Interview: Rajdeepak Das, CCO, Publicis Groupe South Asia, & chairman, Leo Burnett, South Asia

Leo Burnett has had an amazing run in 2023. Besides posting double-digit growth over last year’s revenue, it has won over 50 international awards and returned as India’s number-one agency from the Cannes Lions International Festival of Creativity. Rajdeepak Das, chairman, Leo Burnett, South Asia, & the recently appointed chief creative officer of Publicis Groupe South Asia, spoke to Akanksha Nagar about the ways technology is changing advertising and the things that remain constant. Edited excerpts:

Has the definition of creativity changed with technology taking centrestage?

My work is driven by two anchors – people and product. Our focus will be to create work that is truly world-class, scalable, and makes a real difference for ‘people’ because what is good for the people is good for the brands. People don’t get up in the morning to use a particular brand – if you are not relevant in their life, they will reject you. So, you have to be authentic, have to understand the cultural cues and the brands’ purpose to unlock truly amazing work that resonates with audiences. Creativity, data, and technology are the holy trifecta for success. Use these to create campaigns that are impactful and real. My vision is to create work that solves real problems and impacts billions of people and this will unlock the true power of creativity.

With third-party cookie support ending, what are the new ways for advertisers to collect consumer data?

Creating your ecosystem of first-party data will be the key element for success going forward. First-party data offers extensive opportunities to strengthen client relationships via owned media. It helps us manage customer identities correctly, and build trust, it also enables us to make meaningful conversations with audiences which in turn helps to elevate the human experience at every interaction. To scale your data, you could partner with Google, Facebook, and other social media apps, and e-commerce platforms to utilise it as a seed to connect with audiences.

Leo Burnett did well at international festivals. What’s the secret sauce?

It’s been a historic year for the agency—it had double-digit growth over last year’s revenue and it witnessed a revenue growth of 48% over the pandemic year (FY 2020) revenue, and won over 80% of the pitches participated. We are not a commodity business but a people’s business—the products that we give to the client are the people and work that they are creating. Our biggest investment in 2024 is going to be getting the right people and spending time training and empowering them – which is the ‘Burnett way of working’. The revenue for the agency is a healthy mix between new-age and established clients.

There’s much hullabaloo in the tech area — around GenAI, metaverse et al. What impact will these have on advertising?

AI is already transforming the way we create content. It is a platform that offers the opportunity to not just turbocharge the growth but also revamp the way we work. But the trick to creating magic is combining the tech with the strategy and processes; the first step is understanding the potential of AI and how best it can be used to solve the clients’ problems. For that, we are running several learning programmes to upskill our teams on AI. We recently concluded a month-long AI Hackfest that saw participation from brands and practices across the Groupe to harness the potential of generative AI ideas. Overall, we are incubating ideas, events, and programs to truly adapt AI into our solutions for the brand partners.

Interview: Rajdeepak Das, CCO, Publicis Groupe South Asia, & chairman, Leo Burnett, South Asia

‘Creativity, data and technology is the holy trifecta for success’