MxMIndia

Category: Opinion – Archives

  • Our ad and media industry needs to explore reinvention of advertising for countering adblocking, writes Indrani Sen

    Indrani Sen: Adblocking knocking on our doors!

    By Indrani Sen

     

    Globally, adblocking has been a cause of concern for publishers, advertisers and agencies for quite some time, but industry in India have been generally oblivious to its effect. A survey conducted in 2015 by GlobalWebIndex was an eyeopener. The survey showed that number of people actively using adblockers in India increased over one year from 2 million (second quarter of 2014) to 4 million (second quarter of 2015) with a trend of steady growth. (http://www.livemint.com/Industry/p3FZbvf9oulswnCf4zGxbN/iPhone-users-in-India-embrace-ad-blocking-survey.html). The survey showed that 42% of India’s iPhone 6 users use the software to block ads on their devices compared with a global average of 31%.. India ranked fourth among the 34 countries surveyed by the market researcher—after Russia, Poland and Indonesia—in terms of adoption of adblock.

     

    During the last few weeks, the online media erupted with various news of adblocking. On March 11, Opera became the second web browser after Apple’s Safari browser to introduce a new feature ‘native adblocking’ in its browser. While Apple enabled its mobile operating software iOS9 to block ads on the Safari browser, Opera has equipped its new desktop browser with the feature. Users of Opera browser can compare the time taken to load a page or a website with the adblocking device turned on and off. It also gives the user an option to view the white list pages with advertising like the popular apps Adblock Plus.

     

    On March 30, 2016 Samsung announced that adblocking feature will be available on its Android browser which comes preloaded in all Samsung phones. Samsung’s first attempt to introduce adblocking was thwarted by Google when it debarred all adblocking apps from its PlayStore as per its policy guidelines. This announcement will surely have effects on online advertising revenue in India as Android-based phones have more than 90% share in the smartphone market in India while Apple has less than 2% share.

     

    Next day, on April 1, we learnt that Microsoft Corp. Is planning to introduce a built-in adblocker into the next version of its web browser Microsoft Edge which has already replaced Internet Explorer as the default browser of Windows 10. Indians will take time to adopt Windows 10 and Microsoft Edge, so this may not be an immediate threat to the Indian system. However, if Microsoft decides to withdraw Internet Explorer, then it will be a different story.

     

    Adblocking is definitely knocking on our doors which may burst open soon. The comparatively high cost of data consumption in India, is likely to attract more and more smartphone users to adblocking in order to save money. Video ads, particularly animated ones require more bandwidth and shrink battery life. Indian consumers, who are not yet ready to pay for viewing online content, will not pay for viewing online ads if they can help it.

     

    On March 31, 2016, Advertising Age India published an interesting article “AdBlocking & User Experience: A Classic Case of Cobra Effect” by Upal Pradhan, Founder & CEO, Kratos (http://www.adageindia.in/blogs-columnists/viewpoint/ad-blocking-user-experience-a-classic-case-of-cobra-effect/articleshow/51614001.cms). Mr Pradhan has advocated against comprehensive blocking of ads on mobiles by pointing out its adverse effect on the entire ecosystem.

     

    “The Guardian’s Changing Media Summit 2016” held in London on March 23-24 had a panel discussion on “Will the rise of adblocking lead to the reinvention of advertising?”It turned out to be one of the most controversial and talked about topic of the event. The round-up of the event titled “Six things we learned from The Guardian Changing Media Summit 2016” (http://www.theguardian.com/media-network/2016/mar/29/guardian-changing-media-summit-2016-roundup) published on March 29, 2016, gave highlight of the various opinions expressed on adblocking by leading speakers from different cohorts of the media industry.

     

    Among the nuggets of wisdom shared by the speakers in the above Summit, I liked most the comment by Helen McRae, UK chief exec and chair of Western Europe at Mindshare, “We’ve forgotten that human insight is the determining factor into how successful your message is going to be. Adblocking is a symptom of something much larger – consumers want interesting, engaging and useful content, or they’ll block it.”

