Connect Network has achieved a major milestone, clocking business worth Rs 100 crore. The news was shared by Founder & Chief Executive Officer Haresh Nayak in a LinkedIn post.

“We are thrilled to announce crossing the remarkable 100 crore milestone in our business journey! We are immensely grateful to our amazing team, loyal clients, and valued customers who made this possible. Their unwavering support and trust have been the cornerstone of our success. We started with a vision, and today we celebrate the realization of that dream.” 

“This milestone inspires us to reach even greater heights and set new benchmarks. We are excited for the future as we continue to innovate, grow, and make a positive impact. Thank you all for being part of this incredible journey!,” he added.

First Economy has come up with an OOH communication for Godrej Properties’ premium project Godrej Five Gardens, Matunga.

The creative aims to emphasize one of the project's key USPs - the provision of three parking spaces per apartment, a crucial solution to Matunga's persistent parking space shortage.

Jigar Zatakia, CEO of First Economy says, “We are thrilled to have the opportunity to work with one of the most reputed real estate conglomerates in the country. The team at Godrej Properties have been very encouraging and gave us the creative freedom to experiment and come up with innovative solutions to enhance visibility, impact and recall.”

In an era saturated with advertisements, it has become increasingly crucial for companies to break through the clutter and captivate their audience's attention. First Economy’s creative team recognized the importance of creating an innovative hoarding that stood out in the crowd.

This insight gave birth to a live-action, an immersive hoarding where a car moves into an empty space along with 2 others, showcasing the ample parking space available at Godrej Five Gardens. This single hoarding has created the much-required hype, impact, visibility and recall for the Matunga property.

This innovative hoarding showcases Godrej Properties' commitment to enhancing the quality of life for Matunga residents, while also positioning the brand as an innovative, caring and reliable partner in the real estate sector.

Connect OOH along with Publicity Parlour has associated with Vadilal Ice Creams for an OOH campaign. 

The decision to appoint them as outdoor partners was based on a deep understanding of the evolving outdoor industry, their ability to provide data-driven planning and the disruptive creative ideas in the ooh space, the company said. 

"As we planned our latest marketing campaign, we recognized the importance of leveraging outdoor media to create a strong, cohesive message that would resonate with our target audience," said Aakanksha Gandhi, President- Branding of Vadilal Enterprises Ltd. "Vadilal Ice Creams' new approach to hoarding advertising breaks away from the ordinary by focusing on interesting models rather than the typical consumption shots. Our vibrant and fun creatives use bright, summery colors and feature models of all ages to appeal to everyone. In doing so, we not only showcase the variety of our products, but also highlight the universality of our brand. We have also ensured that our models were having fun on the set to capture their true joy and reflect it in our creatives. We believe this approach truly embodies the spirit of Vadilal Ice Creams - beloved by all."

Speaking on the association, Anjum Tanwar, Sr. Vice President and National Head - Connect OOH said, “We are elated to work with one of the most dynamic ice cream brands where we addressed the challenge of amplifying creativity and uniqueness, which is impactful and creates a new benchmark for the brand. Disruptive OOH innovation in the cities was talk of the towns and we saw the multicity campaign standing tall in front of us and are extremely delighted with the outcome. The partnership is expected to drive greater brand visibility and customer engagement for the brand” 

Bhumika Shajwani, Managing Partner at Connect OOH said, “It was our priority to reach out to the right audience in the right place at the right time. We, along with our client Vadilal, went hyperlocal and we were able to match the desired results. The entire campaign was spread across multiple cities, and formats, covering more than 400+ sites, covering top 10 cites of the country.”

Amanda Dorenberg, President of COMMB (Canadian Out of Home Marketing and Measurement Bureau) on Friday shared how key innovations and techniques are taking place in OOH advertising in her country.

During her global keynote address on 'The Next Wave of Data-Driven DOOH,' Dorenberg, who virtually joined the 4^th edition of e4m Neons OOH Conference, said COMMB has ingested a national dataset which includes 6.7 million road segments across Canada.

She said, COMMB’s new methodology incorporates a variety of sophisticated measures and data science technologies to provide greater insights into audience activity and to more precisely understand consumer behaviours of those exposed to OOH assets.

“One of the innovations we have taken in the Canadian space is we’ve ingested a national dataset. This is inclusive of 6.7 million road segments. Road segment is a portion of road in between various entry and exit points or intersections.

