in India?</a>

E-com platforms chasing Gen Z

These trends are being closely followed and implemented in product and marketing strategies by e-commerce platforms in India. Storyboard18 reported that there has been intense competition between online retailers to woo the next generation of shoppers, with e-commerce platforms Amazon and Myntra actively investing in the Gen Z cohort.

Flipkart-backed fashion portal Myntra, for instance, announced the launch of FWD, an in-platform experience offering additional brands and styles curated for Gen-Z shoppers.

The move comes days after rival Amazon Fashion introduced the ‘Next Gen Store,’ catering to the unique needs of Gen Z shoppers, who seek to experiment with fashion and have varying preferences in terms of styles, sizes, brands, and fitting.

While Nykaa Fashion has not yet launched a dedicated platform for Gen Z shoppers, it has been onboarding brands that target this cohort. Recently, it added MIXT, which offers streetwear-inspired modern apparel options such as bodysuits, corsets, jumpsuits, jackets, cardigans, and footwear. It brought in Cider, a US-based label, expanding its global offerings to Indian consumers.

Gen Z segment has a distinct aesthetic that impacts their brand choices, which have been driving fashion trends – crop tops, ribbed dresses, chunky sneakers, and baggy jeans.

Unlike previous generations, which were heavily influenced by Bollywood and sports celebrities, Gen Z shoppers are more picky about who they follow. Social media influencers have emerged as a significant force in shaping their purchase decisions.

However, there is a catch. This group only follows influencers or celebrities who ‘walk the talk’ and are more trustworthy.

Value for sustainability, inclusivity

Bindiya Bhatt, senior director of category management at Myntra told Storyboard18 that for Gen Z, inclusivity, authenticity, and unconventionalism take centre stage as well.

"By embracing these values and catering to their specific needs, businesses can create more meaningful and impactful experiences that resonate with this important and influential demographic," she said.

Technopak Advisors' Ankur Bisen had a deeper insight, saying Gen Z shoppers are community-driven and seek better products rather than stay loyal to brands.

"...they are definitely seeking better products than brands and they are also looking at the consumption of fashion through communities. For example, there are communities towards gaming, nature, and even limited edition products. The spin-off from this trend could be the 'sneaker culture' in India and the craze to buy limited edition sneakers that are being sold online. These are some micro trends that one needs to notice," he said.

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“We will have another incremental billion dollars in the next three years for the home-grown billion dollar brand Thums Ups,” says Arnab Roy, vice president and head of marketing, Coca-Cola India and Southwest Asia to Storyboard18’s Shibani Gharat. He also talks about the brand’s new advertising campaign #HarHaathToofan.

<iframe title="Coca Cola's Arnab Roy On Thums Up New Campaign 'Har Haath Toofan' | Storyboard 18 | CNBC-TV18" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/fXe4to9HL4Q" width="853" height="480" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen="allowfullscreen"></iframe>

Coca-Cola's Arnab Roy on Thums Up’s new ad campaign #HarHaathToofan

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Chat with IPG's Arun Kumar and Plum's Shankar Prasad and actor Ananya Pandey

A marquee event like IPL amplifies brand engagement leading to heightened interaction and interest in the brand's offerings. Considering this, Greenply has been leveraging IPL by partnering with Lucknow Super Giants to expand its reach and visibility. "With millions of viewers tuning in to watch IPL matches across India, the brand gains widespread exposure, allowing it to connect with consumers on a national scale. This increased visibility is especially valuable in strengthening Greenply's presence in regions like Uttar Pradesh, where cricket holds immense cultural significance and serves as a conduit for regional pride," says Sanidhya Mittal, Joint Managing Director of Greenply Industries Ltd. 

In the course of the partnership with Lucknow Super Giants, Greenply has endeavoured to create memorable experiences that resonate deeply with fans and embody the spirit of cricket. One such moments came in 2022 when Greenply launched the 'Jalwa Dikhega' anthem, capturing the vibrant essence of Uttar Pradesh and fostering a sense of unity among fans. This initiative wasn't just about entertainment but about making every fan feel connected to the success of their regional team.

The following year marked a significant leap as Greenply integrated AI and digital technologies to redefine fan engagement. Beyond novelty, the aim was to creating personalized experiences that left a lasting impact on each fan.

Mittal discusses how in 2024, Greenply a step forward by rebuilding the ramp at Ekana Stadium in Lucknow to further enhance accessibility for viewers.

Edited excerpts:


What was the rationale behind the Careforall campaign?

The Careforall campaign stemmed from Greenply's dedication to social responsibility and inclusivity. It was inspired by the need to address accessibility challenges faced by wheelchair users at live cricket matches. The campaign began with #pujoforall in Kolkata, highlighting inclusivity during festivities, and evolved into #careforall in Lucknow, where Greenply installed wheelchair-friendly plywood ramps at the at Ekana Stadium in Lucknow. This initiative not only facilitated access for those with mobility challenges but also demonstrated Greenply's commitment to creating inclusive public spaces. The installation of wheelchair-friendly plywood ramps made the experience smoother for attendees with mobility challenges, ensuring they could participate fully in the excitement of live cricket matches.

How important is IPL for Greenply in terms of marketing and advertising?

The key advantage is the amplified brand engagement that comes with associating Greenply with cricket, a sport known for its enduring performance. This connection resonates deeply with audiences during IPL matches, leading to heightened interaction and interest in the brand's offerings. Moreover, the IPL provides Greenply with a platform to expand its reach and visibility. With millions of viewers tuning in to watch IPL matches across India, the brand gains widespread exposure, allowing it to connect with consumers on a national scale. This increased visibility is especially valuable in strengthening Greenply's presence in regions like Uttar Pradesh, where cricket holds immense cultural significance and serves as a conduit for regional pride.

Beyond visibility, the IPL association enables Greenply to infuse its brand ethos among the audience. Through consistent investments in brand building, Greenply leverages the IPL platform to convey its values and messaging effectively. This strategic alignment helps create a positive perception of the brand, fostering a deeper connection with consumers, particularly those who resonate with cricket and its associated values. The IPL also offers ample opportunities for engagement, ranging from targeted advertising during matches to interactive campaigns centered around cricket. These initiatives not only enhance brand recall but also drive consumer engagement, further solidifying Greenply's position as a reliable and performance-driven choice in the construction and interior design sectors.

Take us through Greenply's association with Lucknow SuperGiants. What's been the plan for 2024?

In the course of the partnership with Lucknow Super Giants, Greenply has endeavoured to create memorable experiences that resonate deeply with fans and embody the spirit of cricket. One such moments came in 2022 when Greenply launched the 'Jalwa Dikhega' anthem, capturing the vibrant essence of Uttar Pradesh and fostering a sense of unity among fans. This initiative wasn't just about entertainment but about making every fan feel connected to the success of their regional team.

The following year marked a significant leap as Greenply integrated AI and digital technologies to redefine fan engagement. Beyond novelty, the aim was to creating personalized experiences that left a lasting impact on each fan.