     

    Our advertising and media industry, still in the process of adopting and adjusting to the changing world of digital media, need to simultaneously explore reinvention of advertising for countering adblocking.

     

    Indrani Sen is a media services veteran, having worked with JWT, later Mindshare and then with Emami. In recent years, she is an independent consultant and academic. She is Adjunct Professor in charge of the Media Management programme at the Symbiosis Institute of Media & Communication, Pune. The views expressed here are her own. 

  • Indian broadcasters, production firms, telecom operators, video on demand players as well as international players are all crowding the in the space vying for a share of the rapidly growing segment, writes Indrani Sen

    Indrani Sen: The new kid on the media block

    By Indrani Sen

     

    The digital video entertainment is the new kid on our media block. Indian broadcasters, production firms, telecom operators,  video on demand players as well as international players are all crowding the in the space vying for a share of the rapidly growing segment.  Every business publication as well as industry websites have been carrying news and views on the topic. Broadcast Audience Research Council (BARC) has already announced their intention of starting measurement of digital viewership from end of 2016. Shuchi Bansal,  Media, Marketing and Advertising Editor of Mint recently reviewed the Indian Video on Demand (VOD) market scenario in her article “Video on Demand services set to explode in 2016”. (http://www.livemint.com/Opinion/k18JBjPyvSD7BZSgJcFjQK/Videoondemand-services-set-to-explode-in-2016.html). The lead-in to the article read “What is happening in video-on-demand services sector right now is similar to what happened to private satellite television in India in the early nineties” It will be interesting to wait and see if her premonition comes true, as this time the success of the new players reaching out to the consumers through mobile platform will result in a total churning of the Indian TV scenario and may lead to the death of many smaller TV channels.

    Of course, the big TV players will not be affected as they are all jumping into the brand wagon of video on demand (VOD) or digital video entertainment to ensure that if the audience viewership shifts from large screen to small screen, their revenue goes from one pocket to the other. Star India was the first mover with the launch of Hotstar in February 2015. In first nine months, Hotstar earned the distinction of being one of the fastest growing mobile digital services across the world with 40 million consumers downloading it.  Balaji Telefilms followed suit with announcement of the launch of ATL Digital Media in April 2015. Eros Now from Eros International which had launched earlier in 2012 as an on demand digital movie library expanded their offer in 2015.  Airtel Digital TV was another early mover in this space from 2012 and tied up with Disney India in 2014 to launch an English Subscription Video on Demand (SVOD) Service – “Disney Family Movies”.

    Notable among the others players who entered the Indian market last year were Hooq, Sony Liv and Yuup TV. Hooq, backed by Warner Bros., Sony Pictures and Singapore telecom giant Singtel offered Indian audience Hollywood content from Sony, Warner, Disney, Dreamworks and Miramax along with Indian content from leading banners. Multi Screen Media’s video on demand service Sony Liv rolled out before the festive season in 2015. Yuup TV with their offer of Live TV, Catch up TV and unlimited movies also entered India last October.

    In January 2016, Netflix, world’s leading internet television network, entered the Indian market. After the early move by Star India in 2015, Zee Entertainment Enterprises Ltd (ZEEL) and Viacom took one more year to put their act together.  In February 2016, ZEEL launched their new video on demand platform OZEE earlier this year. In keeping with their business strategy in the linear TV space, Zee Group has entered this new space shooting with a double barrel gun. Apart from launching OZEE, ZEE New Media also launched Ditto TV, India’s first Over The Top (OTT) TV distribution platform. Ditto TV plans to offer live TV channels and on demand video content to consumers through all types of screens, connected TV, desktops, laptops, Tablets and smart phones. Viacom 18 Digital Ventures is planning to launch their VOD brand called VOOT by end of this month. Various start ups like Arre from UDigital Content Pvt. Ltd, promoted by Ronnie Screwvala and B. Saikumar are also crowding in this space. Recently launched Vodaphone 4G LTE service offers VOD services like HOOQ and Hungama Play among other facilities.