“These road segments contain very powerful information on an hourly basis. So, we ingest vehicular and pedestrian volume within each of these road segments on an hourly basis so we know at a particular time and day how many cars and pedestrians cross the digital OOH,” she said.

Sharing her insights, Dorenberg said the digital datasets are used to understand the volume of audiences that crosses the digital OOH, identify total vehicular movement and pedestrian volume of movement within an intersection. They also access average vehicular speed and custom distance visibility zones.

“We have also introduced audience profiling. This is an understanding of demographic lifestyle components. We offer this in top 45 markets across the country. We have 4000 hourly data points,” she said.

Talking about data partners, she said they are vital to carry out data collection and analysis.

“They provide software solutions to understand vehicular volume, insights on marketing population, insights on audience profiles and data of trips taken,” she said, adding that these partners and the methodologies elevate the OOH measurement.

“COMMB has been working to provide not only updated datasets and methodologies but also developing our proprietary tool, ROADMAP. This comprehensive production and planning system is set to launch in September 2023 with user acceptance testing beginning in June/July,” she said. 

The present-day out-of-home media offers advertisers and agencies immense opportunities with fresh technologies, novel formats, and enhanced imaginative strategies to extend the reach of their message. On the Day 2 of the 4th edition of exchange4media group’s NEONS OOH Conference 2023 held recently in Mumbai, OOH industry stakeholders came together to explore avenues for brands to harness the potential of outdoor advertisements and maximize the benefits derived from them. The event saw an insightful Fireside Chat on ‘Transforming OOH Landscape’ between Ajay Mehta, Founder & MD, Interactive Television & MD, Kinetic India and Rajeev Dhal, COO, AdOnMo, who chaired the session.

Dhal started the session by noting the transformations made in the OOH landcape in recent years and asking Mehta his thoughts on the change and what the future holds. Sharing his views on Digital Out-of-Home (DOOH), Mehta said that it’s an often misunderstood concept even within the OOH industry. “Most of the time if there’s a screen put up at any place, people assume that it’s digital OOH, but for me it’s not. All we are doing is changing a static image to a video or a gif- but that doesn’t really qualify.”

He continued, “For me, anything which is powered by adtech, where technology is an enabler to make it more contextual, make it more relevant – that is Digital OOH.” Going by that prism India is still at a very early stage in the DOOH journey, he stated.

Talking about why the OOH industry in the country has not seen major growth in so many decades despite being the oldest medium around, Mehta cites the lack of measurement around this segment of the media, and the lackadaisical attitude of the industry overall. “We did not move with the times into the digitised world,” he said.

Delving into the data side of the DOOH business, Dhal probes Mehta on how does he see the data story shaping up with regards to a “third party layer of validation”. “How do you see this happening across a larger expanse of OOH- data coming into play, data being utilised and data being trusted?” Stressing that the relevance of data or “location data” to Out-of-Home advertising cannot be overstated, Mehta said that OOH is nothing but “location-based advertising”. Getting third party verification is an essential – and not just from anyone, but from an extremely credible source, and that’s a given, he emphasised.

Elaborating on the potential of Digital OOH and data intervention, Mehta said it can make this “oldest medium” the newest. “We are at an inflection point, if we get it right we are poised for ten or even twenty years of superlative growth.” If we get it wrong, he however cautioned, we are going to be living in a flat industry with hardly any growth in an archaic way of functioning.

Citing the challenges in terms of growth of the industry with regard to ROI modelling & the lack of data which will bring to attribution, Dhal questioned about the way forward for the industry. Underlining that it is a responsibility as media owners & agencies to provide ROI to clients, Mehta said that if we don’t we would be doing a disservice not just to the client but to ourselves, and the industry will never grow. “When someone invests in our medium it is our responsibility to showcase what we deliver for them,” he asserted. For that to happen, it was important to upskill and upgrade and bring the entire ecosystem into the digital and data-driven world.

Both the industry leaders agreed that the industry needs to come together to identify parameters on which audience can be measured, adding that adoption will be a function of knowledge and acceptance of change around. The two leaders also touched upon the growing significance of A.I. across media and its potential application in OOH advertising.

At the end of the two-day long NEONS OOH Conference by Exchange4media saw Noomi Mehta, Chairman of the Board of Selvel One and Chairman, The Indian Outdoor Advertising Association, delivered a valedictory address about the future of OOH, how agencies can support this creative way of advertising and way forward.

He mentioned that while media around the world is facing a lot of troubles both in viewership and losses, Out Of Home advertising is one such platform that is continuing to do well.

