End of Broadcasting will be the beginning of conversations, said Tamanna Dhamija, Founder & CEO of Convosight, while speaking at PITCH CMO Summit.

Dhamija shared that she realized the power of online communities when she saw that 40% of conversations there are linked to brands. “I couldn't believe how simple and scalable this phenomenon was if brands had the opportunity to tap into communities such as these online and talk to consumers about the efficacy of brands. It took me three years to get to this realization.” 

Dhamika shared that the objective behind Conovosight was to help brands discover such communities, tap into them online, get insights and market to consumers that are talking to each other. 

In her presentation at the event, she talked about one such community- Jhatpat Recipe which has around five lakh members. She said there are 1000s of such communities just talking about food and other topics and there are 63 million members in these rooms spread across the internet.

According to Dhamija, communities have always existed but now they have arrived online, where people are talking to each other. "For instance,  Facebook groups are the largest with 1.8 billion people in these rooms. They've all joined organically and again, people are talking to each other. It's not just broadcasting. Other platforms are Reddit, WhatsApp, Telegram, and Discord. These are all the channels on existing social media where communities are present," she noted. 

“We've already witnessed this evolution of broadcasting to conversations. It's a tectonic shift in the way we as consumers have started behaving online. We have seen that balconies are where we step online, where a brand or an influencer or a consumer creates the balcony and constantly consumes a lot of content from other balconies," she said. (Balconies are here refer to Facebook pages, Twitter, Moj whereas Halls are Facebook Group, Reddit and Whatsapp ) 

Dhamija shared that since consumers moved to balconies, brands have also followed: “So all of the listening, inciting and paid marketing happen on these balconies. And as we all have evolved, as we all have started trusting each other digitally, we've seen an explosion of halls. And what are halls again? Channels in which people are talking to each other and not just broadcasting.” 

When we look at balconies and halls, there are just a few differences. First, all balconies are created through paid marketing. “So there's the concept of having a lot of followers and we do paid marketing to garner followers, in balconies or in halls, which are built organically. It's all organic because it's based on interest or passion. When we look at engagement between balconies and halls, there is a stark difference. Where you see the engagement in balconies is on an average 10% but when we look at halls one person on average engages six times in a hall which is 600% engagement. Content is created through individuals like you and me and that's how influence is created in a hall.” 

She further shared that not just organic communities, but even brand own communities or Facebook groups have really high metrics. She cited an example of Sunsilk Facebook group, which has just 20,000 members, but the organic reach of the group is 2.2 million.

“We knew communities need to be an integral part of the marketing and insights mix because it's an integral part of the consumer buying journey.”

She also stated that brands have not adopted communities at all and the main reason behind this is that there are no listing or discovery tools that exist that help brands identify the relevant rooms online that they can tap into. 

And there Convosight came into the picture. “That's how Convosight came into existence. It is just an enabler. It's really the change in behaviour that has happened online that has given the rise of communities.” 

She further added, “We were there at the right time and saw this opportunity and now we aggregate communities on existing social channels, really creating opportunities for brands and consumers in communities to co-exist. It's a win-win.” 

She also said, “It drives massive value to the consumer because they are there talking about the brands and categories. It creates consideration through word of mouth. We now have access to 100,000 communities with 900 million members across the globe. And we work with about 150 consumer brands, very large enterprise customers, again, enabling discovery, enabling inciting and marketing into those communities.”

In a world where everything about everyone can be known digitally, Profitwheel is a platform that helps companies know their customers. At the Pitch CMO Summit organized by exchange4media, Vivek Bhargava, co-founder of Profitwheel, spoke to the audience about how the company uses customer intelligence to help brands find their profitable customers.

In the session titled, ‘Decoding Your Profitable Customers With Consumer Intelligence,’ Bhargava talked about Profitwheel’s methods of using data and finding out more about a particular brand’s customer base in a way that the brand knows the interests of that particular customer and can use it to target them through different methods of advertising and marketing.

Bhargava said, “When you look at a brand, they don't know what their best and most profitable customers look like so they don't have a common currency. All the different departments that they have, they all work in silos. But imagine if you knew what the psychographic of your best customers look like, then all the brands can actually get all the departments aligned to this one north star of acquiring and retaining most profitable customers.