Greenply's commitment to inclusivity and social responsibility was exemplified in 2023 with the installation of wheelchair-friendly ramps at Ekana Stadium. This initiative focused on accessibility, ensuring that everyone, regardless of mobility challenges, could share in the thrill of live cricket matches. 

Also in 2023, Greenply hosted the 'In the House' chat show with players like Krunal Pandya, Quinton De Kock, Marcus Stoinis, Avesh Khan, and media personality Ms. Mandira Bedi, to celebrate the launch of Greenply’s state-of-the-art MDF plant in Baroda. It was a blend of sportsmanship, industry innovation, and local impact, showcasing our dedication to creating memorable experiences both on and off the field.

In 2024, Greenply has taken another step forward by rebuilding the ramp at Ekana Stadium in Lucknow to further enhance accessibility for viewers. This initiative reflects Greenply's commitment not only to supporting the city's team but also to contributing to the infrastructural improvement of Lucknow, one ramp at a time. It's about more than just cricket; it's about creating lasting positive impact in the communities we serve.

What is Greenply's media mix? 

The association with Lucknow Super Giants is amplified across digital and social media platforms, complemented by consumer connect initiatives both virtually and on-ground. These efforts aim to generate significant engagement among the audience and foster a sense of connection with the brand.
Greenply adopts a 360-degree approach in its media mix, targeting a wide range of audiences including channel partners, industry influencers, and consumers. This comprehensive strategy ensures that the brand's messaging reaches and resonates with its key stakeholders.
The media mix includes a big focus on unique activations, spanning from AI-driven campaigns to CSR initiatives and entertainment-based engagements. This diverse approach not only captures attention but also reflects Greenply's commitment to innovation and creating meaningful experiences for its audience.

What are some market trends and consumer insights you have been noticing?

Consumer trends in the plywood industry are witnessing a notable shift towards a focus on furniture rather than the plywood itself. Consumers are discovering the importance of quality ply during the process of crafting exceptional furniture pieces. There is a prevalent belief that homes are always a work in progress, leading to a continuous need for change, evolution, and staying updated with contemporary trends. While there is a high level of involvement in home décor, consumers often exhibit a low understanding of materials, relying more on aesthetics and functionality.

In terms of brand exploration, consumers typically delve into 2-3 brands in detail, with a focus on basic functionalities. However, there is a lack of knowledge on how to evaluate plywood beyond these basics. This trend indicates a growing reliance on experts to guide decision-making processes, especially in selecting branded materials that are perceived to offer higher quality and reliability. Overall, these market trends and consumer insights highlight the evolving dynamics in the plywood industry, where a balance between functionality, aesthetics, and expert guidance plays a crucial role in consumer decision-making.

Greenply's Sanidhya Mittal on leveraging IPL, partnership with Lucknow Super Giants and more

Ageas Federal Life Insurance's latest annual campaign with Sachin Tendulkar challenges conventional notions of financial planning. Erum Kidwai, Sr. Vice President and Head Marketing, Ageas Federal Life Insurance shares why Sachin Tendulkar was chosen as the face of this campaign, how it has leveraged technology such as Gen AI and Deep Fake to ensure relevance and relatability for today’s tech-savvy audience and embodying its brand ethos of #FutureFearless, utilizing state-of-the-art VFX and animated storytelling.

Take us through the genesis of Ageas Federal Life Insurance's annual campaign. Why Sachin Tendulkar?

The genesis of Ageas Federal Life Insurance's annual campaign lies in its commitment to redefine the narrative around financial planning and insurance, aligning with its brand philosophy of making our customers #FutureFearless. Sachin Tendulkar, an icon revered across generations, was chosen as the face of this campaign due to his universal appeal and inspirational life journey. His debut at such an early age serves as a metaphor for the significance of early financial planning, resonating strongly with parents and individuals alike.

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Leveraging innovative technology such as Gen AI and Deep Fake, the campaign ensures relevance and relatability for today’s tech-savvy audience. The choice of Sachin Tendulkar reinforces the brand's message of empowerment, encouraging individuals to take charge of their financial future with confidence and optimism. Through the "Cradle to Crease" campaign, Ageas Federal Life Insurance continues to push boundaries in storytelling while amplifying the importance of financial planning across all age groups.

What are some market trends and consumer insights that you are noticing and how is Ageas leveraging them?

Ageas Federal Life Insurance adeptly leverages prevailing market trends and consumer insights to strengthen its brand positioning and engage with its target audience effectively. Recognizing the increasing dominance of digital platforms in consumer engagement, the company strategically focuses its marketing efforts on channels like social media, influencer pages, and OTT platforms, ensuring cost-effectiveness and broad reach. 

The brand exhibits a keen understanding of consumer needs, particularly parental concerns about their children's futures, tailoring its campaigns to address these apprehensions. By highlighting the importance of securing one's financial future, Ageas Federal Life Insurance aligns itself with a customer-centric approach, resonating deeply with its audience. The prime insight driving the current campaign being that there is no fixed time or age to buy an insurance plan. The right time is always NOW and each plan can be tailored to meet one’s needs and objectives to ensure a financially secure future.

The company's adoption of innovative marketing techniques, such as advanced VFX and animated storytelling, underscores its commitment to staying ahead of the curve. We not only embrace market trends but also shape them, all while prioritizing our core values of Care, Dare, Deliver, and Share. By tailoring engagement efforts to diverse customer profiles and product suites, we enhance brand visibility and forge deeper connections across various market segments. This commitment to understanding and addressing customer needs cements our position as a forward-thinking and customer-centric insurance provider. 

Where is the business coming from most? 

Ageas Federal Life Insurance has firmly established itself across the country, however we have a significant market share in the south. This success is owed to our deep understanding of local market dynamics, culturally sensitive approach, and tailored product offerings for individuals and families. Our primary customer base, aged 25-45, includes both men and women, with a notable recognition of women's increasing influence in insurance purchase decisions. 

By capitalizing on our understanding of our customer segments, particularly parents, and our strong suite of products, we continue to excel in this market segment. Emphasizing digital transformation and enhanced customer service through mobile applications and ChatBots underscores our commitment to meeting the evolving needs of tech-savvy consumers across demographics. Overall, Ageas Federal Life Insurance's business is rooted in a diverse customer base, with a focus on inclusive growth and delivering exceptional customer experiences.

What are some of your key advertising and marketing strategies? How is Ageas optimizing AI?

Ageas Federal Life Insurance leads the way with innovative advertising and marketing strategies, establishing new industry standards. We are not only one of the 1st brands in the Indian Insurance sector but also across the corporate sector in India to harness the power of Gen AI technology to revolutionize our approach, crafting personalized campaigns that resonate deeply with our audience. We embody our brand ethos of #FutureFearless, utilizing state-of-the-art VFX and animated storytelling to captivate viewers. Our marketing strategy seamlessly integrates traditional and digital channels, with a strong focus on platforms like social media and OTT, ensuring broad and cost-effective outreach.

