It was a night of madness if you call it with the announcement of Facebook buying Instagram for 1 Billion USD. Well the geography did matter because it was morning out there in US and it took this FB update to become what was probably the most happening acquisition in recent times.

The whole world was on overdrive what with multiple news barrages coming from every news source you could think of. Mashable, Tech Crunch and Huffiington and all mainstream websites took note and it created such a massive trend in the twitter and other social media forums.

The reactions were there for all to see, the FB fans went gaga over such an acquisition which they believe that this will enhance the FB’s already photo sharing abilities. For me too FB has been more of a photo album apart from occasional updates on the statuses. I use twitter to express more than with a constricted 140 character limit. And I use it happily dishing out the news which I come across and more than that adding my comments wherever possible. Ofcourse you could also add retweets to it.

Within minutes the other side who were opposed also made their stance clear, angst against this announcement also snowballed to another big trend with even lead stories suggesting how to do a back up of the Instagram pictures in case you are deleting it.

Now if you are asking why would people denounce this acquisition, here are some of the reasons which they said. FB and its privacy policies are not the best ever. Instagram and FB are two different genres for them and it makes no sense to merge them. One another idea suggested was now all the picture you took and which are on Instagram belonged to FB. I think this was clearly defined in the status update by Mark Zuckerberg where he had said this will be run as it is and the status quo was atleast maintained.

But coming to the facts, I think there were some of the best arguments and reading into the circumstances under which FB had to acquire Instagram. I like this one by Om Malik which closely suggested how wary FB was with the way Instagram was growing in the mobile space and how FB was actually losing the plot. You need to read his transaltion of what Mark wrote to fully understand his tone.

There were lighter moments with tweets which said they were taking you live to Instagram office where the meme pic showed someone counting cash all over the place. It was also great to see how a startup with just six employees had made this happen. Goes to show when you have world class products at the heart of it and make million people use it then ofcourse it doesn’t matter even if you don’t earn a penny.

Not to forget the last week has been memorable for Instagram with the $ 500M valuation and a $ 50 M funding and more so the android rollout and a million downloads in the first 24 hours!

I think this announcement will boost the entire overall apps marketplace and is sure to see many more acquisitions in the pipeline in the next few days.

Most important lesson for me is that Mobile will replace the desktop ecosystem sooner than we thought.

Senthilkumar

PS: For a full reading with links and tweets please go here!

[View the story "Facegram - the FB and Instagram buyout! " on Storify]

It is with great pleasure I am penning this note on our official blog since it is that day when every entrepreneur believes and feel satisfied on the outcome he or she would have began when they turned entrepreneurs.

Being an entrepreneur is never easy, apart of putting up, acting, being remorseless and still being candid is not something that comes naturally to anyone but an actor or a politician. Entrepreneurs have to lead a life, which is full of sacrifices, which is full of pain and always in scare of what the outcome is going to be. There is also social stigma attached to failure and when you go against all odds then boy it definitely is worse than a roller coaster, lot many people just crack up to multiple levels of pressures both internal and external.

I ask all the above as question to myself as to how I managed to pull this threw and there are just two answers that come in mind. One, the belief that others had on you and two the motivation of seeing a good life for your child. My late father was a huge inspiration to me and he instilled from very beginning that there is nothing that one cannot achieve if he or she puts his or her mind to it and that stuck on me forever, I just wouldn’t give up on things that would cause embarrassment to me ever. So every task of mine had become a challenge and by the time I was 25 normal things in life became challenges to overcome, sometimes it is very stressful but in time it just becomes a habit and one learns to just cross over.

My dad called me a “PHOENIX” and if not for anything else it was a huge motivating feeling that he was always around for me and he knew exactly when to touch the chord in me to make me feel bigger than anything else. Sometimes this attitude came across as cocky but deep within me I knew that in time people will know what Ram is and I would let it be.