Imagine you could also give the same platform to entire ecosystem of partners that you have. So, give it to your creative agency, give it to your content creation agency, give it to your media buying agency, give to your influence agency, video market research agency, give it to consulting companies who work with you, audit that work with you. Basically, what you do is you create this one platform that every single person in your company, as well as your ecosystem partners can use when they want to take any decision.”

He also spoke about the usage of artificial intelligence and the famous generative AI application ChatGPT in the workings of Proftwheel. He says ChatGPT can take the data and help make a creative brief, a campaign idea and video scripts for the brand using the consumer intelligence data from Profitwheel.

Bhargava then talked about the importance of knowing what to do with the enormous customer data that brands have and how Profitwheel’s goal is to help marketers know and understand their consumers better. “The biggest challenge I think most of us face today is that we have so much customer data, but we don't know anything about our customers. We just know that okay, this person bought this three times in a month, this person has bought this much value in terms of pricing. But if I were to ask you, how are you going to build them as a community? How are you going to create content for them? How are you going to choose influencers with them? How are we going to decide which countries you should expand in? All these questions are completely unanswered, and it takes a lot of research, a lot of insights, a lot of experience before you can answer any of these questions. So, our goal is that every single person in the company should have access to a bouncing board that gives you real time insights about your customers. As soon as you enter it, you should get some insights, and then use those insights for actions. And not only you, every single ecosystem partner of yours should get the same platform and it should not be linked to the amount of money you spend on advertising.”

One of the most fascinating aspects of agile marketing is the way it empowers businesses to embrace change and uncertainty as opportunities for growth and innovation. This approach not only makes marketing more effective but also fosters a culture of creativity and collaboration that can help businesses thrive in today's fast-paced and ever-changing market. Exploring more on this at the Pitch CMO Summit Mumbai 2023, Amit Doshi, Chief Marketing Officer, Britannia Industries, delivered a spotlight session on ‘Insightful storytelling with agile marketing’.

Doshi shared real stories and case studies from his experiences at Britannia. The first story that he shared was about Britannia Good Day which has stood for the spirit of happiness and optimism.

“For a brand as highly penetrated in the country as Good Day, we needed to create more frequent opportunities to trigger consumption. So we made a simple shift- encouraged people to celebrate the small moments,” said Doshi.

“In terms of agility in absorbing what’s happening around us, we saw that if the world is busy consuming reels, why is it that the consumption format only needs to exist within a social media platform? So we took the same platform and planted it on traditional media. It was about learning and adopting not only what was happening in popular culture in terms of content but also format.”

The second case study of agile marketing that Doshi shared was that of the much-loved Milk Bikis.

The brand existed in a certain avatar. But a decade ago, it was changed to a different format. However, but there was a generation who grew up on the old Milk Bikis and wrote to the brand to bring it back, he said.

Explaining how Britannia adopted agility to deal with the situation, Doshi shared, “We launched a limited edition pack called Milk Bikis Classic. But the response was so great that we made it a permanent product. So, we have a Milk Bikis and a Milk Bikis Classic, both catering to two different audiences.”

The communication around Milk Bikis is centred around nostalgia and is soaked in regional flavours in terms of content, language and even dialects, therefore exhibiting both agility and hyper-regionalisation of content, he explained.

Sharing the third case study, Doshi talked about Britannia Marie and ‘My Startup Contest’ that encourages women to do more and be more.

“Another great campaign that Britannia did was #Letskeepitgoing, which emphasised how only celebrating women on International Women’s Day is not enough,” said Doshi, adding, “It’s really a question of identifying the right moments to continue the narrative forward.”

Summing up his session on how Britannia sees agility, Doshi said, “We believe that ideas can come from anywhere, as most of the work you saw wasn’t even from our mainline creative agency. Let data guide you, listen to what is happening around and then see that it reflects in your work. A lot of our success has come from staying consistent with the insight around which the brand is centred and a lot of co-creation with consumers - either by getting them to participate or by making them the heroes.”

