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Mr. Kunjesh Parihar, MD and CEO, Ad Space Mart (Mumbai) provides a marketers’ perspective on the effectiveness of OOH beyond India’s metros
Considering the lagging power situation in several states inIndiaas well as how low literacy levels are, OOH has emerged as the perfect medium to reach village folks. It is particularly efficient for marketers who need to localise their communication. Traditional OOH like hoardings are extremely affordable when it comes to non metros and have no power requirements during the day. However, traditional OOH cannot be controlled; its lack of flexibility is its biggest handicap for advertisers. Fortunately, DOOH networks that comprise digital audio and audio-visual networks fill these gaps by meeting a spectrum of requirements demanded by advertisers for their campaigns in non-metros.
Far Exceeding the Effectiveness of OOH
Modern breakthroughs in DOOH enable advertising to be completely controlled and managed from a remote location. This unique form of outdoor effectively overcomes all the barriers of traditional outdoor, becoming an agent of change in the OOH advertising space. Along with these virtues, cost and time efficiency makes DOOH an alluring medium. This effectiveness and efficiency comes from the DOOH network’s wide reach to 100 million people, at less than a paise per person. Due to guaranteed listening its impact becomes 100%, while its cost is 10% of the cost of other traditional medium like TV, radio and print. Since the medium has an added advantage of reaching out to media dark areas through audio, effective communication is ensured notwithstanding the local level of literacy.
Ensuring Greater Impact
In order to be impactful, the DOOH communication should be localised and customised considering the sentiments of local people. It should empathise with social issues and problems and acknowledge events in the region. By employing local brand ambassadors, a powerful connect can be built with rural populations. These criteria works particularly well for advertising of telecom services and mobile phones; banking and insurance; agriculture and rural industry related products and services; consumer durables including vehicles and finally FMCG goods.
Summing Up
Traditional OOH is still ranked fourth with respect to advertisement budgets after TV, print and radio since it has been unorganised and lacked control so far. DOOH innovators like Vritti i-Media are working towards making outdoor a bankable medium, and make it a priority area. While OOH can never be a stand alone medium, new-age DOOH networks boast of several success stories; the likes of Gujarat Tea Traders and SBI, where there were no other traditional media used by clients. FMCG Company Kirti Gold has completely relied on Vritti i-Media’s DOOH media, and does not use any other traditional medium for publicity.
As marketers, we should allocate 25% of our budget for OOH. It is only about 5-10% today. The medium has the potential to go a long way in bringing rural India into the fold of consumerism.
Most marketers these days acknowledge that the largest, most challenging as well as the most lucrative consumer groups today, reside far beyond our metros. More and more people are recognising a truth about Indiathat Mahatma Gandhi, the father of our nation, noticed decades ago—that it is a country with boundless potential at the grassroots. Indeed, the consumer market is not only growing but becoming more sophisticated in our hinterlands due to a rising standard of living in small towns and villages. A recent study by MART shows that milk supplement brands like Bournvita and Horlicks and a variety of electronic goods have now made their way into rural households. According to Hindustan Thompson Associates’ research arm, IMRB International, in the FMCG category, milk food and drinks has witnessed tremendous expansion in rural volumes to 41% in 2011 over the previous year. Better options in healthcare, real estate and education are auguring this hunger among the emerging consumer class. These signs are promising because they signify an important shift in the Indian consumer market.
Choosing the right medium
Given this backdrop of golden optimism, the problem that most marketers continue to face revolves around attracting this consumer group. To create a bridge, marketers firstly need to understand the rural mindset and tap the right nerves. For instance, modernisation or not, Indian villages continue to suffer gaping inequities relating to infrastructure. The availability and adequacy of power continues to be a pressing concern in small towns and villages. Given such handicaps, advertising to this population through TV channels like Doordarshan cannot guarantee visibility. On the other hand, it is possible to create alternative touch points. In small towns and villages, locals are seen regularly travelling intra-district or further for studying, employment, shopping, legal work or business. The opportunity to reach them while they are on road can invaluably help advertisers connect to the masses. In fact, advertising on a local level has a better chance to connect to people than through TV and cable. It enhances not only brand visibility, but also brand loyalty. For instance, Vritti i-Media’s OOH audio network medium has helped advertisers draw impressive enquiries. Given lower literacy levels, such media also allow masses to easily grasp audio and visual content better than newspapers.