Leveraging AI, we optimize our marketing efforts, gaining invaluable insights into consumer behavior and market trends to drive targeted campaigns. AI-driven solutions streamline customer onboarding and insurance sourcing through digital channels, accelerating product launches and strengthening partnerships. Our dedication to AI extends to automating underwriting processes and document validation, enhancing operational efficiency and reducing risks. We employ AI-powered tools to scan content, swiftly identifying and addressing any misalignments with brand values or proximity to problematic material. Through proactive measures, we safeguard our brand's reputation and integrity in the digital landscape, ensuring a secure and positive experience for our customers. Additionally, our use of programmatic advertising ensures that our ads reach relevant stakeholders where they consume content, maximizing impact and engagement.

Take us through the brand’s media mix.

Ageas Federal Life Insurance adopts a balanced media mix to maximize its reach and engagement across online and offline channels. Online platforms and channels play a significant role, with a strong emphasis on digital marketing investments. The company strategically allocates resources towards digital spends, focusing on platforms like social media, influencer pages, and OTT platforms to effectively target its desired audience. These channels offer cost-effective and measurable marketing opportunities, allowing Ageas Federal to optimize its digital spends for maximum impact. 

Also, the company leverages AI-driven insights and analytics to refine its digital marketing strategies, ensuring more targeted and personalized campaigns. 

Offline sales channels like Radio, selective Out of Home media, and visibility in high footfall areas like Cafes contribute to the media mix. We also use our branch network to hold meetings and interactions with our customers and prospects. By investing in both online and offline channels, Ageas Federal ensures comprehensive coverage and engagement across various touchpoints, ultimately driving brand awareness, customer acquisition, and business growth in the competitive insurance market.

Sachin Tendulkar and Ageas Federal Life Insurance challenge conventional notions of financial planning

Rohit Bhasin, president, retail liabilities, product and chief marketing officer at Kotak Mahindra Bank, ensures his team does not work on weekends. They are pulled in only in exceptional cases such as quarterly results or a board meeting, he told Storyboard18 in an interview.


With many meetings during the week, Bhasin barely gets time to think during the week. So he keeps a part of Saturday just to think about things on top of his mind and about who he wants to speak to. 


Edited excerpts:


The creator economy has taken the world by storm. Which influencers and trends are you following?


I'm a lot on Instagram, and I developed awareness about many influencers from their felicitation by PM Modi at the National Creators Awards ceremony. Post this event, I have begun following Ranveer Allahbadia aka BeerBiceps. I also follow RJ Karishma and Aiyyo Shraddha. With Aiyyo Shraddha, we did some work with her on Kotak in the past, and I had actually gone to attend a workshop with Meta. She was the MC there and did an amazing job.

Podcasts are something which have become extremely popular. I'm a lot on Instagram because that's where I pick up a lot of trends, and a lot of what is happening in popular culture. If you really want to see what is happening in popular culture, the place to go is Instagram.


I'm also on LinkedIn a lot and it is a great place to read good content, on marketing, on news, on what's happening in the world in terms of good pieces of creatives, especially what they have been inspired by. 


What marketing-related content do you consume in your free time?


I don't consume market-related content in my free time. I do a lot of that during my work time. If I'm on LinkedIn looking at content, I see what other brands have worked on.


Also, a lot of marketing content may feel like it's entertainment. But, to be a good marketer, one needs to really understand what is happening in popular culture. And if you don't understand popular culture very well, you will not really be able to feel the pulse of the country.


When you're trying to build a campaign and you think of insights, your insights will be very theoretical. So whether it's watching movies on OTT, going to cinemas to watch movies, you'll see so much of popular culture there.


So, for me, any and every place where I go is a place to just get insights about what's happening in this country. What are the aims and aspirations of people? What is the cultural fabric and social fabric of the country? What are people talking about? What are the insights? How is the new generation behaving?


I'll give you one example – the pre-wedding festivities of Anant Ambani. It was the world coming together to celebrate the pre-wedding of a couple from India's richest family. But for me, it was an amazing experience in earned media. My thought was process was that none of that content was paid media. But imagine how they would have thought about how we drive visibility? How do we make this event the most talked about event? And that happened.


And for me, a big insight as a marketer was when I think of my campaigns, ‘How do I really use the power of earned media to do something similar to that scale?’


That's my learning. If I can ever build a campaign of mine to that scale where it is the most talked about event on the weekend, I would have really done amazing as a marketer. So while people saw it as a means of entertainment, my biggest lesson was the amazing use of earned media to drive visibility about your campaign, and about your brand.


There’s a lot of talk of burnout, workplace toxicity and the hustle culture. What steps have you taken to avoid the always-on culture? And what advice would you give your peers, colleagues and next-gen marketers?


The lines are blurring between personal time and office time, which is good and which is bad. The good part is that you're always thinking about how you can get an insight from anybody and not switching off from that perspective. And, you're just learning.


But I'm on LinkedIn on the weekend. I'm learning something. So I may not be sending emails. But am I using it to become a better marketer and if I'm a better marketer, I can help drive better campaigns for Kotak. But what we have to be very careful of is to respect the personal time and personal spaces of people.


So as a practice, we don't work on the weekends and unless there is an unavoidable event like declaring annual results or quarterly results on the weekend, or a board meeting on the weekend, a media event or a media conference, then we work on a Saturday. But that should be an exception and not the norm. So therefore, everyone gets those two days to just unwind, spend time with friends, families, entertain themselves, play, and make sure that they're fit, and just come back recharged and energised on Monday. But at the same time, there are people who want to work on the weekends.


I have lots of meetings during the week and therefore, I do not get a lot of thinking time during the week. So I keep a part of my Saturday just to kind of do my thinking. What are the things which are on top of my mind? What do I want to do about some of those things? Who are the people I want to speak to? So that kind of gives me a clear direction when I come back to work on Monday, I'm very clear what I want to drive this week.


When I send out an email or a message to someone on the weekend, I'm very clearly telling that person that ‘I don't expect you to respond to this message. I may not have time to send emails on a working day.’ But I'm very clear that I want my team to respond at a time when it is feasible to you and there is no pressure on anyone to immediately respond to an email. 


When I was in Singapore, I had joined a badminton club and was a part of a group who would play badminton every morning on Saturday and Sunday and then sit down for a cup of tea after that. So, that was like a weekend ritual which really made me fit as well as got me bonding with a valuable set of friends.


I was an avid biker. I would kind of bike every alternate day or run to just spend a lot of time outdoors while I was in Singapore. I don't do a lot of that here in Bombay. But I kind of regularly go to the gym on alternate days. I do yoga twice a week which keeps me fit. It also channelises my mind and energises me.


What are you watching or streaming this weekend?


I have been watching the IPL (Indian Premier League) these days. My girls play cricket for Singapore and one of them is a CSK (Chennai Super Kings) fan. She loves Dhoni (MS Dhoni) and I'm a Mumbai Indians fan. So, we have a bit of a rivalry.

Other than that, we kind of share notes on IPL every day. So that's our common ground.

Any work hack or life hack you swear by?

I wish I could become a bit more disciplined with my time. I'm not very good with my time. For me, one work hack I always try to follow is to be prepared for a meeting. I always prefer to have a pre-read for a meeting so that I can read before I go to the meeting. I'm clear about what this meeting is for.