Jack in The Box Worldwide, along with MARS Petcare has launched a digital campaign for Pedigree India called the #Pedigree6WeekChallenge. It promises a visible difference in dogs' digestive system, skin and coat, muscles, bones, and natural defence within 6 weeks of consuming Pedigree as compared to feeding home-cooked food. Devising an Influencer activation starring Shikhar Dhawan, Yuzvendra Chahal and Dhanashree grooving to a catchy, specially produced rap song, the challenge encourages users to first sample, then buy a 6-week supply of Pedigree Dry Food, all while reengaging with customers through a seamless WhatsApp-focused campaign. The customers also stand a chance to win a 2-day ‘staycation’ at Taj with their pets upon entering their details to sample the pet food. 

Salil Murthy, Managing Director, Petcare at MARS International India Ltd said, “At MARS Petcare, we are always aiming to set the highest food standards and spread advocacy for nutritionally balanced diets for pets. We are committed to using high-quality ingredients that make your pets healthier and fitter for a happier living. With the #Pedigree6WeekChallenge, we are confident that pet parents will see the difference a balanced diet makes to their dogs and start preferring this alternative which is also time-convenient and cost-friendly.” 

Axon Alex, Managing Partner, Jack in The Box Worldwide said, “The 6-week challenge was a great collaborative exercise with the team at Mars Petcare. This collaboration allowed us to flex our muscles both from a creative and UX standpoint. The rap song we conceptualized was to allow influencers to have genuine fun with their dogs instead of reading from a script. This combined with building the WhatsApp journey allowed us to interact with the audience through their entire journey from awareness to post-purchase which was unique and exciting.” 

The #Pedigree6WeekChallenge brings together the elite names with 100 nano influencers grooving to the rap song that is informative as it is entertaining. Through the messaging, customers are made aware of their chance to win a 2-day vacation at Taj with their pets. They are then redirected to sample the product by entering contact details on the website, helping push communications through WhatsApp. 

The brand engages with these potential customers through weekly updates and information that helps track pet health. They are also encouraged to share images of the progress through 6 weeks, thus solidifying the promise and creating an authentic bank of user-generated content.

EatFit has announced the launch of its latest campaign #IPizzaLove today, on account of the Indian Premier League 2023, where EatFit celebrates India’s love for Cricket and Food together with a range of healthy and nutritious pizzas during the IPL season. 

To kick off the #IPizzaLove campaign, EatFit has partnered with Mayank Agarwal, one of India’s leading cricket players, and Joy Bhattacharya, Sports Enthusiast for two ad campaigns which will be published on Twitter, Instagram, LinkedIn, Facebook and YouTube. In the first ad, Joy is caught off guard discussing EatFit’s pizza range with Mayank during a post-match presentation whereas, in the second ad, they are seen talking about how pizzas are the best way to celebrate a match victory. The second ad will be led by famous cricketers who plan to celebrate their match victories with EatFit pizzas. 

To add a twist of fun, each of the IPL team players will celebrate the campaign in their own style and make a video reel on Instagram while competing with each other and see who creates the most fun content. The players who will be participating in this video trend are Shefali Varma and Jemimah Rodriguez from Delhi Capitals, Rajat Patidar and Shahbaz Ahmed from Royal Challengers, Devdutt Padikkal and Yashasvi Jaiswal from Rajasthan Royals, Mayank Agarwal, and Bhuvneshwar Kumar from Sunrisers Hyderabad who have their own interpretation of how they plan to celebrate with EatFit pizzas. 

Commenting on the campaign, Gokul Kandhi, Chief Business Officer, Curefoods, said "As a health-focused brand, EatFit is committed to providing customers with healthy and nutritious food options that don't compromise on the Indian taste. With the #IPizzaLove campaign, we are providing a healthy and delicious food option to all cricket fans and motivating them for IPL 2023 to celebrate and cheer for their favorite team. We are encouraging people to rejoice this cricket season with their preferred food while taking care of their health and nutritional needs." 

The #IPizzaLove campaign’s food range consists of pizzas made with fresh ingredients and real cheese, ensuring that customers enjoy a guilt-free indulgence. The pizzas are available in a variety of options to cater to different taste preferences. From gourmet pizzas to affordable but nutritious millet-based treats, Curefoods has curated a whole gamut of brands to fulfill everyone’s pizza desires. This new range of pizza is available on delivery platforms like Zomato and Swiggy, apart from EatFit.in platform, with unlimited options that will last for the entire season.

