Influencer marketing is here and well to stay, with the number of brands and adoption to it increasing day by day
Shahir Muneer, Founder and Director,Divo
Divo has been at forefront of digital media especially in the Southern regional markets and having 3 service lines across online video creation & aggregation, music and digital marketing. Having our finger in the pie across these markets we have been able to work very closely with content creators and brands/advertisers.
Here are 5 areas we will see as our Focus 2021.
Rise of Regional brands on digital
Regional brands especially in the retail and FMCG sectors have still been more traditional media focused, despite the large online audience already present across regional markets. 2021 is where we will see more investments from these brands to digital. The investments would not necessarily be limited to just digital advertising and web/mobile assets like e-Commerce sites, but also towards branded content, influencer marketing, and the entire spectrum. These brands will discover now digital advertising is beyond branding and reach, but performance as well.
Music DIY
With the limited set of films that have come out, more and more artists, both upcoming and established are making time to put out content that fills their creative liberties and reaches out to the audience directly. This is where a music label per se in the traditional sense may not have a say, and Artists will prefer to work with DIY music distribution services while retaining copyright and majority, if not all of the royalties from streaming and other revenue sources.
Key Opinion Leaders – KOLs
Influencer marketing is here and well to stay, with the number of brands and adoption to it increasing day by day. From the biggest brands to startups are seeing value in it, not just for a perspective of reach, but also engagement and outcomes. However, as brands mature in their approach, they are also clear that a premium can only be paid to an influencer if he/she has the influence to be able to achieve these engagements and outcome from their audience. This is where the rise of KOLs come, influencers who are not just posting random selfies and videos but have a specialized approach towards a specific category and is being seen as an expert in that field and hence a key opinion leader.
Ramya Subramanian is one such similar case, where she has over past couple of years shed her TV anchor image and focused to be a fitness and health expert by investing her time in broadening her knowledge and experience in it with certifications, etc. plus making digital content across YouTube and social media to cater to the digital audience.
Outcome based models for advertisers
Advertisers investing in digital marketing, branded content, influencer marketing, who have spent enough resources over the past couple of years, are maturing in their approach to these modes and mediums and are looking beyond impressions or eyeballs. Focusing on outcome – such as engagements, sales, installs, etc. We are already seeing brands looking at each platform, each content, and each post, on what tangible outcome they get. Hence the more engaging the platform is or the content creator/influencer is the more chances for their opportunities to work with advertisers increase. These is where companies like us, spend time analyzing data, providing industry best practices for strategy, implementation, marketing, comes in to picture to work towards the goal for better engagements to lead to a higher outcome for advertisers.
Short Video Apps
With the demise of TikTokin India, the void it created has resulted in multiple short video apps rise in 2020. While many claims to have the user base and installs to make it among the top apps in the country, there may be more clarity coming in 2021 to know which of the apps go on to become a market leader and make impact. The biggest USP of TikTokwas the mass adoption from tier 2, 3, 4 users not just to consume, but also create content and making it the biggest UGC platform, such that advertisers were also flocking to it. Will be interesting to see which of these apps break out and grow to reach that mass, until then, content creators investing time on all these apps cannot be ignored as well as they would need to grow their base. So, we will be seeing media companies, content creators, using these platforms for discovery, cross-promotion and it will be part of our focus 2021 as well.
