"Media agencies will have to lead brands": CVL Srinivas, GroupM

At the recently held Ad Club Media Review, CVL Srinivas spoke about the ever-changing role of media agencies in a borderless, always connected world.

CVL Srinivas, CEO, South Asia, GroupM, spoke on 'Redefining the role of media agencies in a borderless world' at the Advertising Club's Media Review held in Delhi recently.

Beginning his address, Srinivas traced the evolution of the media agencies over 20-odd years highlighting that this is the best possible phase for the industry. According to him, a host of changes in the marketing and media industry has transformed the way media agencies operate.

Srinivas exemplified the 'borderless world' through a Facebook map which was released by the social network's engineering team in 2010. Then Facebook had 500 million user logins which has now gone up to staggering 1.35 billion every month.

"This picture sums up the connected world that we are living in today sans the geographical boundaries," he says.

Brands, today, have to stay not just relevant but also meaningful as the consumer is a lot more connected, empowered and knowledgeable.

"It also has a meaning for the agencies as well who do not have to just act as trusted advisors of the brands but rather move up the value chain and lead the brands," noted Srinivas adding that apart from chasing scale, size and volume, agencies now have to be aware of new developments, understanding technology and data and extracting insights out of it.

"Connected world makes the agencies' work more involving and encompassing," he highlighted.

Srinivas listed down a number of disruptive trends that are affecting media agencies. The first, according to him, is multi-screening. He quoted a Millward Brown study on Ad Reactions which states that consumers who possess a smartphone spend 30-40 per cent of their TV viewing time toggling between the two screens while those who own notebook or an ipad spend 50-60 per cent of their TV viewing time on the second screen.

"It is a disruption in the way content or advertising is being consumed by the user. This pushes the media agencies to devise interesting content strategies to get the attention of the consumers," he asserted.

The other trend, he said, is e-commerce which is the biggest disruptor in marketing. Unlike media agency's traditional role of putting through the communication now they can be involved in the last mile activity (in this case the sale on the e-commerce platform).

'Brands becoming publisher' or a 'Franchise of content' is the third trend says Srinivas. Red Bull setting up a Media House globally to promote the brand especially through sports content, Pepsi forging content partnership with MTV creating a niche channel MTV Indies and Unilever rolling out exclusive movies for television with MTV released digitally are few examples of this ongoing trend.

"Such initiatives make media agencies provide up holistic content solutions to brands," he added.

Digital devices being used in the activation activities has allowed agencies an opportunity to put science behind leading them to move up the value chain.

In his opinion, it is also crucial to lend a careful ear to the young blood of the organisation as they are the digital natives who understand the medium well. He mentioned the Youth Executive Committee (YCO) that the agency has set up across brands which along with Executive Committee XCO (senior leadership team) help take the right call for its clients.

Putting focus of 'data' in the media agency operation, Srinivas said that media planning will have to move from contextual to audience planning which is possible through data. Programmatic buying is also possible today because of data.

"This helps agencies to put out campaigns for relevant consumers," he quipped.

He concluded the address by mentioning two recent campaigns that his agency did for Google and Amazon India and Honda Mobilio. For the former, the agency created an online platform titled 'Grand Diwali Male' started on October 2 till Diwali. The website had all kinds of categories including real estate, automobiles, consumer durables, electronics, FM CG products, music and entertainment.

The latter is the digital launch of the Honda Mobilio featuring comedian Kapil Sharma. The client brief, he says, was to make an otherwise serious technology heavy brand like Honda more emotional and fun.

"Clients get good work if they give us interesting briefs. This shows the power of content, data and targeting the right audience," he concluded.