The Laqshya Pitch CMO Awards 2023 celebrated the best minds in the marketing industry in India on Friday in Mumbai. The dazzling awards night was graced with the presence of top leaders, industry heads and experts from a wide cross-section of marketing, media and brands.

The awards recognise marketing leaders for their exceptional and innovative marketing efforts. The Laqshya Pitch CMO Awards celebrate the stars of the marketing domain for their outstanding creativity, strategic thinking, and impactful content.

The title sponsor of the event was Laqshya Media Group and it was co-powered by Vserv, WebEngage and Bharat Express. The growth partner of the event was Mobavenue and the performance partner was Admattic. 

The marketing leaders were recognised across 13 different categories for their outstanding work throughout 2022. The winners are decided by some of the finest minds in the industry for their works in the past year, using a set of metrics based on performance, their marketing strategies, financials and in-category success.

In the ‘The CMO Leadership Award’ category, the five winners were Abbey Thomas, Head of Marketing & PR, Volkswagen Passenger Cars, Anupama Ahluwalia, Chief Marketing & Customer Services Officer, Reliance Retail Limited, Deepali Naair, Group CMO, CK Birla Group and Nilesh Malani, President and Chief Marketing Officer, Polycab India Ltd, and Mayank Shah, Sr. Category Head at Parle Products Pvt. Ltd.

The ‘The CMO Transformation Award’ category had four winners - Abhishek Gupta, Chief Marketing Officer, Edelweiss Tokio Life Insurance, Shuvadip Banerjee, Chief Digital Marketing Officer, ITC Ltd (Foods Division), Sunayan Mitra, Director (General Manager) Coffee & Beverages Business, Nestlé, South Asia Region, Vishu Goel, Associate Vice President Sales, Marketing & Commercial, Asian Paints.

A total of three winners bagged the award in The ‘CMO Growth Award’ category. The winners were Ashish Mishra, EVP – Marketing, ACKO, Shamik Banerjee, Chief Marketing Officer, Apollo 24x7 and Utsav Malhotra, Chief Operating Officer, Nexxbase.

The ‘CMO Innovation Award’ category had three winners- Gaurav Anand, Chief Digital & Marketing Officer, L'oreal India, Shivani Behl, Chief Marketing Officer, Plum (PurePlay) and Virat Khullar, Group Head Marketing, Hyundai.

In the ‘CMO Customer Experience Award’ category, a total of five best minds were awarded. The winners included Anuj Sharma, Chief Marketing Officer, Xiaomi India, Avneesh Khosla, Chief Marketing Officer, Vodafone Idea Ltd., Deepti Sampat, VP Marketing, Tata SIA, Ranjivjit Singh, Chief Growth Officer (CGO), Hero MotoCorp and Kartikeya Bhandari, Chief Marketing officer, Livspace.

In the ‘CMO Digital Marketing Award’ category, three marketing minds were honoured. Anuj Arora, Chief Marketing Officer, Symphony Limited, Jennifer Pandya, VP – Marketing, CaratLane - A Tanishq Partnership and Vishal Subharwal, Chief Marketing Officer and Group Head - Strategy, HDFC Life are the winners.

The ‘CMO Content Engagement Award’ category had a total of four winners. They were Ankit Desai, Chief Marketing Officer, Hershey India, Anuja Mishra, Chief Marketing Officer, Honasa Consumer, Darshana Shah, Head-Marketing and Customer Experience, Aditya Birla Capital and Maneesh Krishnamurthy,  Head of Marketing (Eyecare), Titan.

In the ‘A Futuristic CMO: Retention-First Thinker Award’ category, three winners, including Geetanjali Kothari, Head of Marketing & Corporate Communications, Bharti AXA Life Insurance, Mahuya Chaturvedi, Chief Marketing Officer and Online Business Head, Baggit and MVS Murthy, Chief Marketing Officer, Federal Bank, were awarded.