    The two major Dish TV operators chose different marketing strategy for entering OOT TV. Dish TV launched Dish Flix in 2015 with a separate hardware along with a monthly subscription fees for watching ad free movies. Tata Sky is inviting their consumers to set up VOD services by connecting their internet to the TV set which is included in their subscription package. Quicker Entertainment is offering movies on demand to Cable TV operators which may help cable services to get additional revenue.

    There is no doubt that we have now an ecosystem that supports VOD platforms with improving bandwidth and increasing smartphones. The young Indians who prefer entertainment on the go rather than appointment viewing on linear TV are turning out to be the early adopter of digital video entertainment.  Low percentage of multiple TV households will help in adoption of personal devices for finding individual solutions to entertainment. Our e-commerce system is also ready to support the transactions.

    The real challenge for all the players is two fold. Firstly, they need to find a sustainable monetization model. Three  types of business models are currently operating in Indian VOD market-  (i) Subscription supported video on demand (Airtel, Tata Sky, Dish Flix, Quirk Entertainment, Netflix etc.), (ii) advertisement  supported video on demand (Hotstar, OZEE, VOOT,  You Tube, etc.) and (iii) transactional video on demand (pay per view).  Some of the subscription based models are offering ad free viewing while the others are combining subscription with advertisement support (Balaji ATL). Some are trying out the Fremium revenue model. However, time will only tell how Indian consumers with their penchant for consuming free content on internet and used to free downloading via Torrent will react to paying extra for digital video entertainment. Secondly, the heterogeneous Indian market makes it difficult for the VOD players to offer an ideal package of quality content to the consumers for which they will be ready to pay.

    While many advertisers have already started experimenting with this new medium, the industry is now eagerly waiting for the BARC inputs to legitimise their expenditure. The large VOD players also need to build up their own analytics based on data generated by mobile users. Personalisation of VOD offering based on consumer insights will become a key differentiator which will make this medium stand out from other mass media.  How different VOD players use mobile analytics in addition to the BARC data for customising mobile user data for different advertisers will be an important factor in determining their success in the growing Indian market.

     

    Indrani Sen is a media services veteran, having worked with JWT, later Mindshare and then with Emami.  In recent years, she is an independent consultant and academic. She is Adjunct Professor in charge of the Media Management programme at the Symbiosis Institute of Media & Communication, Pune. The views expressed here are her own.

     

  • In her column this fortnight, Indrani Sen brings us excerpts from a recent conversation she had with Impact Communications and RMAI President Sanjay Kaul

    Indrani Sen: Rural Media: Moving from Darkness to Light

    By Indrani Sen

     

    Indrani Sen
    Sanjay Kaul

    Recently, Sanjay Kaul, CEO of Impact Communications and President of Rural Marketing Association of India visited Symbiosis Institute of Media and Communication in Pune. He had an interaction with the students studying for MBA in Communication Management and shared his rich experience in rural marketing. Later, I had an interesting interaction with him exploring the changes happening in rural marketing and media, which I would like to share with the readers of this column.

     

    IS: What impact do you think BARC’s Rural TV Ratings will have on rural marketing?

    SK: Marketing companies will take more judicious decisions in terms of how much to spend where. Assuming that GECs and other TV channels have access to rural areas, it will not make sense for brands to go one to one, use BTL or other tactical marketing tools in those areas. It will make more sense to leverage TV based on popular ratings for media planning. Earlier these ratings were not available, now a large chunk of the TV viewership seems to be in rural areas, the bigger question is what percentage and at what cost. However, marketers now can take more informed decisions about media spends in rural areas which earlier were considered to be media dark.

     

    IS: So, the marketers’ spends on non-traditional media for rural campaigns will decrease with the availability of Rural TV Ratings?