The second bit is the motivation bit and to me it is just my son whom I want to see very happy. HappYness is a very relative term and it gets difficult to interpret the real meaning because to each his own and that makes it all the more difficult to express that pursuit. But there are moments in life that one would clearly classify as the moment of happiness and those moments are special to every individual. These moments automatically translate into a sense of belonging, which later translates into motivation. To me there is nothing else motivating than to see my son Arjun Sai grow to be a smart man and I will do all that it takes to ensure I achieve this bit.

These two factors were good enough for me to focus towards achieving what otherwise would have never been possible. At every corner of my tough situation post the launch of NetworkPlay in October of 2008 I had these 2 reasons to keep me going and boy it is a proud moment for all of us at NetworkPlay.

A company that was started from sheer frustration of not being able to do what we aspired between a bunch of us to what it is today is something that Sunil, Ampreet, Viren and I hold dearly and we thank everyone who has been part of this wonderful journey including all our employees from the years gone by to the ones who continue to work diligently for a cause that is changing the way digital is being percieved to everyone in the trade both advertisers and publisher partners and our wonderful partners across all lines of our businesses, THANK YOU VERY MUCH for believing in us and I hope we have delivered to our promise, capability and commitment that hopefully would have created wealth for all our partners.

Having worked with over 350+brands in close to 4 yrs, it is a remarkable feat that we have managed to keep 70% of them as our repeat advertisers. So I am hoping that our effort has also added value to all your objectives. A BIG THANK YOU TO ALL OF YOU TOO.

My incubator Sidharth Rao and investors Capital 18 who blindly put the money behind us, I hope we have created enough and more wealth as we move along to being bought over in a all cash deal.

NetworkPlay has been bought out, yes, it is a great moment for us to make this exit and be part of the World’s Largest Media Conglomerate. We will be part of Bertelsmann AG, and will be rolled under their Magazine and Electronic Media Sales Company Gruner + Jahr GMBH.

NetworkPlay is now a G+J Company and business continues to run the way it used to with the team now being part of a larger group and we look forward to rolling out new products and services from G+J in India that will benefit all our partners in the days to come.

Plz continue to support us and as they say this is just the beginning.

Thank you all once again

Best
Ram

The day 2 at ad:tech was another day of learning and also involved great discussions on Social Commerce and presentations on metrics with special reference to Social Media. There was a track on Spotlight, one on Mobile marketing and ofcourse on Search too.

The first keynote of the day was that of Pete Blackshaw, Global Head of Digital Marketing and Social Media, Nestle.
Prior to his being on stage, we were treated to a wonderful walk through of the last day’s events and learnings and even a look at the exhibition area by our Brad Berens who incidentally has become a rage for his special Good Morning New Delhi! Some of the Twitteratii felt he was giving our very own Vidya Balan of Lage Raho Munnabhai a run for her money – viz her Good Morning Mumbai!

As Pete started the sheer statistics of Maggi being sold than 1.2 Billion packs became quite a rage, I saw that was unintended but when it was compared to Indian population as a number it was in the news. He also unveiled what Nestle was doing differently with regards to the digital and how corporate communication is also being run under digital it makes for interesting take out. As he rolled out his ideas on Small is the new big in digital marketing, he also made it a point to reiterate that basics still matter in digital and social.

The Digital and social media strategy at Nestle is based on excellence in listening, engaging and inspiring. Moreover he also said that Nestle plans its digital strategy on the local scale and makes it a success. The strength has been that of decentralizing the digital marketing programme and it has been able to deliver excellent results across.

They call it Brand Building the Nestle Way – BBNW.

As the screens are getting smaller or say our screens are shrinking, we need to think harder about simplifying our messaging and serving the consumer. He also said the whole process got to be social by design. It had to be 24/7 sense and respond a tactical way to be engaging a consumer.

When the screens get smaller it is also a big challenge to get eh attention span to yourself. He shared one of the most important point on a successful mobile phone application - it has to provide rich content, excellent service and consumer focus. His keynote brough back some of the boring basics to be taken seriously, and more so because in digital its the basics which still matter.

In one of the game changing context he said ‘Think about a way to take your big ideas on other media to digital. Digital strategy for any brand should not be isolated.”

