The pandemic has brought about notable shifts across industries, and the case has been no different for marketing. Today, digital marketing has become a crucial aspect in order to acquire new customers and retain existing ones. In our weekly BrandWagon Ad Talk series, industry experts highlight what has changed over the past two years and more importantly, are these changes here to stay.Shivani Behl, chief marketing officer, Plum, talks to BrandWagon Online, about the dos and don’ts of digital marketing, best marketing campaigns, and more.
What is the difference between launching a brand in today’s digital era versus earlier?
With the advent of digital media, there is lesser distance between brands and consumers. With the dissemination and global exchange of digital content, the consumer of today is well informed, hence making transparency and interactivity key pillars for building a brand’s equity in today’s context.
With the growth of influencer marketing and reduction in consumer response times through social media where one can share immediate feedback and propagate their experience through word of mouth, the lead time needed for a brand’s initial growth phase has also significantly reduced. This has enabled a lot of new players especially in the beauty and personal care space, driven to growth by their consumer interactions. However, this also comes with the responsibility of attending to negative feedback from these consumers; hence, brands need to invest even more heavily in offering superior and seamless customer experience.
What are the recent best marketing or advertising campaigns you have seen and why?
Given the number of brands fighting for share of voice in today’s digital landscape, clutter break is a necessity for brands to stand out. Below are two examples that come to mind in this context:
The CRED series of ads has certainly been one of the most memorable campaigns. It set the differentiated tonality for the brand right from the start, while ensuring consistent messaging – a single line defining the product offering; both of which led to a great brand recall. In addition to this, they have built a distinct identity of celeb utilization in the ads almost showing a ridiculous reality of situations. The recent series of ads as well featuring Anil Kumble, Viswanathan Anand, Sunil Chhetri, Jhulan Goswami & Mary Kom follow the initial set of ads with a similar celeb treatment that struck an instant recall. This was further complemented by a focused large scale media strategy and audience targeting that hit the nail on the head – especially by utilizing one of the biggest media opportunities through strategic timing around the IPL.
With the flavour of cricket in the air, one of the brands that come to mind in this context is Puma and their hard-hitting campaign that brings to light the gender bias in the most popular sport of the country. The brand asked viewers and customers across their stores to guess the next brand ambassador who is a known cricket achiever. 80% of the audience guessed male names, while the actual name was Harmanpreet Kaur. The campaign was further amplified by asking people to rewire Google Search results that only displayed men cricketers on searching for “Indian Cricket Team Caption” through use of the hashtag #IndianCricketTeamCaptainHarmanpreetKaur. This got a truly relevant context of bringing women sportspersons to the limelight which ties back in to get better brand recall for Puma through social media community building.
Which brand in the last year has made the best use of digital and how?
Cadbury has always been one of the brands that has made wonderful use of the digital medium through their activations for driving consumer engagement and being the top-of-mind brand when it comes to the concept of celebrations and happiness. They were one of the pioneers in the use of AI with the use of Shah Rukh Khan for generating UGC ads to aid local shops. The spirit of using the digital medium for greater good has been carried forward by them which also reflects in their latest campaign of #HeartTheHappiness. Cadbury was also one of the first brands to adopt extensive impactful use of technology – right from their last year’s Valentine Day’s secret messages campaign that showcased customized messages for loved ones though the use of AR, to the latest Valentine Day’s campaign of showcasing “healthy love tips” from Gen Z influencers that not just share gifting and relationship tips but also tips to deal with rejection.
In a post-Covid world, what are the dos and don’ts of digital marketing?
Personalize & differentiate: The post-Covid world has seen a surge in the number of digital first brands – with a consumer scrolling through over 400 feet of thumb content in a day, personalization and differentiation is key to any brand’s success in the digital world. The surge in digital content has also enabled brands with plenty of data – investing in data analytics is now a hygiene factor and no longer just a differentiator.
Invest Wisely: The other must-have element in terms of do’s would be investing in technology. The pandemic has taught the world to survive in an all-digital world giving rise to higher acceptance of features like virtual product trials, live shopping tools, tools to provide a seamless experience between the online and offline journeys for omni-channel brands. These technological investments in addition to delivering better conversions can also improve ROI through cost reduction and increase in efficiency.
Do not ignore the human experience: Consumers are looking for interactive content, hence key to being a part of their everyday life is by creating an interactive conversational experience for them at all touchpoints, as against a one-way information dissemination. This also includes not underestimating the importance of physical stores (for omnichannel brands) and the touch and feel experience that they have been deprived of for the past two years. Ensuring a seamless experience across online and offline touch points is key to success in this fast-paced ever-changing business scenario.
One recent bad case of advertising you have seen, and why?
Creativity is subjective. What contributes to the success of an ad is context, timing, understanding of your audience and a scale up plan to complement it.