    SK: That is likely to happen. Earlier when we did not have the measurement of TV reach, we relied more on non-traditional media. Now, we have a better understanding of TV penetration in rural areas which is more cost-effective than non-traditional media. But, when we want the audience to experience the product or to give a demonstration of its use that cannot be done through traditional media. There, we will have to use non-traditional media. If you see the urban space today, there you will find more and more use of non-traditional media over and above the traditional media. So, both will exist in the rural space.

     

    IS: With the increase of literacy in rural India, do you think the reach of newspapers can improve in rural areas?

    SK: Newspaper penetration and reading habits are different in urban and rural areas which are not just based on literacy. When a copy of a newspaper goes to a rural chaupal, it is read by 20/30 people or more. More educated villagers read out the newspaper to less literate people. News and information get disseminated in the rural areas, but not in the same way as in urban areas where you have newspapers delivered on your doorstep every day.  Now one or two persons in a village or establishments like barber shops and tea stalls subscribe to the newspapers and this pattern may not change. Literacy going up may not get huge traction in numbers in terms of circulation of newspapers.

     

    IS:  How do you think the reach of radio can improve in rural areas?

    SK: In the unban space, radio saw a revival through FM. The rejuvenation of content radically changed the listenership of radio. Primary stations of All India Radio need to change their content and make the same more contemporary. FM is not getting penetration in rural areas due to Governments policies and regulations which prohibit acquisition of one FM channel by another. Otherwise players like Reliance would have established huge network of private radio stations. Big FM and some other radio brands are going to smaller towns and are combining activation and events with radio broadcasting with a rural spill over in surrounding areas.

     

    IS:  You mentioned in your talk that toady mobile is the most viewed screen in rural India. How are the marketers leveraging the growth of mobile in the rural areas?

    SK: Mobile is going to be a game-changer.  This is the only thing which is in everybody’s hand in India today. Where there is no media penetration, there is still reach of mobile. Marketers are using it today both for control of their sales forces and facilitation of their business. They are also using it for sustenance of their business, for trade engagements and for pushing ideas. Coke is doing “Coke Sampark” riding on mobile; we are doing for Tata Chemicals a programme called “Sparsh” for various Kishan Kendras through mobile; BBC and Miranda Gates Foundation have done the program “Doctor on Mobile”, etc. Mobile is used today in every rural campaign in some or other form. Looking at mobile as a medium, the maximum downloads of entertainment clips from Hangama Digital happening in rural areas, so does the rupee one clippings of the cell phone operators.

     

    IS: Do you think the current structure of rural marketing based on events, activation and mobile screens will continue in Digital India of future?

    SK: We are thinking that something like a revolution is going to happen soon with Digital India. But, if we look at the Government’s plan for Digital India, it will take at least 16/17 years before whole India gets digitally connected. Government’s current plan of CSE centres is for facilitating e-commerce and various services offered by the Government. Social media traction is different in rural areas from urban areas. Anyway, rural people are more social and mutually connected than their urban counterparts. Digitization has to be seen more from the point of view of empowerment of rural people than from the point of view of extension of social media. The current structure of rural marketing will continue parallel with our shift towards Digital India for many years.

     

    IS: Finally, do you think with the advancement of technology, rural fairs and festivals can be brought to the urban audience as a virtual experience? Like taking a virtual dip in the Kumbh Mela; or virtually visiting the Pushkar Mela?

    SK: I never thought of it in that way. You have given me an idea. Sai Baba Trust offers you the scope of doing a virtual aarti and it may be possible to extend the experience of rural fairs and festivals to urban audience with help of technology.

     

    IS:  I think it will open the scope of a reverse integration between rural and urban India. Thank you for sharing your experience with our students and for agreeing to do this interview.

     

    Indrani Sen is a media services veteran, having worked with JWT, later Mindshare and then with Emami. In recent years, she is an independent consultant and academic. She is Adjunct Professor in charge of the Media Management programme at the Symbiosis Institute of Media & Communication, Pune. The views expressed here are her own.

