Meghna.Sharma@expressindia.com

Volkswagen, amidst battling the emissions scandal in 2015, launched a 70-second digital-only film titled Ode to the Bug in India. The campaign was the first to promote Beetle in the country and used the platform to reach out to the car’s ardent fans.

The German car maker isn’t at the forefront to launch a digital-first campaign to reach its target audience. Many brands across sectors have ditched traditional mediums over time. Mondelez India launched a digital campaign for its new variant of Oreo cookies on Facebook and Twitter. Or take jewellery brands like ORRA and Gitanjali. The brands have not only earmarked higher digital marketing budgets but also taken their digital media plan across various platforms including display networks, Google AdWords and YouTube.

The reason for this is simple — #DigitalIndia. According to GroupM’s This Year, Next Year report, 2016 will see an increase in digital advertising, with the Digital AdEx estimated to grow by 40% to Rs 6,525 crore from Rs 4,661 crore in the previous year. A significant part of this growth is on the back of higher investments in cross-screen campaigns. The digital AdEx is estimated to take an 11.3% share of the total AdEx in 2016.

As digital moves from being just a check-box in a marketing mix, brands as well as advertising and media agencies are finding innovative ways to be relevant digitally. Although most network agencies have launched their digital arms or have bought independent digital agencies to stay on top of the digital game, it is impertinent to ask: in the process of moving from traditional to digital, is the brand voice integration getting messed up? Are traditional and digital agencies working in such silos that the brand appears inconsistent on different media vehicles?

A brand identity

Think pug and Vodafone’s (then Hutch) You and I in this beautiful world comes to mind. Well, that is brand voice for you —  a personality, a signature mnemonic, a voiceover or theme that creates a brand image/association and leaves lasting impressions on consumer minds.

A brand voice, and its consistency across channels, is more important today than ever before. This, especially in an environment where user generated branded content is rampant. One has to admit that the digital economy has brought in a slew of changes in the areas of brands controlling conversations, consumer attention spans and media consumption patterns.

That digital channels allow a two-way interaction between brands and consumers, unlike the linear narrative of print and television, is no surprise. But recently, even television is turning more interactive in nature, points out Ashok Lalla, an independent digital and marketing advisor.

Sadly, a lot of digital and social media work for brands in India is limited to the specific platforms and based on low level metrics such as Likes and Shares. “Digital channels are newer yes, but rapidly developing and based on the audience to be reached, they also enable brand messages to reach large groups. The point really is that this so called conflict is only in the minds of advertisers and marketers,” highlights Tripti Lochan, CEO, South East Asia & India, VML Qais. “The consumer doesn’t consume content/ advertising thinking whether it’s on a digital or traditional medium.”

It can broadly be said that the brands that make digital a part of their permanent marketing mix are more successful than those that just test waters and do not make a sustained effort. “Being on digital is a commitment and only those who persistently spend on it can hope to make any impact,” asserts Virinder Villkhoo, creative director, Experience Commerce.

But who does the onus fall on to ensure integration actually happens — the client, the network agency or the digital specialist? “The onus of making sure the brand voice isn’t lost when a specialised digital agency and a main-stream agency are working for it is on the client,” points out Social Street co-founder and chairman Pratap Bose. “Because if the two work on different things, it could lead to an issue. The client needs to brief them together so that there is integration.”

From the advertiser’s perspective, the digital and real world manifestations of the brand are merely different faces of the same single holistic entity. Says Sanjay Tripathy, senior executive VP, marketing, product, digital and e-commerce, HDFC Life, “When a consumer turns to either the digital world or the physical world to seek out a brand, her expectations from the brand are medium-agnostic. So, consistency is what the client is expecting.” HDFC Life has created a brand book which chronicles the personality of the brand, as well as marks out all the communication rules, dos and don’ts, so that consistency across the board can be maintained, agnostic of the medium.

15 seconds of fame

Every year, India sends its best work to the Cannes Lions. However, if we go by last year’s wins, one cannot deny that in new media categories, India lags way behind. Having said that, recent months have seen a number of ‘viral’ campaigns from numerous brands, whether we talk of Biba’s Change is Beautiful or Fortune Oil’s Ghar ka Khana, the campaigns generated conversations both online and offline. But did they convert into action? Is the focus on creating viral digital films or do brands and advertising agencies want something more from such exercises?

“We are wary of introducing ‘scale’ into digital ideas. It is an understandable obstacle… when on the learning curve of possibilities, advertisers would rather take baby steps,” says Chraneeta Mann, co-founder, The Mob. Concurs Anil K Nair, CEO and managing partner, Digital L&K Saatchi & Saatchi, “We are still a roti, kapda, makaan nation. We have just about added basic Wi-Fi to this triumvirate. For us, pure-play engagement and technology innovation are still a luxury for most clients. But I believe that the winds are changing.”

S Yesudas’s start-up, triggerbridge, advocates marketers to unlearn what they have over the years. “Today mass media is changing into smaller groups and moving towards conversations. One mustn’t forget that the consumer will remember the campaign if it makes her feel something,” he says while adding, “If a digital agency can help a brand create conversations then a brand should rather opt for it rather than a traditional agency, and vice versa.” India is slowly understanding the power of new media. Big agencies are trying to test shallow waters first, and hence we do not see too many groundbreaking campaigns. Having said that, new age categories like e-commerce, in a race for eyeballs and downloads, have been guilty of ignoring tried and tested brand building paradigms. But given increasing competition and tightening investor purse strings, we can see a return to the basics and some effort in creating a sustainable positioning. Take Amazon for instance. The e-commerce platform is creating interesting work on traditional mediums especially TV to drive consumers online.

Breaking free

New media is dynamic and forever evolving. “The knowledge of a 40 year-old of the digital medium would be very different from that of a 20-something. That is the reason why brands believe that traditional agencies don’t have the experience and opt for specialised agencies to fill the void,” asserts Bose. Last year saw a host of start-ups in this space, something which isn’t new to the ad world. But what is worth-noticing is the fact that most of them claim to be ‘holistic’ agencies.

Why these new firms are shying away from terming themselves as ad agencies is the million dollar question. Most of them, started by senior creative professionals who have spent years in the industry, claim to have an offering different from the network agencies they have worked for. One cannot ignore the fact that the creative officers launching these start-ups have business counterparts who are much older to them.

The younger Davids, in some sense, are collaborating with the Goliath mindset. Take the latest agency Thinkstr’s Satbir Singh for instance. At FCB Ulka, the last agency he was stationed at before launching his own, Singh worked with MG Parameswaran who, as executive director and CEO, is much more experienced than him. Though no one wants to admit it aloud, the buzz within the industry is that the age gap plays an important role in the integration conflict.

“While everyone talks about integration, very few want to move from their comfort zones,” says a senior creative officer from a major advertising agency, who doesn’t wish to be named, adding, “Integration is the most talked about word, but least implemented.” Nonetheless, some smart brands have realised that the future is about marketing and communications in a digital world, rather than digital marketing in a traditional (analog) world. And that future is now!

@meghna0101