Contract Advertising launches healthcare division

Lalitha Srinivasan in Mumbai

In a bid to cater to the healthcare communication needs of clients, Contract Advertising India Ltd, the second agency of J Walter Thompson Company Ltd in India has launched its healthcare division called — Contract Health.

According to Mr Soumitra Sen, head of Contract Health, healthcare communications is going to be the next growth engine for the Indian advertising industry. “We are now recruiting professionals for our new division. We have already bagged the ad account of pharma brand, Life on Pediatrics. Also we have recruited a medical advisor who will offer information on healthcare brands,” adds Mr Sen.

At present, the major players in this niche segment include, Lowe Healthcare, Ogilvy Healthcare, Grey Healthcare and FCB-Ulka Healthcare, among others.

As for the rationale behind the launch of the new division, Mr Sen says: “We felt the need for advertising pharma brands. Pharma companies now look for specialist healthcare division to handle their accounts. We are in the process of hiring people for our creative and account service divisions,” explains Mr Sen.

With capitalised billings of Rs 210 crore, Contract currently has two divisions which include, Contracti (interactive & direct marketing wing) and Design Shop, a specialist design wing.

As the focus is on effective retail communication strategy, Design Sutra, Contract’s specialist design cell has recently bagged a host of retail ad accounts like Renaissance Group.

According to Ms Vetry Ramachandran, head of Design Sutra: “We have completed retail design projects for our clients ABN Amro India and Bharat Petroleum Corporation Ltd (BPCL) recently.”

Ms Ramachandran says that the retail revolution has truly begun in India. “We at Design Sutra recognise that this market cannot be tackled by visual splash. What it needs is a very structured visual approach.”

For retail identities, Design Sutra follow the following basic principles:
* The objective for the brand has to be cracked first.
* We evaluate as to how this objective will build traffic.
* The objective is then evaluated in a context (retail space).
* The designs are then based on all the learnings and the visual identity is then created.
* Work does not end after the site is up.

“We make sure that our design is driving traffic to the relevant counters and sections. So there is a research done to observe the traffic,” says Ms Ramachandran.

Finally, Ms Ramachandran sums up that Design Sutra’s techniques have worked well for brands like ABN Amro and BPCL. “What is required for retail designing is three things: a mind of a researcher, the efforts of a structured designer and the vision of a graphic designer. At Design Sutra, our designers are trained to do these three jobs,” adds Ms Ramachandran.”