Mehta spoke about reasons why consolidation in the OOH media is not happening and how can that be taken care of. “So many handicaps have been mentioned in OOH. They talk of diffused ownership, too many small players. But this is natural. It's a local medium. It's been so in every country around the world. What makes it different is the consolidation progress. Why hasn't consolidation happened? It is because the big bucks haven't arrived as yet. When they do, the market will dramatically change and there will be consolidation.”

“We have the additional problem of generation. The generations have what we call the legacy element. A person who inherits a business automatically feels emotionally attached to it and that emotional attachment causes valuation expectations far in excess of reality. We talk of no credible third-party monitoring but this problem is easily solved. The only problem that is not solved is who's going to pay for it. If the client expects another freebie, it is not going to happen for a long time. Lack of third-party data and recognized viewership data has often been mentioned. The platform for measurement is ready. The app is ready. What is not ready is the agencies willingness to take to it. As soon as the agencies make up their mind that measurement is indeed wanted and they subscribe to it, we'll be on our road to well measured outdoor advertising assets,” he added.

He also explains how laws in the country can be a tricky business in terms of road permissions for OOH advertising, but the industry is making progress in the same.

Lastly, he explained how advertisers and agencies can work together to make the best use of OOH and digital together. “Digital OOH is one to many. But the advantage is it can have a layer by which the many can also talk to the one. So, you can get both mass and personalized medium in one single ad by using the combination of the smartphone and your digital ad. Make no mistake, digital outdoor is here to stay and so are we. Digital will grow and so will we. But it's not an us versus the agency situation. It is us and agencies. We are two sides of the same coin. We both dine at the same table. Together we can prepare a feast. We need the agencies to help prepare the measurement sauce, which spices up our media offering and makes OOH experience a delightful culinary journey. Otherwise, the table will remain bare and we will be left fighting for scraps.”

On Day 2 of the 4th edition e4m OOH Conference, experts deliberated on the topic 'Leveraging DOOH for Innovative & Impactful Media Formats'. The panel comprised Nabendu Bhattacharyya, founder and CEO, ideacafe; Alok Gupta, Director, Graphisads Ltd; Dheeraj Soni, National Sales Head - India, Lemma Technologies, and Yatnesh Pandey, VP-Marketing, GreenPly Industries Ltd and the session was chaired by Ashish Karnad, EVP – Media & Digital, Hansa Research.

Speaking on the difference between digital OOH and traditional OOH formats that are currently available in India, Soni said, “Before talking about what is different, we need to talk about what is similar between OOH and DOOH, and I think common is OOH and problematic DOOH are a complement to others available in a media mix. We have seen that the results are replicating multifold. Whenever a brand is activating OOH or DOOH, they have seen good results within that media mix. I think these are commonalities. In terms of what is different between the two is just that on OOH you can only show static images which, over a period of time, become
dead. On the other end, if it is a digital screen, you can keep on rotating that creative which can become engaging as well.

Gupta added, “I have been a part of the industry for the past 17 years ad when I started, we were a traditional OOH industry. I will be honest, when we talk about OOH as a synonym, 80 percent of everyday people will not know about OOH also; they still relate it with outdoor. But when we are taking this shift from outdoor to DOOH to PDOH, things have changed dramatically in the last three to four years. The good thing about DOOH is that there is no baggage to carry like OOH. We have some system of sales which were through agencies, through direct lines. The DOOH deals today are very disruptive in nature. They are actually behaving like start-ups. So,
to say, DOOH today is the start-up baby of our industry, which will disrupt the overall scheme of things. And in the next three to five years, the changes will be far dramatic and drastic in nature.”

Bhattacharyya pointed out, “I have to buy from both. I think DOOH has its advantages. There are brands that are built on DOOH and many OOH. The famous brand we see, is Apple. Apple, as a company, across the world, only use static media, not DOOH media. They are different, they wanted to be premium and they have done their class, aesthetic and beauty and creative – everything they brought together as an example across the world.”

Speaking from the demand side, Pandey spoke on how he sees DOOH and how it fits in his media plans. He said, “As an advertiser, we always are in between the supplier and the measurement. Before coming to why we choose DOOH or OOH medium, let me give some context. We are in the home improvement/ renovation category
where the consumer purchase cycle is long. So when you have to chase the consumer, you have to remain in this consideration for a longer time and then you have to create impact. And for creating impact, we use this OOH medium.”