Then, I avoid people making presentations at meetings because I feel that when you get together as a group, you should spend more time discussing the issue and finding solutions rather than spend most of your time where people presenting to each other. 


I always basically ask a simple question: What does success look like for you in the meeting? And by the time you end the meeting, you should be able to ask the same person the question: ‘Do you think the meeting got you what you wanted?’


If the answer is yes, it's a successful meeting. Otherwise, we wasted everyone's time.


What happens in a workplace is you just get pulled into various meetings. And you need to make sure that meetings where you don't add value, you should try and cancel 50 percent of meeting. And use that time to do thinking and talking to people. That's a much better use of time. Secondly, have an agenda for the meeting, have a pre-read for the meeting, be prepared. And basically try and have expectations clear for the people who organise the meetings so that you can deliver those expectations. That's really my work hack.


The other work hack I always try to do is for every mail that you write back to a person, do you think you can have a better outcome if you pick up the phone and speak to that person?


That will also help you build a more personal equation with the person rather than sending two mails to and fro. So that's what I try to do. Of course, if it's one to many people, I write an email. But if it's one-on-one, the best thing is to pick up the phone and speak. So those are the two hacks which I try to follow. 


What are you reading? Any recommendations?


We got a new CEO and he gave us two wonderful books to read. One is called ‘The Secret Lives of Customers’. The second book is called ‘Competing Against Luck’. I've read the first one. It's a fabulous read. It takes a theoretical concept of jobs to be done. It lands on a simple philosophy that consumers have needs. They have jobs that they want to do. For those jobs, they hire brands.


If those brands and products do their job very well, they rehire those brands. If they don't, they fire those brands. So if you really want to be a preferred brand, you should understand what is the job for which the consumer wants to hire you and to be able to do that very well.


And that's really the concept of jobs to be done, which I learned at Unilever and brought here to Kotak, is beautifully explained in a very storytelling way. 


A piece of wisdom you would like to share?


As a marketer, always start with keeping the consumer at the heart of everything you do. Always start with understanding what are the needs of the customer – whether they are stated or latent. Be the voice of the consumer in the room. And build products and solutions which really answer those needs. 


If your product doesn't really answer the needs of the customer, then the customer is not going to buy it. 


Read More: <a href="https://www.storyboard18.com/brand-makers/honasa-consumers-anuja-mishra-when-you-go-to-work-like-youre-going-to-school-it-paves-the-way-to-enlightenment-15082.htm">Honasa Consumer’s Anuja Mishra: When you go to work like you're going to school, it paves the way to enlightenment</a>

Kotak Mahindra Bank’s Rohit Bhasin: Marketers must keep consumers at the heart of everything

For Upasana Taku, co-founder and CFO of MobiKwik, the biggest personal milestone has been to pay for her own education. When she got the chance to study at Stanford, her family definitely could not afford the expenses of that education. "I did not have any scholarship at Stanford; I had to either give that up or hustle. I decided to go to Stanford one month before college started. I stayed on the couch of my sister's friends and commuted every day by bus to Stanford, and met more than 100 professors, introducing myself and asking them if they had a position where they could offer me research assistantships or teaching assistantships. Just before college opened, I got a call back from one of the professors from SLAC National Accelerator Laboratory. They ended up paying for my entire education for two years," says Taku.

The rest is history.

In an exclusive chat with Storyboard18, Upasana Taku, co-founder and CFO of MobiKwik shares her thoughts on receiving an award from the President for being the first woman to lead a payment startup, the need for diversity and inclusion but not at the cost of favouritism, artificial intelligence, the fintech landscape and more. 

In 2018, you received the award from the President of India. What are your thoughts on that?

It is not so hard to build a fintech company; at least, it's not as hard as being the first woman astronaut or first woman fighter pilot. Having said that, it feels great to be recognized and acknowledged. It's still a largely male-dominated environment. 

If I think about it from the perspective of tech startups or traditional finance banks, there's still a long way to go. It's good to see some familiar faces when one goes to industry events; it's lonely to be the only female leader there. So, it feels good that now we have some more. 

How is MobiKwik promoting diversity and inclusion in the ecosystem ? 

Given that one of the co-founders is a woman, we always wanted to make sure that there is no favoritism for women, but there is always inclusivity, whether it is our hiring process, our appraisal process, or our promotion process. We see roughly 30-35 percent female participation in our workforce, at both junior and other levels. Within the MobiKwik group, we have five subsidiaries, including MobiKwik, and every subsidiary has a woman executive director. We definitely have a seat at the table; we have had many women who joined us, in their mid to late 20s and during their six to seven years stints at MobiKwik, they have gotten married and had children. We have had fairly supportive and collaborative environments; it's not very hard to create an inclusive workforce and a company; it's just a little bit about having open minds.

Currently, what are some market trends and consumer insights that you have been noticing in the fintech space and how is MobiKwik leveraging them?

Fintech presents a very large opportunity in India. India is the third largest fintech market in the world, and it is also the sector which has seen the highest amount of foreign direct investment in the last five to six years. Today, India has about 400 million users i.e. around 30 percent of our population who are actively transacting via digital mediums.

By 2028, this number is expected to double. About 800 million plus people will be actively transacting digitally. Currently this market in India is about $1 trillion. That's why, we see so many banks, mutual fund companies and NBFCs in this play. By 2028, the market is expected to become a $4 trillion market from $1 trillion. While the customer base is expected to double in terms of the size of the opportunity, it's going to be 4X just in the next four to five years. Therefore, fintech continues to be a very exciting sector in India; both traditional financial institutions and pcoming technology companies like ours coexist.

We use our payments business as the foundation of our business. After we acquire both users and merchants, we enable them to make payments via QR code on the app via UPI or on the website. After they start transacting, we start assessing the data and decide what other financial products we can offer them; we resemble a bank in that sense as we offer credit products, investment products, insurance products and advisory products. Bear in mind that, we are the distributor and not the creator of these products. The creator is a bank, a mutual fund company or a NBFC. We are really good at curating the product and making it simple so that it can be delivered very easily over a smartphone. This is very important for a large market like Indi; getting that distribution and curation right is what fintechs are good at. 

Currently AI is a buzzword. How is MobiKwik leveraging that? 

We have used some elements of machine learning in our understanding of our users' data to figure out the propensity for which user to be interested in which financial product.

Also, we use AI as well as machine learning in our operations facing the consumers and the merchants. However, in terms of utilizing generative AIto the hilt, we are still working on building some of these applications and models that will help us in our overall business. Currently we are already using it in data to understand the users and for better profiling of our users and merchants, to understand their needs and also in our operations. We are working on the next level solution using Gen AI. 

Give us an idea about MobiKwik’s media mix.

We are a digital first company and we are fully focused on distributing our products via app stores as well as the web, whether it is Facebook, Instagram, email marketing, notifications-led marketing. All the digital channels like YouTube display are very important for us for user and merchant acquisition. 
 
We also look at all the traditional channels, including radio, television, and print. We go down the regional level in terms of tapping into the markets because most of our users are in the tier 2-3 cities of India. 