In the ‘The CMO Experiential Marketing Award’ category, three marketing leaders have been awarded. The winners in this category include Kavitha Ganesan, General Manager – Marketing, TVS Eurogrip, Rahul Singh, Vice President & Head of Marketing, SAP and Vineet Sharma, Vice President- Marketing & Trade Marketing, AB InBev India have been honoured.

Meanwhile, four winners including Abhishek Jugran, Vice President-Marketing, Dabur India, Jaya Jamrani, Vice President – Marketing, Castrol India, Sachin Chhabra, Head of Brand Marketing, ACC Limited, and Sooraj Balakrishnan, Head – Marketing, Acer India and Bangladesh Acer have been awarded in the ‘CMO Sustainability Award’ category.

In the ‘The CMO Social Responsibility Award’ category, Amit Doshi, Chief Marketing Officer, Britannia Industries Ltd. and Jaswinder Sodhi, Head of Customer Propositions Digital & Marketing - Wealth & Personal Banking India, HSBC were given the award.

‘The CMO Creator Ecosystem Award’ category had two winners- Damyant Singh Khanoria,Chief Marketing Officer, OPPO India and Raunika Malhotra, President Marketing and Corporate Communication, Lodha Group.

In the last category, i.e., the ‘CMO Rising Star Award’ category, three lucky winners were bestowed with the big honour. The winners in this category include Amritansu Nanda, Chief Marketing Officer, Zepto, Pooja Baid, Chief Marketing Officer, Versuni and Vijay Kumar Pampana, Director, Head of Marketing Department     Procter & Gamble Health Limited.

Here’s the complete list of Laqshya Pitch CMO Awards 2023 winners:

The Raymond Group and its communication strategy have evolved gradually over the last 97 years, reflecting the mood of the nation in all its ad campaigns, said Sunil Kataria, the CEO of Raymond Lifestyle, at the Pitch CMO summit in Mumbai on Friday.

Speaking to a bunch of CMOs and other marketers at the Summit organised by exchange4media, Kataria in his keynote speech informed the audience that Raymond was established in 1925 as “Raymond Woollen Mills” in Thane and the group will mark a century in two years. 

“The company used to make blankets and woollen fabric. It wasn’t doing good business when Lala Kailashpat Singhania acquired it in 1944. The company tapped the mood of the nation and became part of the nation-building thereafter,” Kataria explained, sharing glimpses of the old Mills and the brand’s marketing strategy. 

From a woollen blanket producer, Raymond has not only evolved into an iconic textile brand but has also become a diversified conglomerate. 

He deliberated how the brand has kept pace with the times and remained relevant to an ever-changing customer profile. 

“It was the post-independence era with the country full of hope, optimism and new experiences when the company adopted Chess King Motifs in 1959 which became brand identity”, Kataria noted. 

“In the 1970s when the country was under emergency and unrest, giving rise to the success of angry-man films of Amitabh Bachchan, we decided to go beyond product promotion and focused on brand-building,” Kataria said, adding that Raymond campaigns at that time sought to build the narrative of masculinity through gentleman, just opposite to the angry man phenomenon of those days. 

In the 1980s Raymond came up with its first ad campaign titled ‘The guide to a well-dressed male,’ targeting flamboyant men. But it was ‘The Complete Man’ campaign launched in the 1990s that took the brand to the pinnacle of glory.

The campaign, which coincided with India’s economic liberalisation, grabbed the attention of aspiring young men to the growing big brand.

From Chess King Motifs in 1959 to iconic “Complete Man” in the 1990s to “Feels like Heaven” in 2010 to “Celebration time” of Ethnyx by Raymond in post-Covid time, the company’s communication strategy always reflects the mood of the nation, said the leader. 

Kataria also explained how the company opened its first store in Ballard Estate of Mumbai in 1958 when the concept of a  B2C retail store was unheard of.  Sensing the mood and aspirations of Indians, the company later expanded across the country with 1,100 stores. 

“Our decision to enter into ethnic wear also arises from sensing the mood of the nation. In the post covid time, celebrations and demand for ethnic wear have gone up. That’s why we decided to enter the segment by supporting the Ethnyx brand,” Kataria said, adding that the Ethnyx by Raymond already has 70 stores across the country and now plans to open 200 more stores in the next 8-9 months.