As he concluded he was on target when he said ‘shrink, serve and simplify, and yes its great time to be in Marketing’. I am sure everyone out there seconded this statement and yes Pete made a lasting impression to kick start the days’s proceedings in a way that was unique to Pete and the brand Nestle.

The next speaker was Satyan Gajwani, Director, New Media, The Times Group with his keynote on the evolution of content, commerce and entertainment in the digital world.

He took us on a journey of how the Times Group was instrumental in identifying the consumer connect and of late has been having a great effort fructify with Gaana.com being a part of FB apps. He also said that now every thing has to go social it has to be inherent by design and we cannot have two different stand alone strategies even when its content. With the social media becoming all pervasive, any initiative in digital has to be Social by design and cannot be a plugin anymore.

It was true that inspite of low internet speeds videos still command a large chunk of the broadband traffic. This was very true of cricket videos being closely followed during important matches – especially IPL.
IPL he said will have a greater impact this year because it will have a lot of engaging features.

Satyan also unveiled the new initiative of TIL in BoxTV.com an answer to Hulu in India. He said that Indians have a penchant for watching online videos and its is only increasing day by day. If we can get them socially engaged with the same, it will be a great way to go futuristic.

He also said that there was a relook in the ecommerce part of the service offering and it could even make people sit up and take notice in the days to come. A visually seamless and thought provoking presentation from Satyan, and the day has had its perfect start.

The session on Mobile marketing gave real insights on how they need to actually see the fit in the first place, apart from SMS to making it an engaging platform. The marketers needed more of innovative solutions to engage and also how we could make it happen with different screens and the need to have a solution cut across the platforms.
In the next presentation session we were treated to extensive use of mobile application on retail and in-store and extended location based advertising using mobile.

So the mobile with its ever increasing penetration especially with smart phones or even with blue tooth connectivity can make a lot of difference while being on the move or sometimes being in store. Lot of retail brands have experienced successful engagement opportunities with some of the service providers with blue tooth and some have used Augmentative Reality to awesome effect and results.

Days are not far when shopping will be socially relevant and will be happening on the move may be time targeted to the core so as to make it absolutely engaging experience. You could be asked for a choice to order from a menu as you pass by a restaurant around noon! Chances are, if you updated you are ‘hungry’ you could get a call from one of those people delivering pizza near you!

During the Spotlight session, we saw how Angels are making their contribution in a fast growing internet economy if I may say so, and their contributions in terms of engaging with the startups has raised the high stakes game to better VC funding for the companies.

That will change the complexion of the game in terms of more angels coming in and making it easier for VCs to identify and support such ventures.

We also had a discussion on B2B marketing strategies and we saw how B2B brands are leveraging the internet and making successful contributions to the marketing plan. The targeting capabilities are making it easier for the B2B marketers to use the power of internet and deliver value in terms of leads sometimes build brands among the most important users.
The afternoon sessions on Social and Search was a mix of wonderful panel discussion and a presentation session.

The Social going commerce or Social commerce in the times of Facebook and twitter and now the coming of Pinterest will surely make it easy for brands to sell. The interesting part is that the shopping has also gone social in a way to make for an interesting ideal context wherein the influencers are friends and sometimes friends of friends.

The last word on whether we would love to do shopping on Facebook has not been said as yet and I think we will wait here in India to see if the global leads will confirm the users would love to keep shopping social but not entirely do shopping on Facebook.

The social media metrics getting an upper hand with the engagement being given importance was the key take way during the presentation on Social media metrics and measurement. Likes on a brand page do not translate to engagement or social talking in real sense. So if a brand x can garner 1000 likes and has over 900 talking about it then the ration of engagement is far higher than having 10000 likes and 10 people talking about it. Ofcourse the metrics is also looking at how positive and negative the influences have been in the social media which are now Facebook, twitter, discussion forums etc.

On the other side of Search we could see that even search is going social, simply because we find lot of people in the social side of the internet.

We saw how a decision like buying a car from a search would eventually become social with so many Facebook comments to twitter updates to reviews will make it more social in the days to come, though of course the starting point would have been search.