Can you take us through the demographic base of MobiKwik?

We are present in 99 percent of the pin codes in India, starting from Ladakh to Kanyakumari. Most of our users are in their 20s and 30s with 65 percent males and 35 percent females. Most of them are early adopters of technology; we are stronger in the northern states. Most of our users are either doing their first or second job or they are self-employed and doing their own business. The average earnings for them range between Rs. 25,000 to 50,000; 70-75 percent of our users are from Tier 2, 3 and 4. 

How is MobiKwik standing out from its competition?

MobiKwik is known for being one of the most capital efficient companies in the fintech sector. Companies like Zerodha specialize in one single vertical like investments; for Policybazaar, it's insurance. MobiKwik is running profitably at the PAT level since the beginning of the current financial year. 

We have achieved our current scale of revenue by having raised the least amount of capital as compared to all the other fintech companies. We probably have the lowest staffing, which itself is close to 1000 people as compared to all the other large fintechs in India. But even with that employee base, we are able to deliver more than a crore of revenue per employee.

MobiKwik's Upasana Taku: By 2028, 800 million plus Indians will transact via digital mediums

India is currently in the midst of two major events, especially from an advertising and marketing standpoint - the Indian Premier League (IPL) and the Lok Sabha Elections. With these two events coinciding, brands have been spending either more on advertising or are allocating their spends on what they think will be the optimal option for them to gain reach. Either way, media agencies have their work cut out for them during this period. Storyboard18 caught up with Hema Malik, Chief Investment Officer, IPG Mediabrands India to understand what sort of shift there has been in ad spends in the last two months, the top spending categories, major reasons behind the AdEx surge and more. 

Edited excerpts. 

What is the kind of increase in ad spends that you are noticing this April due to the combined impact of IPL and elections?

We've observed a notable increase in ad spends, influenced by the concurrent occurrence of the IPL and the Lok Sabha Elections. While the IPL is an annual event, the simultaneous timing of both events is a unique phenomenon in over five years. However, both events captivate a similar audience, generating nationwide excitement. Comparatively, the IPL has shown better performance and increased advertiser participation compared to the previous year. Similarly, the upcoming elections have opened up a positive trend for advertisers. Our estimations suggest that the combined effect of both events could result in a 20-30 percent higher Adex quarter-on-quarter.

What are the top ad spending categories experiencing the biggest surge in AdeX due to the combined effect of IPL and the upcoming elections?

The upcoming elections have witnessed significant participation from various sectors such as Infrastructure, Banking and Finance, Consumer Durables, Automotive, and Retail. Similarly, the IPL has attracted considerable attention from traditional categories like Automotive, Consumer Packaged Goods (CPG), Beverages, and Gaming.

What are the specific goals that brands are looking to achieve with their advertising campaigns during this period of heightened viewership?

Brands aim to capitalize on the increased viewership during this period to achieve broad reach and build awareness, especially through election-related specials. The IPL offers sophisticated advertising options that address brand objectives beyond the top funnel.

Can you tell us which genres of programming are performing best in terms of ad viewership during the IPL and election season?

GECs consistently perform well during this period due to their loyal family audience base. Additionally, there has been an increase in Pay homes, indicating significant contributions from Tier 2/3 cities across all three genres: News, Sports, and Entertainment.

How significant is the ad rate growth compared to usual periods, (or, this time last year) considering both IPL and election?

While the ad rates for the IPL have remained relatively flat, the expectations for news channel pricing, especially on critical polling and counting days, have surged. Bundled options combining election and non-election packages during this period are experiencing double-digit price increases.

Besides IPL and elections, are there any other upcoming events or trends that you anticipate will impact media buying strategies?

Anticipating future trends, we have our eyes on the upcoming ICC T20 World Cup, set to take place in the USA. However, the scheduling of India games at 8 pm is a crucial factor to consider. Additionally, prominent properties such as Khatron Ke Khiladi, Bigg Boss, and Kaun Banega Crorepati (KBC) are also on the radar for festive planning.

IPL and elections combined could result in 20-30 percent higher Adex quarter-on-quarter: IPG Mediabrands' Hema Malik

MullenLowe Lintas Group has launched the ‘State of States’ thought-leadership initiative in collaboration with Quantum Consumer Solutions. Through the initiative, the group aims to partner with their clients in helping create deeper meanings for brands at a local/ethnic/cultural/sub-cultural level and win in the marketplace. 

India is one of the most diverse nations in the world and boasts a rich tapestry of cultures, traditions, and languages across its vast expanse. The dynamic nature of Indian society necessitates a comprehensive understanding of regional nuances to effectively engage with consumers.

Through ‘State of States’, MullenLowe Lintas Group intends to deconstruct the 30 different cultures in India to have a far deeper understanding of the respective culture codes, tensions, and shifts that are happening, to craft brands of the future. Storyboard18 caught up with S.Subramanyeswar, Group CEO – India and Chief Strategy Officer – APAC of MullenLowe Group to break down the initiative and understand its intricacies and how it will benefit India and its brands in the long run. 

Edited excerpts. 

State of States is an interesting initiative. Where did the idea for it come from?

‘State of States’ is an ambitious, one-of-a-kind thought-leadership initiative undertaken by MullenLowe Lintas Group with Quantum Consumer Solutions as a partner. There is a rise in ethnic nationalism or localism or even ultra localism in Indian culture (and in fact, it’s a global phenomenon too), in which identity is defined by perceived genetic, historic, religious, sub-culture or linguistic heritage beyond the democratic ideals or principles. 

The heterogenous ethnic fabric of our people as consuming audience is evolving at a frenetic pace today aided by technology and new media. We felt, it’s a phenomenal opportunity that calls for a granular understanding of the shifting codes to unlock and yield real, meaningful growth for brands/businesses.

How will brands benefit from this initiative and how will it enable brand building in India?

At MullenLowe Lintas Group, we believe, brands are a phenomenon of society, culture, history, and politics, and not mere marketing constructs. Brands are magnets of meaning, and they get built with deeper meanings when they are fuelled by the historical changes and innovations at a cultural/sub-cultural level than by better mousetraps of claims or degrees of comparative propositions.

Through ‘State of States’, we are deconstructing the 30 different cultures in India to have a far deeper understanding of the respective culture codes, tensions, and shifts that are happening to craft brands of the future. There are profound identitarian ideas on every single culture, stories that will change the way brands can connect, the way they can lead, and the impact they can have on the world. 

If Subbu was building a brand today, how would he leverage this initiative in his brand building process?

It’ll be a brand with flexible identity. Anchored in a timeless truth, but expressions that are timely and of terrain.

Storytelling seems to be a big part of this initiative. How important has storytelling become for a brand today and how does the State of States initiative enforce it?

