In today’s landscape, most brands are experiencing marketing budget cuts and looking for more affordable and result oriented channels like programmatic advertising which can deliver an impeccable ROI. The ‘new normal’ in the advertising and marketing industry is being interactive, informative, and creative. Brands are constantly focusing on creating shoppable landing pages and creating new online stores. Supply and distribution are becoming more important than demand, so it’s very crucial for brands to stay in touch with their B2B audiences as well as retailers, distributors, ‘kirana’ stores. Also, this is a time where brands are now exploring partnerships beyond regular e-commerce and hyperlocal delivery apps and looking for a more meaningful connection with consumers in categories like online education, digital wallets, and other utility apps.
Paradigm shift in consumer behavior
A big shift in consumer behavior as more people start searching and reading content around homeschooling, parenting, immunity, fitness videos, personal hygiene, pet care, healthy cooking, and eating. Apart from the usual prime time late evening slots, we are seeing more prominence from 12 pm to 2 pm slot across news, OTT, gaming, and OTT platforms. The bigger question is after this pandemic period which
behaviors will return to what they were like before, which will stabilize for a while, and which will get changed for good? On the media buying front, in case of biddable media, we are seeing a trend of a floor price decline by 15% to 20% week-on-week and a similar reduction in non-biddable inventory as well. However, the bigger challenge for marketers now is around advertising goals and strategies that are understandably shifting. Brands today need a deeper understanding of what’s driving real-time results to plan, execute, and measure the success of their media investments better.
Time to redefine
Being a marketer, one must stay focused on both short and long-term goals as well as always look out for new growth opportunities. But most importantly in crisis times as such brands must take responsibility as consumers need reassurance and they are noticing which brands are playing an active role in their lives and which ones have retreated. Going dark or silent during these times might cost brands heavily in the longer run, as active brands would like to take the advantage to create a halo effect and establish themselves as leaders in their industries. Our recommendation to all brands is to focus on accelerating digital experience and eCommerce capabilities, build new
audience cohorts by using offline data models from pre COVID period like retail, POS, POI, location in combination with current online behavior of same audience cohorts through advanced data modeling exercises. And most importantly prepare for the rebound strategy for the coming ‘The New Abnormal’.
Authored by Bharat Khatri, Country Head – Xaxis India