A very busy day for conferencing with loads of take away value to implement and experiment.
The final part of the day was the penultimate Keynote from Microsoft by Richard Dunmall, VP, Global Accounts & Agencies, Microsoft Advertising, finally to be followed by Kent Wertime of O & M Japan.

Richard took us on a journey of exploring the future of storytelling. Story telling as I see it will not be interesting unless it engages the user and most importantly how they can make the right connect for the brands to see it.
With Kinect and other gaming technology it has become all pervasive to be a part of everyone’s lives and we could see all the technology waiting to tell us stories of ourselves and the brand in the days to come. He extensively spoke about how everyone’s a storyteller and how digital is enabling them to do that. The future is digitally connected with humans and interacting things being the message and the message if I am put it that way.

The best is the human endeavour of touch and feel is getting translated to a mass technology and it will change the way we interact in the near future making human experience all the more important.

It ‘s all about you and how that is going to be the central point around which we have to make all our stories happen with the right people, at the right time and at the right place.

We also had a glimpse of what Kinect could do to engage brands and most importantly the possibilities are endless.

The closing Keynote of ad:tech New Delhi was by Kent Wertime, President and Representative Director & Chief Operating Officer, Ogilvy & Mather (Japan) K. K. & Ogilvy Asia Pacific

He took us on why this is the age of digital and the marketing well well be called digimarketing in the days to come and what’s in store for the future.

Simply put the marketing has shifted from the brands being the center to consumers being in the center of the communication. Content will be the key again and it will possibly the most important part for any brand to connect with its consumers.

You cannot discard social since it will be at the center again. How we value data will also make it important for the brands to engage and how well can we mine them to use for the predictive models to tracking personal habits will be the key.
Its also about managing the consumer trust, making us go back in time on the basic premise that trust is essential in any communication.

Those were absolutely wonderful way to put across some of the most important points to ponder when we think digital is all about so many creative ways and engagement, but the basics remains the same. Those are all abstract forms for example in trust and engagement being one and another after effect.

A class of a presentation from an industry veteran brought the curtains down on what was absolutely engaging event for the digital marketers in the country and what ad:tech across the world is all about.

So will see you all next ad:tech soon in March 2013 and before that don’t forget ad:tech Bangalore makes a debut in September…

R Senthilkumar

The day One at ad:tech was the most anticipated one with the keynote by Shiv Singh, Global Head of Digital, Pepsico Beverages. The day started off with the customary inaugural with lamp bieng lit, followed by welcome remarks by Susan Mac Dermid, President of Digital Marketing Division dmg :: Events and Rammohan Sundaram, CEO & Founder Networkplay.

Mr. Suresh Reddy, Chairman & CEO of Ybrant Digital, (the Platinum Sponsor of the event) also spoke on this occasion. It was delightful to hear him say how some year back Indian brands have looked at ad:tech as a mere participant especially Ybrant and today have come a long way to sponsor one such event in India in all glory. Almost summarises the way digital will be in the near future. India will have a role to play with its ever increasing internet population which is engaging heavily on the net via mobile.

Mr. Shiv Singh took us on a journey of Real Time marketing on digital platform especially with the combination of Facebook and Twitter which has redefined the way brands have started talking to its consumers.

He took an example of how a tweet by Lady Gaga can be a great marketing tool which incidentally reaches over 16 million followers online. Now the way marketers have to plug in their brand communication is with the relevance of what is happening online and probably react or recreate a magic of the brand riding on some of the updates on Facebook and twitter. To me it looked as if those days of pitching in for a client and making a strategic analysis and presenting them are all going to be pre historic in this digital age. How well can we make use of social media in a sense that makes brands the center of conversation across the platforms will be a challenge that has to be met head on.

So Real Time marketing involves realtime insights, response, co-creating content, distribution and engagement. It calls for a multi tasking environment for brands to succeed in this age of digital, and when you say digital its not just the internet but even involves the television and also even the packaging and distribution. The biggest challenge he feels is not technology but the data we can gather on consumer behavior especially the data that focus on consumer preference, his location, style etc probably all the four Ps now will have to be spoken of in terms of the consumer instead of the product and brand, where he is and how he is engaging will probably be the in-thing for brands to associate with.

