Brands are ramping up investments in regional language campaigns to deal with the rising consumer sentiment in Tier-II and Tier-III cities across the country. According to Affle’s Festive Pulse 2025 report, 79% of users engage better with ads in their local language. This has led to 70% of marketers rolling out state-specific campaigns in 2025. Reports suggest regional ad spends have risen by 4-6 percentage points year-on-year, climbing from 20% to 25% of festive budgets. This reflects a key change: vernacular marketing has moved to core strategy for brands.
Regional language influencers are charging 15-30% higher rates from off-season levels, while prime CTV and OTT regional feeds are seeing double-digit CPM hikes. Regional print is also charging higher premiums in Tier-II and III markets, with publishers offering fewer discounts on high-impact days. Digital now accounts for over 40% of ad spends, and about 80% of consumers prefer ads in their own language. Brands are therefore channelling their 10-20% higher festive budgets into multilingual messaging, according to reports.
Despite this spending increase, besides a Coca-Cola here and a Cadbury there, most brands are failing to unlock the full potential of regional advertising. The most common plan? Simply dub national campaigns. Nisha Sampath, managing partner at Bright Angles Consulting, observes: “Too often, brands pay lip service to regionalisation, by changing the endorser, but retaining the same story and message. This is just a little less lazy than just dubbing the Hindi ad in local language.”
The gap between translation and true connection is what separates forgettable campaigns from those that resonate. Sukriti Sekhri, assistant professor of marketing at S.P. Jain Institute of Management and Research, notes that success lies in the details. “A good regional ad should not be a mere translation of the main tagline; rather it could blend meaningfully into the local context, utilising regional idioms, humour, and authentic references.”
Campaigns that get it right understand this principle well. Sekhri points to examples like Amazon India’s ‘Aur Dikhao’ campaign, which tapped into Indian consumers’ variety-seeking behaviour, and Google India’s immersive ads that balance background music, language, setting, and actors to create relatable scenarios. “The secret is authentic localisation, not linguistic adaptation,” says Ramya Ramachandran, founder and CEO of Whoppl.
Yasin Hamidani, director at Media Care Brand Solutions, lays out the winning formula: “The recipe for a good regional ad lies in authentic emotion, cultural fluency, and local storytelling. Use regional language organically, not as an afterthought. Integrate folk music, traditions, and relatable everyday scenarios.”