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Using online to plan outdoor: Brainchild Solutions builds online outdoor inventory
The platform provides site pictures and details, where clients can plot and plan their outdoor campaign
Brainchild Business Solutions, an emerging technology provider for outdoor media companies, has announced the launch of an online solution for outdoor advertisers and agencies.
The solution has been launched through the group's agency business, Brainchild Outdoor Media Solutions. It is an online platform, www.oohcrm.net, where advertisers or their agencies can browse through thousands of outdoor sites, shortlist the sites that fit their TG (target group) and request for quotations for those sites.
There is no fee being charged to use this platform. However, though the service is free, access to it is not open to all. The application access is given on request only to genuine users.
On receiving a request, Brainchild creates an account for each authentic user. The user logs in and can browse the entire inventory list with relevant site level data and photos arranged according to cities, states, media categories and formats. Next, the user selects the specific sites and requests for proposals. Brainchild sends across a proposal within 24 hours and a discussion can take place, offline, between the two parties.
"Our business model is the same as any other OOH media agency. We own a good number of sites now and we have OOH sites from our trusted associates, which we list in oohcrm.net. It's a big opportunity for the media owners to get associated with oohcrm.net. With this, they can present their inventory to a huge media buying audience globally. Also, those media agencies that are operating in specific markets can take this opportunity to enhance their capability to execute pan-India campaigns," says Khan.
For now, the platform covers about 7,000 properties across 650 towns and cities in India. The portal, www.oohcrm.net, showcases all the OOH media offered by Brainchild, including billboards, transit, street furniture, airport, ambient and digital media. The plan is to showcase the outdoor media units from all the Indian states and every city and town with population of more than 5 lakh by end of this year.
The platform not only provides site level data and photos but also gives indicative rates, thus aiding the media plan as per the allocated budget. Finer details about the execution and final pricing are discussed offline between the advertiser/agency and Brainchild's representative.
How does this win over other sites that have similar offerings? A confident Khan says, "We cover entire India, not only metro and mini-metros. For example, from Bihar, we have about 50 cities and towns in our inventory. I am not sure if one can name even five cities from Bihar, unless you belong to Bihar. That is the kind of coverage we are offering."
About a dozen of Brainchild's clients from education, infrastructure and retail sectors have already begun using this application.
Khan concludes, "It will be very interesting to see whether Brainchild will have to compete with big OOH media agencies or, along with them, leverage each other's strength and offer the benefit to the advertisers and the industry as a whole."