Most important weave social through all things and this will be the rule than an example in the coming days. And no campaign can be stand alone but will have platforms where all the brand associations will be shared and will be made into an engaging way forward for the brand.

Measurement is and will be an integral part of all these initiatives. And when we say measure, we clearly know where the engagement is from. He also spoke on Location based marketing and mobile marketing becoming the key in all future campaigns.

An absolutely engaging presentation with an eye on the future especially coming from a hip and trendy brand like Pepsi which thrives being connected to the young and happening audience.

Next was the keynote presentation by Arvind Rajan, MD - APAC & Japan, Linkedin. For us at Networkplay, its been a brand without which we would not have scaled the heights we are in today. LI gave enough insights into what is in store for the brands in terms of talking to a select and affluent set of audience.

Its no more about just jobs, its how the brands can make use of the professional network and place themselves in a position to get more followers for the brands. He also dwelt at length how brand pages on LinkedIn can be a one stop destination to handle its communication to the discerning followers on how its making itself more relevant professionally. It is also again the most important way to engage in real-time. The brands could use a number of tools to generate responses and also engage with them positively and he also cited a lot of examples where brands have exploited the professional networking to great effect.

To summarise, data is at the heart of any social network. It will be in brands interest to mine the data and engage with the consumer effectively and of course the time will be of essence.

An absolutely fantastic start to a great day, with two wonderful keynotes and the ball set rolling for the panels and presentations to come. The Marketing Masters, the Innovation track were planned in the afternoon before the final Keynote of the day.

The track on Brand Strategy looked at two different issues at hand – 1.How to leverage digital and 2. How the brands are now becoming publishers.

The Brand side on the panel was looking forward to spending more on digital and invariably has budgets which are now really numbers to reckon with brand marketers promising to hike it up if the publishers came with real metrics and engagement solutions. It was a cracker of a panel with brands and publishers and technology enablers giving their take on how to leverage digital to the max.

The second panel looked at how brands are telling stories with their own content. The final word on content story has not been said as yet. And when you have Coca Cola and MTV in the same panel it will be a session to watch out for. So today apart from mainstream publishers its also the brands which are creating content to a large extent and how! As much as a brand would love to talk about itself today it has become imperative to turn to the earned media to play the content owner in a way they have never done before.

The Marketing Masters had some of the most wonderful brands present their cases in digital and how they had been able to connect and engage in variety of platforms and end up adding to the bottomline. There were cases of interest from Kotak Mahindra Bank, to IBM to Ford which incidentally launched their Ford Fiesta entirely on digital. Also we had Nokia and dealsandyou making it a great set of presentations at the Marketing Masters. Interesting as it may seem the brands gave clear insights on how they have started thinking in digital right from the word go, while yesteryears the digital was an extension of the offline campaigns. It was very good news and most importantly the way forward for the betterment of the ecosystem.

The Innovation track also had presentations in three sets viz., on how technology can increase engagement with users and on how brands can gamify their brand experiences. It also had a session on how video is driving user engagement and advertiser engagement.Clear take away fro brands to indulge in technology and games and the next biggest inventory available as yet the video.

The day ended with the third Keynote and the final one for the day by Gian Fulgoni, Chairman and Co-Founder, comScore.
Gian had everyone listening to his magic of numbers and also unveiled some of the most important learning from digital especially with reference to the Indian Internet ecosystem.

Some of the notable points during his keynote included:

US was no longer the centre of the online universe. In 2011, US internet population versus the Rest of the World internet population was a 13 percent vs. 87 percent

Asia continues significant growth in the size of internet audience. Growth has slowed in North America and the European growth is mostly driven by Russia.

Indian internet users are much younger than global average. 75 percent of audience is under 35 years compared to 52 percent of the world and 55 percent of the region and ndia’s internet usage is relatively low compared to similarly sized countries

Young people drive internet consumption in India today, suggesting future overall usage will rise dramatically. India’s heaviest internet users are in the age group of 26 to 34 years.