Stories always have a huge value in business because they look in the right direction. At people. Brands are at their best or strongest when they serve up the story their audience expects. They delight beyond belief when the story delivers a new surprise, a touch of the familiar with a pinch of novelty. A deep and fundamental understanding of the cultures and their changing fabric in a contemporary world through ‘State of States’ will help us think in the language of a storyteller, living the proof of a culturally relevant or innovative idea, and the conversion of that idea into action – brand myths or narratives instead of or beyond strategic plans, story arcs for different forms and formats/platforms/surfaces instead of campaigns, thinking of audiences instead of consumers,  thinking of characters instead of products and spokespeople or influencers, and thinking of narrative settings instead of offline/online retail environments or domains for brands. Each serves a slightly different purpose, but all of the methods or ways of thinking will help us define and memorialise our brand narratives.

What does it mean when you say, ‘winning in many India’s’? And how do you look at this?

As one of the most diverse nations in the world, India boasts a rich tapestry of cultures, traditions, and languages across its vast expanse. The country, as we know, is home to several communities, each of whom has their own distinct culture, traditions, and identity. This dynamic nature of Indian society, that makes it unique and beautiful, necessitates a comprehensive understanding of regional/local nuances to effectively engage with consumers. 

The one size fits all approach to marketing or brand building does not seem to work anymore in the context of angularly rising ‘many India’s.’ We believe that at the root of every culture exists cultural gene codes and understanding the interplay between these codes and how they collide with events and narratives of today, present transformative opportunities for creating winning strategies or inspiring meaning systems for brands/businesses.

Is winning in many Indias essential for a brand to build a strong name for itself in the country today?

I believe it’s an idea whose time has come long back. It’s only getting more pronounced now as every part of the country is proudly wearing on sleeve its own culture, values, customs, and their way of leading life. This truth is here to stay and decisively shape the future of marketing and brand building in India. We are all joined together by an idea called India, but we are very different from state to state. While we are proud Indians first, we are also proud Mumbaikars, Bengalis, Punjabis, Delhiites, or Tamilians on the same plane at the same time. 

In a richly diversified market such as India, a culture/sub-culture led strategy to win in many Indias offers a powerful tool for anyone – from an established brand marketer to an entrepreneur seeking mainstream success. Localising products and brand appeal, connecting with the audience in their societal context and responding with a particular cultural expression takes a brand closer to that region and pays a huge dividend.

This ideology has long been understood better outside the business world. For politicians, artists, and social activists, this way of doing things is the name of the game. It’s time brands take a leaf out of them.

And the new world of digital and personalised media aided by technology can only be an indispensable catalyst for this kind of work, in advancing the way consumers confer local cultural values on the brands they use or brand experiences they engage with.  

How is Lowe benefitting from the State of States initiative? 

We find our fruits in our roots. Lintas has always been known for Thought Leadership. Over the decades, we took deep sense of pride in our ability to inspire and galvanize our own people and the clients we partner to think new thoughts, modify the way they have always done things, and embark on new behaviours, new paths, and new actions to drive change and transform the brands that we serve and the world at large, through deeply resonant conversations.

A seminal study like ‘State of States’ is an original and genuine understanding that uses the expertise, insight, and experience of several deep thinkers, cultural experts, sociologists, anthropologists and reputed thought leaders. The wisdom gained out of this groundbreaking work has changed the conversations internally and with our clients. This thought leadership initiative is all about us creating lasting value for our brands and the clients that we partner, building deep-seated knowledge, and taking a stand. 

We have finished 20 states so far and the rest will be done by the end of current quarter. Eventually, we envisage ourselves to becoming the ‘Cultural Portal’ of India that brands can tap into to power their growth.

Why now? Why is it the right time to launch this initiative now and why wasn’t it done before?

There is nothing like right time, in life or in business. There is just time and what you choose to do with it. As I had said, the axis of marketing and brand building is decisively shifting more and more towards regional/local. The new media fuels it further. By giving brands a creedal identity based on local/regional/ethnic creed or ideas, businesses can effectively engage with their audience and foster loyalty beyond reason.

If we could go back in time, this is where it all began. Therefore, the question of ‘why now’ actually is a quest for ‘how now’ for us. So ‘State of States’ is not a study or understanding with an end, but one that prompts a beginning.

How do you plan to popularise this initiative? What are the marketing strategies? 

Our clients are aware of this pointed work and are highly receptive to the learnings and application of those on the brands. We are already seeing the positive results of the work on some of our brands. Without getting into too many details, all I can say at this point of time is that this study will be our GPS to design a multi-India strategy for brands (and not just one-India strategy). For the brand’s destination in the market place and its destiny in the world, with the new culture maps of meaning.

Brands are at their strongest when they serve up the story their audience expects: MullenLowe Lintas' S.Subramanyeswar

Max Life Insurance has crossed the Rs1.5-lakh crore mark in assets under management (AUM) as of March 31, 2024. This reflects a growth rate of over 20 percent year-on-year. In the e-commerce market, Max Life holds the overall rank 2. The company has been leading the online protection market with a 28 percent share and ranks 2 in the savings market with an 18 percent share. Max Life's online channel continues to gain traction, with one out of every four new customers now acquired through this channel. Max Life maintains its leadership in the Claims Paid Ratio metric, with a ratio of 99.51 percent in FY23, as per the IRDAI Handbook on Indian Insurance Statistics 2022-23. 

In an exclusive conversation with Storyboard18, Rahul Talwar, Chief Marketing Officer, Max Life Insurance shares what Bharosa means for Max, how the insurance company has been targeting women, GenZs, the LGBTQIA community and the insights that came out from the studies - India Protection Quotient and India Retirement Index Study.

Can you take us through the current consumer insights and industry trends at the moment?

When you look at the previous quarter from January-March, the category tends to see a good amount of seasonality. That’s also because of certain habitual moments which are there in the larger understanding of the category where there is a play of a tax phenomenon that kicks in towards the end of the calendar year. Every year, we have seen post festivals and specifically this year post festivals and after the euphoria of the World Cup, the category always tends to be in an upswing. There was an earlier heightened intent and interest in having the right kind of life insurance because of the pandemic.

We recently concluded the sixth edition rollout of the India Protection Quotient in partnership with Kantar. About 5000 odd respondents from 25 cities representing urban India were surveyed and we found out that the number of Indians serious about financial protection has increased. Currently, there is more awareness and knowledge about life insurance; people are understanding that having the right kind of life insurance with the right amount of insurance or cover is important.

There are various needs for which they’re picking up life insurance. Those needs could be around life’s goals, children and long-term savings as well. Therefore, if you look at the category as a whole, it’s fairly buoyant.

What role does Bharosa play for Max Life?

Life insurance per se has been fairly a passive conversation. The traditional narrative of life insurance largely has been attached to uncertainty and insurance makes an entry during the absence of the breadwinner due to an unforeseen scenario.

Max Life has tried to anchor itself on a positive narrative. India being a fairly young country and hence longevity being fairly high; the aspirations that that Indians have and as they grow in life, the risk they would also keep growing in that sense. Max Life is trying to anchor itself in celebrating the breadwinner in keeping the narrative fairly positive versus the burdensome narrative of the fear of death.

Secondly, Max Life is aiming to build a very proprietary narrative around trust because at the end of the day, our engagement and relationship with our present and potential customers is ideally for a fairly long duration. These relationships could start from five years running up to 40 years depending how soon do you end up buying life insurance or the right life insurance. Hence for Max Life, trust has been an important parameter to build itself on. We have tried to build out this entire narrative of Bharosa .