Creating a memorable campaign
Speaking of OOH, hoardings, information boards, ST bus panels, public vehicle branding, pole kiosks and audio networks for announcements at ST bus stands are among the most successful offerings of Vritti i-Media for rural reach. These modes offer fabulous opportunities to advertisers to communicate interact and engage with people when they are on the move for work, education or recreation. Yet, the real challenge is styling OOH or Digital OOH (DOOH) communication to aptly convince the audience. So, it is important for communication to be different, unique and relevant. A right balance should be created between disseminating and withholding information, with regard to the advertisement, so as to create curiosity about the brand.
For effective OOH, the core idea should be simple and easy to grasp. The OOH campaign should be unique and clutter-free, while the theme should resonate with the social fabric of the region to trigger mass sentiment or a wow factor. Vritti i-Media’s Digital OOH audio network at ST Bus stands, for example, garners plentiful interest of its captive audience as it integrates advertisements with content of public utility. Since advertisements are meshed with bus arrival and departure announcements, it engrains the advertising message in the minds of alert travellers, presumably people who impact buying decisions in their households. This is a very innovative concept and has worked well for several prominent brands inIndia.
Rural insight
An interesting case is that of 9X Jhakas, a newly launched Marathi music channel. Since the intent was attracting residents of small towns inMaharashtra, Vritti i-Media adopted a cent-percent OOH approach for them. To this end, an MSRTC bus was hired and embellished with the brand identity of 9X Jhakaas. The bus was then used to provide free rides to commuters. Audio announcements as well as hoardings and sign boards were further put up at MSRTC bus stands to inform masses about the free rides provided by 9X Jhakaas. The point was to garner significant captive audience through the rides for ensuing engagements with them during their travel by the bus, which included quiz contests and music shows. Participants were awarded a range of freebies. The initiative was a true 360-degree awareness connect through an outdoor medium for rural masses and its success helped 9X Jhakas reach out to more than 15 target districts in Maharashtra.
Given the growing dynamism of life in metros and beyond, such a 360-degree integrated approach can immensely impact consumers. Appropriate implementation of an integrated marketing strategy will vary as per industry vertical and dictate which medium will have greatest impact when coupled with OOH. For instance, FMCG sector loves to combine outdoor with TV, while banks go for a 360-degree approach by roping in TV, newspaper, radio and outdoor media. Today, DOOH media such as Vritti i-Media’s audio and audio-visual networks bring both, time and cost efficiency to the table. They are the very embodiment of dynamism in rural advertising today and are extremely affordable as well. Given the invaluable benefit of reaching consumers inIndia’s remotest areas, the relevance of DOOH will only increase in times to come.
The ‘banker to every Indian,’ State Bank of India (SBI) is the country’s largest BFSI entity by revenue, assets and market capitalisation. With 13,000 outlets including 150 located abroad, the branches of this state-owned corporation can be found literally anywhere an Indian might aspire to travel. Its reputation as a trusted banker has been concretised since 1806, so much so, that it was ranked the 29th most reputed company in the world by Forbes in 2009. Indeed, inIndia, SBI represents trust and financial stability, and the company decided to leverage this perception in rural areas.
Despite being a household brand name in rural India, a common belief was that SBI is acutely selective in providing loans and that their systems are cumbersome. In a bid to alter these believes, the bank brought Vritti i-Media on board to promote its loan offerings and position itself as a one-stop-shop for all rural borrowing needs. The offered loans comprise SBI Tractor Scheme loan and crop loans (for farmers), as well as home loans and car loans (for middle class employed people). In addition, the bank promoted gold loans to farmers, small retail businessman and other lower and lower middle class people in Maharashtra. The aim of the exercise was to reinforce the fact that it is easy to get loans from SBI, and that villagers can approach the bank to meet their needs of tractors, a house, farm or dairy purchase.