He also made it a point to see things beyond just clicks and may be that will be a mindset that will revolutionise the industry

Great insights and makes it all the more interesting because India was central to all these data points. For me personally the way he presented for once I started to love the numbers. Probably the way the masters have a way with words.

A great day of learning at ad:tech New Delhi ended with a wonderful keynote.

(This is the second of the 3-part article on ad:tech New Delhi)

ad:tech New Delhi had changed the context for the digital fraternity in India with its first edition last year in April 2011. It still has the reminiscences of the keynotes of Babs Rangaiah of Unilever to David Fischer of FB to Sav of Digitas UK. It had left an indelible imagery on what is in store for the future. Continuing the trend and increasing the learning curve, the second edition of ad:tech New Delhi started with a Master Class on day zero on Search and Social.

The Master Class was organized in association with the Knowledge partner Communicate 2. The Master Class with 7 sessions gave a deep understanding on Search and Social and how it can be applied in real time and enriched the participants with enough practical knowledge to try them on their own.

Here’s a round up of the days learning’s…

Search is indispensable at every move for the brand to be present when they are being searched for even if not directly. It would also make great for brands to be present as content providers in times of searches so that they engage with the prospect or a consumer online in the way they choose to.

Content has become the King and the Queen, that remains the uncontested statement with all the brands and publishers looking to make content the center of all their communication. It goes without saying if we have content then of course there is rise in engagement. One of the best use of content was the Google adwords FAQ page. That according to me is a master stroke by the people who do what they talk, or walk the talk.

Its not just our website these days, there are many manifestations of the brand communication which is today spread across the spectrum with search and social integrated, the search apart, we have Facebook, twitter, Google Pages etc. How often have we devised a strategy to be in line with the brand communicates across the platforms across every point of communication. It is most important for brands to sync all these together in a way that consumers get a feel of the brand and engage constructively for raising their brand equity.

Reputation management has become very important in the literal sense because of online social platforms, and listening on Social media will be imperative because the net id going to have a wider impact than ever before. We have also seen some of the brands being online and how the listening has not exactly been the way it should be. Going forward there will be a lot of traction in terms of customer experience management online especially the social media. For sure an angry customer today has only this to do update his status with a tag to the brand experience good or bad.

One of the most important unveiling infact was that of YouTube presentation wherein the content owner can own his right and YouTube will search for any usage of the content across the network. This is done by a video search and I think the algorithm searches the video in parts and lists if there are videos that are similar. This is an ideal situation where in the piracy will be checked and of course the content creators get their due with respect to their work and monetize the same in due course.

Ofcourse the video is going to be big and in a way will lead the brands to own content than ever before. Collaborative effort will be in the making like that of Coke Studios by MTV.

Thanks to the knowledge partner Communicate 2 for their handling of the session and a great kick start to the ad:tech New Delhi 2012.

R Senthilkumar

(This is the first of the 3-part article on ad:tech New Delhi)

Are you an avid Indian blogger?

Do you know digital marketing like the back of your hand?

Then, this is your chance to leave your mark amongst India’s leading brands, agencies, publishers and service providers.

ad:tech New Delhi 2012, the largest gathering of online marketers, invites entries for its Blogger Contest for the Best Blog Entry and the Official Blogger.

This is one of the best opportunity for you to be at ad:tech New Delhi and be the voice of the community. There’s a lot of action awaiting the select blogger… more details here..

R Senthilkumar

So that’s billed as a big fight! Infact one of the twitterati that I follow named it as bitch fight. One TVC and three months later another series to give it back in their own words or say giving a taste of their own medicine.

Well I am talking about the big fight between The Hindu and the Times of India with their TVCs, you can see all the The Hindu videos here & TOI here which have created quite a debate and a following in traditional lines that Hindu reader normally does, take sides and also the TOI reader snaring / laughing off at the portrayal.

Now coming back to why I chose to write on this, well I have been a regular reader of the Hindu ever since I got subscribed to it say from 1991 or so till the last one year before I came to Delhi. My association with the Hindu has been diverse, a reader, an advertiser, a PR guy. But my association remains the best as a reader that’s when you get to enjoy all the best the Hindu has to offer.