We rather try and land Bharosa in a fairly tangible way for our customers or consumers, and in the narrative, Bharosa gets manifested as the Bharosa of claims which is where Max Life Insurance is a beacon of trust where we have best in class claims paid ratio in the industry currently clocking a 99.51% as our claims paid ratio in FY 23, as per the recently introduced report from IRDAI. Second, in another category we would talk about the Bharosa of guaranteed returns which is again playing to this entire insight of Indians wanting better returns. On another long duration, looking at the lifelong income plans, we would speak about Bharosa of life-long income again when you try and look at your savings narrative running into retirement space.

For Max Life, Bharosa has to be delivered keeping an imagery which is fairly stemming from real life heroes which is why we realized that universally if Indians buy into the passion and the emotion of Cricket, we try and extend that into our brand as imagery and which why we partnered with real-life couple Rohit Sharma and Ritika Sajdeh. Max Life has ensured that this entire narrative which should appeal to a young family which believes in mindful financial planning is able to be projected on screen or in our storytelling using both Rohit and Ritika. 

Could you help us understand the study?

We are keeping the customer at the centre of our communication and we want to be able to ensure that we are able to talk about the larger narrative for India, through thought leadership. We articulated two specific thought leader platforms. One of them was anchored in this entire space of protection or in a product category called term insurance. six years back we institutionalized this platform called the India Protection Quotient which is a partnership between Max Life Insurance and Kantar Research, giving us a barometer of how Indians are feeling around financial protection.

India Protection Quotient (IPQ) gives us critical data relating to the financial behavior, the savings pattern, attitudes and behaviours, and it also tells us how urban Indians are looking at their own financial preparedness. The one that we have just recently released talks about a significant increase in the knowledge levels of urban Indian respondents from 57 to 61.

We do a similar exercise in the retirement space. We understand that while today we are a younger country, retirement planning is an activity that should be undertaken by all well in time. For the same, we institutionalize another platform called the India Retirement Index Study (IRIS) which is basically an eye into the future.

The last edition of IRIS revealed that 9 in 10 urban Indians who are more than 50 years of age regret not starting early for financial planning keeping the retirement in mind. Another insight which was interesting was that 1 in 3 believe that their savings will last for only five years post-retirement, which is why they need to be prepared in terms of having better financial planning. Like IPQ, IRIS is also one of those platforms which allows us to understand nuances around these critical spaces of protection and retirement in a better way, and our product solutions, our customer experience plans, etc. then anchored around the insights that stem from these kinds of thought leadership platforms.

How are you guys catering to a diverse demographic of customers like working women, the Gen Z, the LGBTQIA community and such?

If you were to look at our stated vision, our stated vision would be articulated as wanting to be the most admired life insurance company by protecting the financial future of ‘all’ of our customers. The reason that I emphasize on ‘all’, is to be able to highlight the inclusiveness that we have for these newer cohorts which are newer in terms of their participation in these conversations, but they’ve always been there.

For example, working women, Gen Z, and now going forward even LGBTQIA+ community. One of the reasons of why we embraced our partnership with both Rohit Sharma and Ritika Sajdeh on the brand was to ensure an active participation of the women representation in financial decision making.

Again, initiatives like IPQ and IRIS would have a complete double click of not only the demographics or gender pieces between male female or urban tier 1, tier 2, but it would definitely be able to give us deep insights around working women, millennials, Gen Zs. And specifically, if you talk about IPQ sixth edition, we’ve truly gone a step further to become more inclusive by also doing a specific module around the LGBTQIA+ community as well and insights for that are going to be rolled out sometime later this month.

We also went ahead and did this entire partnership with the Mumbai Indians Women Premier Leagues team. The idea again being that women as a partner in this financial planning journey and their role in decision making needs to be spoken about. 

How is Max leveraging new edge tech for better customer experiences? 

We have been able to ensure that the tech enablers have allowed us to look at creation of end-to-end personalized videos, and messaging among others to be able to ensure that when we are making the right representations to our customers, either directly or via our sellers, we have customized selling pitches available. Moments marketing happens to be again one of those big marketing use cases where this technology has allowed us to ensure that we get to a high degree of personalization.

If you were to look at our relationships with our customer, these are for fairly long drawn durations and to ensure that over this duration, we have a good engagement going in with our customers we want to be able to use these technologies of AIs and personalized videos to ensure that we are delivering differentiated experiences for them.

Again, vernacular for a mass retail brand like ourselves is important because we cut across all geographies and we always know that vernacular tends to play that much extra when it comes to engagement. So, all in all, we are ensuring that we try and use technology to not only become better at the backend, but also to be able to ensure that we take the right communication mix to our customers.

Max Life Insurance's Rahul Talwar on building a proprietary narrative around trust

Pragya Bijalwan, chief marketing officer of Crompton Greaves, believes in the power of the Pomodoro technique, which recommends working for 25 minutes and then taking a break. Then, after frequent intervals, take longer breaks. She says it helps because one can break away from monotony, but for those 25 minutes, one has to really focus on work.


She spoke to Storyboard18 about work pressures, how to get through the weekdays and weekends, and her hacks for the workplace and the home. 


Edited excerpts:


The creator economy has taken the world by storm. Which influencers and trends are you following?


Everyone is hooked on social media. In fact, Gen Z spends in excess of 240 minutes per day on social media. While I don't belong to Gen Z, I'm pretty much on social media to know about a lot of things.


I'm pretty much a fitness freak because I think it's very important to keep that side of your system alive. One person that I have followed over the years is Milind Soman. I don't follow many of them, but when I follow them I get quite inspired and there are no stereotypes.


You don’t have to hit the gym to be fit. What I've learned after seeing a lot of content is that you just need to be in your space and there is always room to exercise. I try to consume as much during the day, more so because I have a health regime. Secondly, if I don't practise health and fitness or exercise for a day, I feel guilty of not doing it… So, that keeps me a little bit alive and also motivated.


There's a lot of talk about burnout, workplace toxicity and hustle culture. What steps have you taken to avoid the adverse impact of the always-on culture on yourself and your colleagues and what advice would you give them?


There are so many things happening around that one wants to be everywhere. Marketers often have this fear of missing out. If there are 10 platforms, they think there is a need to be there on the 10 platforms. One has to make a frugal choice. Work is a lot different. Similarly, you have to make choices on the way you also operate.


So, one is that you define your work. Quite often, what happens is that when you really want to do everything, you get busy, you don't get effective. So, one is to think about getting effective rather than to get busy.


Just because you're working 12 hours a day, it doesn't mean that you're doing the best of the work. After four o'clock, I don't allow for anything. It's all pre-blocked for me, which basically says: No meetings after that from my side.


I have blocked lunch time, I have blocked reading time for myself, which helps me and my team members to divide the time and not stay just busy.


Secondly, it's very important to be realistic in your ambition. You have to define the top three things you have to go after and just stick to that.