Before its campaign with Vritti i-Media, SBI invested heavily in terms of cost and time for reaching out to rural markets through newspapers, OOH and below-the-line activities. Vritti i-Media devised an experimental pilot for the bank in 20 locations for three months which worked wonders. The campaign involved the use of Vritti i-Media’s audio network at MSRTC bus stands and audio visual network at food malls and dhabas on national highways and express highways. It not only enabled SBI to change people’s perception, but also established a channel of direct communication with farmers by educating them on various schemes, akin to the internet medium in urban areas. Fantastic results from the pilot drove the bank to extend the geographies and duration of the campaign. Extended from the three-month pilot, SBI will now conduct this campaign at all stations served by Vritti i-Media for a year.
On conducting the campaign, Vritti i-Media and SBI were able to fructify several cherished motives. For instance, with the initial campaign which was conducted for 20 days, SBI was able to garner enquiries worth Rs. 500 crore from varied rural target groups comprising farmers and small businessmen. The promotion also helped SBI in reducing its non-performing assets by directly communicating various schemes available for farmers if they pay their EMIs on time. Conclusively, with promotional help from Vritti i-Media, SBI was able to position itself as a one stop solution for all borrowing requirements of small town folk. It was able to establish itself as a simple, easy and responsive entity to deal with in a bid to encourage financial inclusion. Due to the success of the campaign, SBI recently renewed its association with Vritti i-Media and continues to count on its assistance to connect with Maharashtra’s hinterlands.
Take a glimpse on the audio ads created to reach the non-metros masses of Maharashtra:
SBI Bank’s car loan jingle:
SBI Bank’s tractor scheme jingle:
Commercial vehicles that have pan-India permits are a great mode of marketing and branding. Due to their innate advantage of traversing diverse geographies, this mobile OOH medium spreads awareness about goods and services in regions that are inaccessible by most advertising channels. In this way, a vehicle which was used for the single, plain-vanilla purpose of logistics can be used to make a brand statement. An instance we have seen for years are trucks carrying soft drinks that always feature cola advertisements. Every time this truck travels to some distant part ofIndiaand moves deeper into villages, it serves a two-pronged purpose. Consumer-facing companies, in particular, can optimise their logistical expenditure by enabling their vehicles to advertise their offerings.
For years, Maruti Suzuki has been the undisputed king of Indian roads. In recent years, however, the company has become increasingly competitive to fortify itself against increasing global onslaught. To retain its premier place, the company has resorted to wooing rural India. Recently, at a town 370 kms northwest of Delhi called Amritsar Kalan, the company’s converted truck, accessorised with an LCD TV, split ACs and push-back chairs, attracted a throng all interested to watch the company’s beguiling ad-film. With a simple story and identifiable characters such as a villager who is convinced to purchase a WagonR due to its many virtues, the ad-film is an effective means to tap the functional and emotional aspirations of this class of clientele.
With this on-wheel initiative Maruti Suzuki was looking to tap farmers of Nagpur’s oranges, Tamil Nadu’s turmeric, West Bengal’s potatoes and Himachal Pradesh’s apples and fruits, in addition to Hyderabad’s granite polishers, Jaipur’s blue pottery makers and Bihar’s Madhubani painters. In this way, several measures by the company to reach rural India has helped the company increase rural share in sales from 3.5% five years ago to 26% in FY 2012.
Similarly, SBI’s ‘Bank on Wheels’ is a concept launched in a number of states including Kashmir and Karnataka, with a fleet of more than 100 vehicles. The idea behind this is to penetrate remote areas where financial inclusion is deemed to be most difficult. The bandwagon visits 4-5 villages twice a week and its employees ease the account opening process for villagers in a bid to sign up as many customers as possible. In due course, it has been realised that financial inclusion, among the most pressing concerns of our economy, can greatly benefit from such concepts.
In the area of advertising, the concept of car wrapping has gained popularity.
Eye-catching wrappings for cars, vans and trucks make an attractive and incredibly cost-effective form of advertising. In metros, several prepaid cab companies display ads on their backs or sides. Innovators, the likes of CashUrDrive, revolutionised the vinyl vehicle advertising space. On its inception in August 2008 the company employed this medium in an innovative way by using private cars to promote its client Bonn Bread in Shimla,North India’s hill-station town.
