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Cars24's latest advertising outing has no involvement of a creative agency. Is this a one-off
or a new model more advertisers will follow?
Where do ads come from? A brand of course! And who makes them? Why, an ad agency, of
course. Or so it would seem as status quo.
Apart from all the buzz about the shortage of talent, creative folks having diverse options etc.
the ad business might be undergoing another shift, but discreetly. We could spot plenty of ad
campaigns, over the last few weeks, which did not have an 'ad agency' setup involved. Brands
did it all in-house or got it done by individual freelancers and then roped in a production
house to put it on film.
We spoke to Vani Gupta from Hypersonic Advisory, the brains behind the campaign, to
find out more.
So why this campaign?
"Cars24 approached Hypersonic with a growth problem. We started gathering insights for
understanding the brand perception. We found that the original proposition of selling a car at
its best price was not tenable for the long term as the idea of price is subjective. Our
interactions revealed that consumers were happy not only because of the price but other
things as well like ease of use, branch experiences etc. and these needed to be highlighted.
Another part was that the brand was a leader in the used car market. We weaved both of these
into a full campaign," Gupta says.
"We worked on what could be the alternate proposition. This was followed by workshops
within the company. We crafted a proposition and tested it with consumers. We then prepared
a creative brief and approached freelancers for an ad campaign," Gupta adds.
However, this is the first time Hypersonic has done a campaign of this size. In Gupta's words,
it includes everything, 'end to end'. The people who were brought on board for the campaign
are folks Gupta had worked with previously or were recommended by her own marketing
community.
Vikram Chopra, CEO, Cars24, says in a press release, "The entire campaign - from insights
to execution - was led by Vani Gupta of Hypersonic. We worked with several service
providers on the recommendations from Hypersonic - media experts, digital, creative,
influencer marketing and others."
"I have been quite vocal about the reducing relevance of traditional 'agencies'. While clients
are struggling to align with the dynamism in customer mobility, the agencies, based on their
legacy team/remuneration structures and mostly used to the campaign planning/thinking
linked to the legendary 4Ps of marketing, have failed to make provisions for the digital
necessities of speed and the willingness to test multiple ideas. Even recognising some may
fail," Yesudas says.
"We will witness more of these in the future with the growth in the importance of content.
But the story is not any different for the media agencies. Since most media-agency thinking
gravitated from traditional to digital, the focus is still on millions of 'impressions', even if it
means 80 per cent plus bounce rates. Out of the US $4 billion predicted in digital investments
by 2020, I feel 25 per cent of this could be invested in channels like Google, FB etc. even
directly by clients, based on real data. Another 30-40 per cent could be moving towards
digital transformation, essentially cutting the layers between the brands and consumers into
the hands of meaningful transformation partners. Transactional 'advertising' will then be left
with around US $1 billion, which is the current benchmark, but with at least another 100
more 'digital specialist agency' competitors."
Rahul Jauhari, joint president and chief creative officer, Rediffusion India and Everest Brand
Solutions, maintains that the threat is real and agencies should venture out of the traditional
line of work.
"Yes, agencies are facing threats, temporary at times, from clients directly commissioning
work or giving it to a 'not so traditional agency'. Quite often, this can be a decision based on
cost, not on deep strategic value. A smart client judges or values his or her agency basis the
value the agency adds to the brand, not just basis a film or two. Agencies need to continue to
focus on being closest to the brand and responsive to the marketing challenges the client may
face. You can take a film away, but taking a brand away is not as simple a task. Over and
above, agencies need to think smarter and be more experimental to counter the challenge of
non-traditional competition," Jauhari says.