As the festive season nears, platforms and brands seem to have already begun preparation to drive maximum return on investment (RoI). Interestingly, the same is the case for Meta. One of its recent studies shows that business messaging continues to grow in India during Diwali. Eight in 10 shoppers used WhatsApp (64%), Instagram (39%) and Messenger (38%) to engage with a business during Diwali. 66% of Diwali shoppers are more likely to consider purchasing from a business if they can contact them via instant messaging. Research further reveals that Meta technology is the most important channel for short-form videos (87%) and creator content (79%).
The proof of the pudding also resides in the fact that Meta posted an 11% increase in advertising revenue to $31.5 billion for the second quarter ended June 30, 2023, from $28.1 billion during the same period in the corresponding year. The rise in ad revenue is believed to have helped the tech giant grow its total revenue by 11% to $32 billion in Q2,2023 from $28.8 billion in Q2,2023. In a conversation with BrandWagon Online Arun Srinivas, director and head – Ads Business, Facebook India (Meta) talks about how the platform has remained relevant for brands (Edited Excerpts)
Despite advertisers’ tightening their purse strings Meta’s ad revenue has grown. Does it worry you as we move towards uncertain times?
We recently announced our global results and I think we got some spectacular results. Globally, the business has grown by double digits. If you look at global headwinds and other issues, our results show that advertisers obviously believe in the power of Meta platforms including all our products – Facebook, WhatsApp and Instagram. So we are very optimistic and we believe our results also show that our platforms deliver return-on-investment.
Personalised content through ads on social channels gained traction especially for Diwali shoppers, with 69% agreeing that it was easier to complete shopping with personalised products and gift suggestions. To what extent has that helped both Facebook and Instagram drive traction from brands? Furthermore, how does AI work in this case?
If you look back artificial intelligence (AI) has been at the heart of whatever we have done since 2006. The feed is typically curated basis of a user’s likes and what she follows. How personalised advertising works is, for example, an e-commerce marketplace owner who wants to sell fashion brands. In this case, if my content is more interesting and if I as a user have liked or followed more activewear brands, I will be shown advertising related to this category. While if you like more ethnic or Indo-western wear, you will be shown content related to that. This is irrespective of gender.
Languages have played a key role in getting users online. In fact, it is expected that going forward languages will not only drive the next set of users as well as revenue – where do Meta’s products stand in the game?
Initially, we had some users from metros besides the top few languages dominating the conversation on our platforms. But what we have seen now is that is out of scale and base, people have started to sign in from remote areas of our country. So at the scale that we operate today, language is no longer a barrier. The scale that we operate, that is we allow people to create content in various languages and businesses can further tap into these content pieces. Furthermore, we tell businesses to create their assets on Instagram in multiple languages, so that the right communication goes to the right audience. Also what we have seen is that large brands can use different ad formats to serve different sets of audiences.
How is the strategy different for millennials versus Gen-Z audiences?
A business typically works with us as Meta first needs. So these businesses develop campaigns which can be used across our platforms. For example, if I develop a still image for my catalogue of footwear. While there is a possibility of me using Instagram before Facebook, but I will also utilise the other platforms. So through AI what we have found out that when the algorithm decides we get better results.
In the last one-two years WhatsApp has evolved as a marketing tool, more so in the CX space. How do you see its role evolving to use targeted messaging for consumers?
WhatsApp started in this country as a person-to-person messaging service but over time what we have seen is that more than 80% of users engage with our messaging service. Also, there are many categories where a user wants more information as a result in our ads we have options now such as ‘Shop now’ which if a user clicks, the chatbot opens and we can have very good engagements. So it is not only about customer service post-purchase of goods, it is also about providing service at the time of buying a product. This is especially true in the case of consumers purchasing cars, who can look at all kinds of features in a car and we can use chatbots through WhatsApp to answer many of their queries as typically cars are bought offline. As for customer service, we have seen huge efficiencies across businesses. What WhatsApp allows is it to resolve consumer queries at a faster pace and lower cost as opposed to calling up a call centre agent, who may not be able to resolve the issue.
While artificial reality and virtual reality were put to a lot of use during Covid – has the use case dropped or picked up?
While many businesses used AR to drive sales and conversions during Covid as there were many constraints at the time, businesses still continue to use it to drive conversation among consumers. There are businesses which are prone to use AR/VR or have a use case. For instance, auto, beauty, fashion and lifestyle are some of the categories which basically run on a trial model. Also, our study shows that there is a noticeable increase in the proportion of Diwali shoppers likely to use AR/VR tools to explore products. Three out of five shoppers feel AR experiences help get them into the Diwali spirit, and ultimately help their purchase decisions.