Due to its terrain, Shimla isn’t the ideal destination for OOH, and there aren’t many cabs for on-vehicle advertisement either. Thus, CashUrDrive came up with the idea of engaging private car owners through their innovative campaign. It invited private car owners to offer their cars for promotion by partially or fully wrapping them with advertisements, in exchange of a reward. The reward included prepaid fuel cards to be used at HPCL and BPCL pumps. To ensure full realisation of this medium for advertisers, only cars driven 80 kms a day could register, while random checks were conducted to ensure that the wrappings remain pasted. Heavy weights like Tata, Reliance and the Virgin group had already advertised on this medium which is seeing several newer players such as Adometer and Ads on Wheels. With these efforts vehicle advertising is set to gain momentum as a dynamic new form of OOH, set to grow exponentially inIndia’s expanding consumer market.
Our memory of Bollywood in the era of Eastman Colour would be incomplete without the mention of those larger-than-life and colourful film hoardings put up outside ‘movie-talkies’ and graphitised on building walls. Back then, the advertising of big-budget movies was limited to music promos on radio and OOH such as wall paintings. Their popularity was so wide that given the relative media darkness of villages, rural audiences still thronged to theatres. In villages, media has very definite patterns. Due to little reliance on electronic media, traditional forms of media such as OOH still rule the roost here. With the incapability, and also reluctance in some cases, of villagers to read print media, OOH methods such as on-vehicle advertising, hoardings, DOOH and wall painting or graffiti still command the most attention.
Although wall painting as a mode of OOH have somewhat lost steam in India’s big cities, they remain a favourite in small towns and villages. One of the reasons for this is the abundance of skilled painters as well as a lack of affordable printing options in villages. Besides, having a local painter reproduce an advertisement in his own regional or cultural style can create an effective connect with the consumer. Painting, as opposed to hoardings, can fit on walls of any shape or dimension. Since paint essentially beautifies and protects walls, permission for painting ads on walls of shop or homes as per maximum visibility, can be easily and cost-effectively attained. Owing to its benefits and the emergence of organised players in this space, graffiti has now come back in vogue.
In light of these developments, several MNCs as well as large domestic companies are seen advertising through wall paintings. Ads for Idea Cellular, with its iconic sunshine yellow visuals are among the most noticeable OOH initiatives in recent times. Everyone has spotted at least one of these ads while travelling to a small town or hill station by road or train. In fact, in Madhya Pradesh and Chattisgarh, graffiti was among the predominant media used by the company to create rural awareness. Additional media such as branded vans and rural events were also employed, but graffiti had, by far, the most significance.
Similarly, with a view to increase the consumer base for its 2,000 rural branches in Madhya Pradesh and Tamil Nadu, HDFC Bank started a graffiti campaign in 400 towns and villages in February 2012. The graffiti campaign was meant to overcome the communication barrier in these regions, and promote the bank’s services including gold loans, NRI services, vehicle loans, current account and saving account facilities, as well as agricultural loans.
In a bid to popularise its Re 1 sachet, Emami’s ‘Navratna Tail’ decided to paint ‘ghumti’ shops in villages of Madhya Pradesh, Maharashtra and Gujarat. Ghumti shops or stalls that sell paans and beedis are generally frequented by rural men in large numbers. Since this crucial target group lingers around these spots for some time everyday, it makes them a perfect venue for the graffiti. Also, since these stalls get small income from the sale of paan and beedi, they are increasingly retailing small packs of soap, shampoo, toothpaste and other hygiene products. This augured well for Navratna Tail, since the wall paintings bearing Amitabh Bachchan’s endorsement was brought so close to the point of purchase.
Emami is said to have witnessed growth on the back of its OOH wall paintings. The company is 
estimated to have achieved 12% growth in volumes over the last year and a significant portion of this emerges from non-metros. This result proves that OOH media is among the most cost-effective rural media, although it is not equally suitable for big cities today. Despite a number of disadvantages as compared to other modes of OOH, graffiti brings rural consumers the empathy and simple communication that works best for them.
In an exclusive interview with Mr. Veerendra Jamdade, CEO, Vritti i-Media, Exchange4Media understands the potential of Vritti’s service offerings in effectively reaching the potential consumers of tier II and tier III cities.
Vritti i-Media’s audio advertising network across public bus stands and unique audio-visual advertising at highway food malls forms an innovative platform of OOH advertising for advertisers in India. While the audio advertising network is used as an efficient tool of rural advertising by a vast array of brands, the audio-visual signages at highway food malls are becoming a excellent OOH advertising tool for marketers to connect with the niche consumer segment.