One more important thing is don't overkill yourself with ambition. It is good to be a perfectionist sometimes, but it's also okay to lose that perfection sometimes for peace. If that 10 on 10 is not going to be sustainable each time, then you have to take a call for yourself.


Sometimes, when you get involved with your work, you get very emotional and passionate about it. Withdraw yourself at the right time – that will ensure your mental health or your mental capacity does not get exhausted.


Is there any sport or fitness routine you practice to steal a few minutes of me-time for yourself?


I work out late in the evening, after office hours. I directly hit the gym. Over the weekends, I have lately started playing squash, which requires a lot of strength. More than that, it requires a lot of mental agility because you focus so much on the game.


What does your weekend look like?


Like anyone else, I actually look forward to the weekend. I would say a little bit of work to the point that it adds on to my knowledge area. It is a cocktail of a lot of activities which provides me relaxation and also helps me see things outside of my work area.


So socialising with friends, going out, reading a lot of stuff, and also playing my sport. I also believe in mindfulness, so tranquillity to the extent that if I can sit and just close my eyes and focus on something for half an hour, I do that either on a Saturday or on a Sunday.


It's basically anchored towards a Sunday because Saturday goes into a lot of other things. So on a Sunday, I need to again clear my mind so that I can be ready for Monday.


Share one work hack and one life hack you swear by.


While a job requires us to attend meetings back to back and read a lot of stuff, I try to take breaks in between. Pomodoro technique says to work for 25 minutes and then take a break. Then after frequent intervals, take a longer break. I think that helps because you break away from the monotony. But for those 25 minutes, one has to really focus on work. The biggest distraction these days is your phone.


On the personal front, one hack which works is – and I think it's quite dated – is to have a to-do list. So, I think that's one thing that you can do is to have a look at your diary and then you can just go through what your week looks like.


I keep a diary and I maintain it every day in the morning when I land in the office between 9:00 and 9:30. Morning time is the best time for me, where I take on the most difficult task. Because if that gets sorted for me, which has been a pain for a little while, then the rest of the day looks easy. So, I try to eat the frog first.


What are you watching or streaming this weekend?


I've been watching One Day at a Time on Netflix. It's about an American-Cuban family and it is a comedy drama. The family members have battles with each other when they talk about what they want to do. They talk about people having different preferences in their life and how the family still works together in a different country.


What are you reading? Any recommendations?


There's a book called Thinking, Fast and Slow by Daniel Kahneman. So it talks about two systems about humans. System one is about intuitive systems. If there is a problem, my intuitive self says that this is what can work out. I am very quick in my response. I immediately react to it.


System two is about a delayed decision but a thought-out decision. And you apply all kinds of projects to arrive at that. Now it talks about how system one and two can work together to arrive at the right decisions. It also talks about cognitive bias.


A piece of wisdom you would like to share?


Life is not always the same. You'll see a successful person and will look up to him or her. But remember, that person has gone through a lot of downs as well. So I'm a big fan of resilience.


I keep saying this to my team because we have a lot of Gen Z crowd. We need to take care of the new-age trend. And these are the future of our target audience for us. Everyone wants to move really fast. But when failures come, it's very difficult for some of them to really absorb and learn from it.


It's very easy to see 10 things happening and say you're lucky. Nobody is lucky. They work through that. You haven't seen the failures behind it. So my mantra is that if you fall seven times you should stand up eight times.


Always plan your day because a lot of things are unpredictable. But be ready for that. Work around it. And if you persist and you have the resilience, you'll always see the right things happening at the end of the day. But don't lose that resilience. Because speed is one thing. But sustaining that speed is another thing.


Read More: <a href="https://www.storyboard18.com/brand-makers/job-is-a-part-of-you-you-also-have-another-side-of-you-says-darshana-shah-aditya-birla-capital-29568.htm">Job is a part of you. You also have another side of you, says Darshana Shah, Aditya Birla Capital</a>

Crompton Greaves’ Pragya Bijalwan: If you fall seven times, stand up eight times & you’re sure to win

We aim to instill a sense of responsibility and agency among our users: BluSmart's Anirudh Arun

India is currently in the midst of two major events, especially from an advertising and marketing standpoint - the Indian Premier League (IPL) and the Lok Sabha Elections. With these two events coinciding, brands have been spending either more on advertising or are allocating their spends on what they think will be the optimal option for them to gain reach. Either way, media agencies have their work cut out for them during this period. Storyboard18 caught up with Harish Iyer, EVP, Media and Investment, Interactive Avenues, the digital arm of IPG Mediabrands India to understand what sort of shift there has been in ad spends in the last two months, the top spending categories, major reasons behind the AdEx surge and more. 

Edited excerpts. 


What is the kind of increase in ad spends that you are noticing this April due to the combined impact of IPL and elections?

In April, we initially observed a slow start among advertisers and platforms, but there has been a notable uptick in ad spends recently. This surge can be attributed to the combined impact of the IPL and upcoming elections. Notably, key sectors such as beverages, e-commerce, automotive, BFSI, and consumer electronics are leading the charge in terms of increased ad expenditures. As user traction remains strong across both high-impact activities, advertisers are capitalizing on this opportunity to maximize their brand visibility and engagement.

 

What are the top ad spending categories experiencing the biggest surge in AdeX due to the combined effect of IPL and the upcoming elections?

The top ad spending categories include those mentioned earlier: beverages, e-commerce, automotive, BFSI, and consumer electronics. These sectors are strategically leveraging the heightened viewership during this period to amplify their advertising efforts and connect with their target audience effectively.

 

What are the specific goals that brands are looking to achieve with their advertising campaigns during this period of heightened viewership?

Apart from seeking increased audience numbers to boost brand visibility and awareness, brands are also focused on driving engagement with viewers. Leveraging this engagement, they aim to foster brand loyalty among their audience base, thereby strengthening their market presence and customer relationships.

 

Can you tell us which genres of programming are performing best in terms of ad viewership during the IPL and election season?

In terms of ad viewership, news genres and live sports platforms are experiencing significant traction. Viewers are tuning in to stay updated on the latest developments surrounding the elections and other news events, making news programming a key avenue for advertisers to reach their target audience effectively.

 

How significant is the ad rate growth compared to usual periods, (or, this time last year) considering both IPL and election?

While there has indeed been an increase in ad rates, this increase is primarily viewed as a correction rather than an unprecedented surge. Advertisers are adapting to these adjustments in ad rates as they navigate the competitive landscape shaped by the IPL and elections.

 

Besides IPL and elections, are there any other upcoming events or trends that you anticipate will impact media buying strategies?

Following the conclusion of the IPL and elections, attention will shift towards the T20 World Cup, scheduled to be held in the US and West Indies. Some advertisers are already strategizing for a full-quarter activation centred around sports and news, anticipating continued opportunities for engagement and brand exposure.

India is going through a phase of creative confidence: Diageo's Amitabh Pande

Amitabh Pande, chief consumer planning, strategy and digital officer at Diageo India shares his bullish views on India's creative industry, Storyboard18's YoungGuns, YoungGuns all around the globe and more.

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