I read with interest this article which appeared in Forbes blog. Very interesting take on why the ad in question from TOI actually woke up the Hindu. To a great extent, it is true and in fact my being in Delhi has changed the readership routine to Times of India for obvious reasons. I still get a hang of the Hindu online everyday even tweeting some interesting takes on my home town on and off. But to keep up the smell of the coffee I just buy a copy of the Hindu from Saket bookstall on Saturdays and Sundays during my walk.

The Delhi edition or rather the one printed at Allahabad or Mohali is very thin – less number of pages, but you get the Sunday Magazine and the usual Saturday stuff.

My early remembrances of the Hindu include the Saturday Sports special, which I started missing it when they stopped it altogether. They also did away with the last page sports reporting which was my favorite page. I reckon all the tennis reporting these days would not come close to the way they did without the internet and stuff we have today. But today is another different story. Then there was this change of design and all that which made news without dateline and it was fun reading those days when you could actually find same news items twice in the news paper or sometimes churned out the very next day.

And yes it has been a long way and editorially though I wouldn’t approve of it quite a few times, we would necessarily brag about the way its written; that immaculate English and the vocabulary that it imparts, it sheer brilliance and that what the stuff is made of at the Hindu. No doubt they refer the Hindu as a paper of study for the civil services.

Now you know all the questions that were asked were actually a part of the UPSC exams. It had caught the imagination of the ad industry and the people who read the Hindu, but my only hunch is will anyone from the TOI brandwagon jump the ship. True the south doesn’t celebrate the Bollywood or any of the Kollywood or Tollywood or Mollywood in the way the English dailies up north do it. There are no gossip columns there. There are a number of vernacular magazines which bridge the gap.

I think I am seeing a different newspaper in the Hindu in the sense they are also going commercial and also thinking about marketing, not that they were lame about it. I still think the Sportstar ads by Lintas were one of the best ever. But now it’s the time to be heard loud and may be this reaction. So welcome aboard the tough seas, the Hindu.

I will be missing the point if I don’t talk about the ads. The ads are well shot and are cute in fact, that’s a ridiculous comment you may say but what do you do when you know that lip sync is so obvious. Isn’t that the cute part. I should also be proud of the fact that I cracked almost 100% in all the ads. Now where is my big prize? Jokes apart it was trying to sell a bit of intellectual pursuit which is fine in a way but would the hurt guy (one mocked at) bite the bullet. They are a happy lot anyways! But they were entertaining for sure… Well that’s my personal take! It was nice seeing The Hindu take an aggressive stand though will have to wait for the business part of the subscriptions.

A look at the celebrity followers in India especially on twitter will give the reason why Page 3 exists so much than all pages, it’s actually the 10 pages of Page 3 news articles which they call it the city times. You could also blame it on twitter and @Srbachchan for letting the world know that Ash was pregnant on twitter.

Anyways this should be good for the TV Channels, who are making money out of Newspaper fights.

On the other hand it is also noteworthy that they made a viral out of the ads they did. I got to know of the TOI ad after this hit back by The Hindu. That was the best part and it was on my timeline so many times both on FB and twitter. That perhaps is a lesson for all marketers. My take out of the episode: Digital is here, it is here to stay and grow big, now you get to choose whether you want to stay ahead of times or not.

R Senthilkumar

Happy New Year everyone. It is the new year already and the last year, at least the last quarter whizzed past like a whirlwind. If I were to draw a line graph of the emotional ups and downs in the quarter, it would be a bloody jagged line. But one thing is for certain. The trend line was always on the up and up. Which is hardly surprising if you ask me because that is how it has always been. Neither time nor tide have been ever able to daunt the spirit that is the true Networkplay spirit.

A quick recap of the last quarter is in order. Obviously, we grew over the previous quarters as we have QoQ since inception but we also breached a huge mark. We crossed a million USD in revenues for the second time in a row after JAS as a Quarter outside of our events business, which is as big :-). A million dollars! That is the stuff dreams are made of, really!

