Mumbai: What makes for a good ad – A question that has left many an advertiser and creative mind in a state of constant flux. During the Ad Review by The Advertising Club held last evening, industry stalwarts attempted to answer this question with recent examples of campaigns that have left a lasting impression. The session titled ‘Who Cares. vs Who cares?’ was kicked off by the Raj Nayak, President, The Ad Club and saw Agnello Dias, Co-founder and Chief Creative Officer, Dentsu Taproot India, and Josy Paul, Chairman & Chief Creative Officer, BBDO address the need for clever advertising. The session was moderated by Subhajit Sen ,CMO,Micromax informatics ltd.
Flagging off the event and setting the tone for the evening, Raj Nayak, President, The Advertising Club, said, “It has been our constant endeavor to encourage an inclusive analysis of our work from within our industry. I am thankful to Agnello, Josy and Subhajit for their enthusiasm in partaking the Ad Review, 2016 and hope tonight’s session leaves both the creative and the business minds of our industry with a more in-depth understanding of our work. Also, I’d like to thank Bhaskar Das for helping us curate tonight’s event.”
Agnello Dias took to stage a very powerful point of view – everyone cares and everyone has an opinion. He addressed the challenge of new age and emphasized on the point that communication has become a mass spectator sport. He said, “We live in fractured times and it is getting increasingly challenging to make an ad that cuts across all that clutter. Especially now when times have changed where you are going through a trialogue compared to previously when there was a dialogue. Now everyone has an opinion even though they may not be your target audience, and they will be influencing you consumer. This is the challenge in the new age.”
Some of the examples of good campaigns for the year were Lifebuoy’s Chamki as one that is talking to a broad audience even though the target audience is fixed. Similarly Ariel’s ‘Share the Load’ to highlight the aspect that a detergent brand could cut across categories because of the appeal of the theme.
Josy Paul brought out an important point of context building being important more so than content. He said, “In order to change the game much more importance needs to be given to context. Content is fleeting whereas context is something that will be remembered.”
Elaborating on campaigns that focus on context setting, he showcased campaigns by OLX, Whisper’s Touch The Pickle, Barbie and Airtel – campaigns that start and grow conversations. He laid emphasis on the fact that context, be it social, gender related or nation related, helps make heroes of the brands that use them.
Subhajit Sen, who moderated the session concluded, “In the end a good ad is one that makes the CFO happy; one that generates profits and sales. Not to forget that social media has indeed changed the way we are making ads and it is something to be cognizant off.”
Bipin Pandit, CEO, The Ad Club, proposed the vote of thanks at The Ad Review 2016.
The Annual Ad Review, held by The Advertising Club endeavors to be a great ideas exchange that has the power and the ability to educate, study, and objectively analyze all the work that the industry has collectively done in the year gone by. The Advertising Review has successfully provided introspection and insight into the dynamics of the advertising industry and also presented a roadmap of evolving consumer and industry trends.