Get more insights right from the founder, Mr. Veerendra at http://www.exchange4media.mobi/Story.aspx?news_id=46153§ion_id=26
Traditionally, local eateries like old-school halwais, bakeries and Irani café’s have never had to advertise their wares. It was only aromatic wafts that tempted people walking along these eateries to venture into them and try out a beguiling delicacy. Every city boasts of a few legendary eateries that have managed to maintain a loyal clientele over several decades. Yet, times have changed. In cities, where MNC franchises like MacDonald, KFC and Dominos Pizza have fought tooth and nail to become the giants of a new Indian fast-food space, the likes of Jumbo King, which are well-supported by smart marketing strategies have emerged. By turning the simple vada pav to a newly competitive and dynamic offering, for instance, Jumbo King has turned the fast-food industry on its head with the proposition of an inexpensive, hygienic and tasty food on-the-go. The company’s surprising success shows that new-age branding and advertising tools can do wonders to affordably transform simple offerings by small enterprises.
Pin-pointing the Issue
Fast-food eatery ‘Nalawade Samosewale’, located at Kankavali in Maharashtra’s Sindhudurg district is a promising eatery that deals in samosas, wadas, misal pav and other fast foods. It is a nascent eatery with a seating capacity for a dozen customers and has already achieved an enviable turnover in its first year of operations. It prides itself on its best-rated and high-demand offerings, such as jumbo wada, Punjabi samosa and misal pav. In order to increase popularity of its products, increase sales and awareness, the eatery kick-started its marketing campaign by partnering up with Vritti i-Media.
Devising a Solution
So, in a bid to increase sales and awareness for its offerings, Nalawade Samosewale decided to create greater interest for his products among the people of Kankavali. Reaching the right audience at the right time and in the right manner was a challenge, and to ease matters, Vritti i-media was brought onboard. Vritti’s i-Media Audio Network is a means of audio advertisement through public address systems at district bus terminals, for which the company has sole authority by the Maharashtra State Road Transport Service (MSRTC). The audio broadcasts of Vritti i-Media at over 80 plus locations across Maharashtra, makes it a formidable mode of advertising in non-metro areas. By meshing commercial advertisements with buses arrival and departure announcements, the medium creates maximum impact.
Mr. Parag Nalawade, the proprietor of the eatery, had heard various audio advertisements by Vritti i-Media at Kankavali bus station himself, and was sure that this mode would certainly achieve the desired popularity and improve business. Being highly impressed with Vritti i-Media’s past achievements, he made a direct enquiry with the company. His advertisement was a 30-second jingle that elaborated on the various fast-foods available at the eatery. Vritti has been running this campaign for the last one month and has been reaping the rewards of this ‘completely dynamic’ medium since then. Some of the attributes of this medium make it simply amazing like the timing and content of the advertisement campaign, which is set to run for three months for this eatery, can be modified in tune with seasons and festivals and communicated in the local dialect.
Reaping the Benefits
The campaign has worked wonders for Nalawade Samosewale and there is a high chance that the advertising contract may be extended. Being a small company, Nalawade Samosewale required efficient use of its modest advertising budget. Vritti i-Media’s Audio Network ensures maximum reach and retention of jingle. On an average, Vritti i-Media Audio Network is said to touch approximately 40,000 people a day at a single location, with it’s per person cost being about 10% of other media. This cost-efficiency and effectiveness has made Vritti i-Media’s solution a critical component of the media campaign by Nalawade Samosewale, and is sure to inspire several local businessmen to promote their products and services in such markets.
April 25, 2012: Wherever you go, the ads will now follow you. Imagine waiting for a bus at an inter-State terminus and hearing a jingle waft out of the public address system. Or driving down a highway, and finding that wayside eateries are offering product samplings of all kinds of brands.
In Maharashtra, 80 bus stations and several food joints on the expressways are already doing this.
Take a drive down from Mumbai to Pune and if you stop at the food mall near Khopoli, you might see LCD screens beaming ads of online travel firm Make My Trip. Billboards at the eatery scream out messages highlighting the ease with which you can book bus tickets on the travel portal. For Make My Trip, which recently launched its online bus booking services, the highway was an obvious location to introduce the concept to potential users…
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