And if there is one person who has made it possible, it is…wait a minute! The credit for this huge achievement goes to the entire company. Not one person can be singled out with 100 percent certainty for the whole deal. It is the joint effort of every spoke in the wheel. Every creak, every whirr, every small noise good or bad led to the making of this million-dollar symphony.

Notable mentions:
1) On the DTH front, we finally seem to have come of age. We really, really (and I am not given to using the same adverb twice in a sentence but I am making an exception here) outdid ourselves and that by a long margin. Saurabh, the man behind it all did a fantastic job of seeing the other side of the 8 digit number.
2) On the Web – Impact side, we again did a never done before kind of number. I will, of course not be giving out numbers here but suffice to say Hitesh and team rocked it.
3) Jignesh, who I have known for almost 5 years now (longer than anyone else who has known him in this company), is still a mystery to me. He rocks it when least expected (and while this is an all-praises blog, I would also like to mention that he has not done so well at times when he is expected to and hence he is a mystery). But all said and done, under his guidance and steering, the Results team notched a hitherto unachieved number as well. And from the looks of it, he is poised to outdo himself by huge margins quarter after quarter going forward too.
4) I can’t also believe how many fights, disagreements and arguments we keep having with the Ops team, led by Viren and Distribution team led by Ampreet. What however stands out is how each person in these teams is also collectively working for the company’s growth.
5) The Events Sales team (Isha and Namita) also did a kickass job of clocking in revenues for ad tech along with Jaswant’s team.

I am not taking names but everybody I have mentioned above and everybody I have missed contributed to the best of their abilities to ensure that we rock this quarter. And we did.

Hurrah! To many more such quarters.

Till last year India’s digital fraternity used to attend ad:tech a global digital marketing event away from India. It is a place for the digital marketing professionals to get a sense of what is happening and how technology is changing and the way brands are positioning themselves with an increasing digital mass audience, but this changed with the 1st edition in New Delhi last April. The event is a brand in itself with a decade of keeping abreast of the changes happening in the technology side of business and marketing and has been in the forefront leading the challenge in the internet and digital industry.

At the inaugural Indian edition, we saw some of the best technology in practice being displayed and some of the innovations showcased on internet and mobile and digital as a whole. India with its ever increasing internet population which at presently an estimated 120 Million active users and is fast growing into the largest medium where advertisers can target their marketing communication. The challenge it proposes is the interactivity and the closeness, in social media front has been a steep learning curve. Brands will have to go social and be in the midst of the mind space with more time spent on the Facebook, Twitter and other social networking sites. The content has become the king and for brands the first time it has given them an opportunity to own the content as media itself.

The event also brought into light how technologists are turning creative directors with creative and engaging mobile applications and augmented reality making its presence in the traditional domain. A great amount of exposure and learning is in store at ad:tech New Delhi where the best of technology brands and marketing case studies are shared with the audience. Thus making it possible for others in the digital space to embrace the technical knowhow and exploit it to engage with the consumer, be it on social, search or mobile.

It’s a new era where marketing meets technology is the buzzword and ad:tech is poised to take it to the next level in India. Mobile with its penetration and mass reach will also be a challenge for brands to engage effectively. The smart phones which are growing fast with the prices going south and features being loaded by the minute will soon become the most important medium. Mobile applications fondly called apps are changing the way people use their phones from being a simple communication device to an engaging branding console. Getting to make the best use of the technology and the latest in location based services which is making a lot of advancement in making a connect to the user at a particular location making him glocally available for brands to communicate.

So the game is on the most empowered consumer today because of his being connected and internet being available on multiple platforms the desktop, his laptop, the mobile and the all new internet powered TV. Following him wherever he goes and that too without being seen as intrusive, a marketing miracle which will be a success to replicate.

So, while the reach of the digital has removed the concept of “distance” with a keystroke or a touch, it’s never been more important to physically connect with friends, colleagues, business associates, trade journalists and the growing base of marketing experts that have come to represent ad:tech’s expanding network.

With such a background, ad:tech New Delhi’s 2nd edition in February 2012 will be a platform for all stakeholders to get updated, share, network and do business.

R Senthilkumar