At O&M, we constantly push ourselves to outdo our own performance.

Working for the numero uno advertising agency in India can’t be an easy task surely. But even after nine years at O&M, Sanjay Thapar, president, O&M, Delhi, seems to love the challenge his job poses. In his own words, he is a true ‘O&M-ite’ at heart, no matter which branch he heads.

Thapar, an IIM graduate from Lucknow, began his career in sales at Bata. He left that organisation eight years later as brand manager to move on to the ad world, where he worked for agencies such as Ma Bozell and Mudra. He moved to O&M, Kolkata, as the branch head in 1998.

Since 2002, Thapar has been heading O&M, Delhi, and, apparently, enjoying every minute of it. In a frank discussion with Sujata Dogra of agencyfaqs!, Thapar reveals his plans for O&M, Delhi, and how the ad scenario in Delhi is going to boom vis-à-vis the rest of India...

Edited Excerpts

During the period that I was working at Bata, I used to interact with a number of people from the ad world. I got fascinated increasingly by the excitement and flurry of activities associated with the ad world.

After eight years of being associated with Bata, I got an opportunity to work with Ma Bozell, where I was in charge of retail communications. Then, before moving to O&M, Kolkata, as the branch head in 1998, I did a small stint with Mudra.

Finally, in 2002, I moved on to take charge of the Delhi branch of O&M. Delhi, with its fast-growing market and wide-ranging client portfolio, proved to be really challenging and gave me a king-size role to play.

I don’t think the advertising culture changes with the place. I am an ‘O&M-ite’ at heart, whether I’m in Kolkata or Delhi. However, I do find that there’s a shift in terms of the priority and one’s approach to objectives or targets. In a market such as Delhi, one needs to strategise and focus rigorously on business plans.

When I came to Delhi, my focus was to consolidate existing accounts and get new businesses, which could be either acquiring new dealings or getting more business from existing clients. The key to securing new businesses is to treat our clients as our partners and literally live and breathe the brands in order to know them thoroughly.

Some of the major clients of O&M Delhi then were Hutch, American Express, Seagram, Dabur and Perfetti. Different brands bring different challenges, and this does require a fair number of structural changes. It is important to work across all the divisions, whether it is advertising, activation or direct marketing. For some of our clients such as American Express and Hutch, we formed a core team, which worked under one brand custodian. In this way, we brought in greater consistency and flow of mutual thoughts and ideas.

Over the years, we have added a number of big businesses to our kitty, such as Hindustan Times, Maruti, LG and Glaxo Smithkline.

The Delhi market is growing much faster than Mumbai. And for the last three years, we at O&M, Delhi, have been catching up with the Mumbai branch. The business opportunities in Delhi are plenty. We do have some plans for our Delhi office. And I am sure that sooner or later; we will definitely grow faster than the Mumbai branch.

Mumbai has been the hub of financial services and advertising for a long time. That’s definitely not going to change soon as most of the advertising agencies have their head offices there. However, as far as creativity is concerned, I don’t think Delhi is being overshadowed by Mumbai in any respect.

In 2004, O&M, Delhi, won two bronzes at Cannes, one for the Concern India Foundation and the other for Hutch. Even this year, we have won a silver at Cannes for ‘A: Door’. In addition, Duracell was one of the finalists at the One Show. The kind of work that we have delivered makes me believe that O&M, Delhi, is definitely among the top ten agencies in the world.

My prediction is that new sectors will move to Delhi and new avenues will open up. So, obviously, there’ll be greater business opportunities. We must focus on specific needs and try and provide specific solutions for those needs.

When we receive a client’s brief, we first try and locate the business related problems. We then try and leverage the solution on a 360-degree plan, rather than concentrate only on the advertising aspect.

In the process, we try and move towards providing a constructive communications solution, which includes advertising, direct marketing and activation. However, that does not mean we will ignore the creative aspect completely. Ultimately, it is ideas that rule this business. What we want to achieve is a 360-degree communications solution provider led by great creative work. And this is the biggest challenge for us.

Winning awards can actually represent so many perspectives. For us, the ‘big idea’ is the product, which we translate into creative work. If our product brings in rewards, it increases the level of confidence and trust from the client’s side.

Secondly, awards help in creating a benchmark for oneself. We make a conscious effort to beat ourselves at our own game in order to keep the graph rising all the time.

I personally feel that if your work doesn’t get an award, it is because it did not deserve it, irrespective of who the judges were, or whether they were biased. I think people will say whatever they want to say. If an agency cannot perform, then there is no point in blaming the jury.

It is true that our agencies sweep most of the awards. However, it is not as if we are the only ones to win. Yes, I do believe we have done very good work and there’s no harm if we get recognition for it. I don’t think that just because we win, that automatically gets accounted to being biased.

Sometime back, we took a conscious decision to not participate in too many national awards. We thought of doing this because we wanted to put pressure on ourselves and raise our own standards. We decided to make international awards our benchmark. Since, in India, the Abby’s is the most prestigious awards, we chose to take part only in that.

I don’t think creative guys follow a Westernised approach. A great idea always becomes universal. In some cases, Western casting may be required, but the execution should be such that the idea comes to light. I do not spot any kind of a trend where I can clarify that we follow a Westernised format. Maybe certain categories do reflect that, but those are completely contextual.

Indirect advertising is an integral part of the business. In fact, O&M’s indirect divisions, such as activation, public relations and direct marketing, constitute around one-third of the agency’s total revenues. For instance, Ogilvy Activation has come a long way. It has actually revamped itself into an out-of-home communicator. In the coming year, we have plans to concentrate more on this. We’ll be conducting a number of on-ground activities such as events, shows and display stalls at various retail stores.

We have a number of specialised tools and practices that we use. In fact, we have a knowledge centre that specifically designs methods to help us develop our core ideas. There are tools and techniques for all kinds of strategies. Most of our tools are proprietary tools.

One such tool is called the 360 Degree Brand Stewardship Principle. It helps us access the equity of the brand and its competitor’s strengths so that, accordingly, we can devise a strategy to strengthen the brand’s position.

We have to constantly challenge ourselves and keep on providing the correct solutions to our clientele, solutions that encompass all the four disciplines of direct marketing, advertising, public relations and activation.

Yes, we are way ahead of the others as per the AC Nielsen study. And when there is a big gap between us and our next competitor, the need to benchmark against ourselves increases. If tomorrow, our competitor reduces the gap, then the pressure will definitely build upon us and we’ll push ourselves even further. However, having said that, I think that even now, we are constantly pushing ourselves to outdo our own performance.