Occupying a major share of the marketing budget pie, digital marketing is not only crucial but the need of the hour. With newer technologies sprouting every second day, it has become essential for marketers to be ahead of times and cater to their TG. Digital marketing is important in not only acquiring new customers but also retaining existing ones. In our weekly BrandWagon Ad Talk series, industry experts highlight what has changed over the years and more importantly, are these changes here to stay. Hayden Scott, creative head APAC, Virtue Worldwide – The Agency powered by VICE Group, talks to BrandWagon Online, about the dos and don’ts of digital marketing, best marketing campaigns, and more. (Edited Excerpts)
What is the difference between launching a brand in today’s digital era versus earlier?
Today digital is everything and everything is digital. Agencies in the years gone by, would focus all their efforts on cracking that one big idea when launching a brand. And when they did this, they would congratulate each other and go home for the day. Today, while you still need to have a big idea, you can’t forget about the many small ideas that are essential support for your big idea and will ultimately give it reach and scale it needs to stand out in a fragmented media environment.
What are the recent best marketing or advertising campaigns you have seen and why?
I loved the recent Cadbury’s My Birthday Song campaign. Excellent coming together of voice AI, a true insight and brand purpose.
Which brand in the last year has made the best use of digital and how?
It’s the brands that are born and raised on the internet that are doing the best work. I largely like the stuff Swiggy has done in the last year. The work has a craft and connectedness across platforms that is quite rare today.
In a post-Covid world, what are the dos and don’ts of digital marketing?
While being present across every platform is great, content pollution is not. Post pandemic we are seeing more and more people facing screen fatigue. If we address this by creating more useless communication we as an industry are shooting ourselves in the foot. Sometimes, saying less can say more about you as a brand.
Can we stop calling it “digital advertising”? This siloed approach to communication (digital, mainline etc) died ten years ago and the pandemic was the final nail in the coffin. Today, we identify what we want to say and then figure out the best way to say it across mediums and platforms.
One recent bad case of advertising you have seen, and why?
No agency wakes up in the morning vowing to put out bad work. No client does this either. And in case it is work that doesn’t meet a particular standard then one has to be cognisant of the fact that many circumstances go into creating a piece of work for better or for worse. To comment on any one particular piece as “bad” based on my limited understanding of what happened behind the scenes, would be incredibly unfair.