     

  • It will not be surprising if our Advertising Expenditure gets on a roller coaster ride keeping in line with the predictions of PMAR 2016, writes Indrani Sen

    Indrani Sen: Boomtime for Media. A review of the Pitch Madison Advertising Report 2016

    Indrani Sen

    By Indrani Sen

     

    The official press release of the Pitch Madison Advertising Report (PMAR) 2016 predicting a 16.8% growth rate in advertising spends and a promise to cross the Rs 50,000 crore mark in 2016, instructed that the news should be carried only on Monday, February 15 or later. In true Indian style, the highlights of the report hit the online media on February 11! Before our Advertising & Media Industry could rejoice the prediction of “Boom Time” in 2016, on February 12, the Sensex posted biggest weekly fall in over six years with some sceptics in the industry murmuring about the possibility of a mid-year review by the authors of the report with a downward revision of the predicted trends.

     

    It will not be surprising if our Advertising Expenditure gets on a roller coaster ride keeping in line with the predictions of PMAR 2016. Let us recall that as early as in 2003, Goldman Sachs forecasted that China and India would become the first and third largest economies by 2050, with Brazil and Russia capturing the fifth and sixth spots. It seems we have a date with the destiny if India has to live up to the forecast of Goldman Sachs. The real growth driver will be the increasing middle class population in India and their sheer numbers will absorb the shocks of falling Sensex, etc. According to Goldman Sachs, the middle class population in India is expected to grow exponentially between 2010 and 2020.

     

     

    Sam Balsara’s quote in the Press Release confirms that similar factors have been considered by them– “In arriving at the numbers we are conditioned by the fact that the Indian economy has become the fastest growing economy of the world; our GDP growth rate at 7%+ is the envy of the western world, now  looking at India in new light…”.  Indian advertising market has grown consistently across last three years to achieve a growth of 60 %from 2013 to 2016, compared to the previous 3 years from 2010 – 2013, when the growth was only 28%.

     

     

    In February 2015, the Pitch Madison Media Advertising Outlook 2015 first predicted a growth rate of 9.6% in advertising spend from 2014 to 2015. In September 2015, it was subsequently revised to 13. 8%. The final tally has emerged as 4 percentile point higher than their revised predictions. The year on year growth has not helped in our ranking in the global listing, which continued to be 12th with only 2% share of the global advertising pie. However, we have managed to increase our share by 1 percentile point.

     

    Percentage share in Global Advertising
     

    2013

    2014

    2015
    Brazil

    5%

    5%

    5%
    Russia

    3%

    2%

    2%
    India

    1%

    1%

    2%
    China

    11%

    12%

    13%

    Source: WARC International AD Forecasts

     

    We should remember that while 1 USD equals 68.13 INR, 1 USD equals only 6.53 Chinese Yuan. Like the practice of calculating normalised GRP in media planning, if we could have normalised the global advertising expenditure, then probably our ranking and share of the global advertising pie would have improved.

    According to PMAR 2016, FMCG clients continued to be the largest contributor in 2015 and spent Rs. 12,364 crore or 28% in advertising across media, followed by Ecommerce players which contributed to 10% by spending Rs. 4,231crores, Auto and Telcom are next in line contributing 9% and 8% respectively.  Contrary to the common belief that Ecommerce was the growth driver in 2015, organic growth from the FMCG sector played a major role in the growth of advertising expenditures. HUL topped the list of advertisers with a whopping Rs 2500 crore (approximate) spent in advertising.

     

    In the nearly Rs.44,000 crore of Indian advertising expenditure in 2015, TV and Print continued to be the two dominant media with Digital enjoying the highest growth rate. After a gap of five years, TV has again emerged as the number one contributor in 2015 with Print loosing 3 percentile points in share which got distributed  across TV (+1%), Digital (+1%), Radio (+0.5%) and Cinema (+0.5%). The projection for 2016 shows a further dip in the share of Print in spite of a 10% growth over 2015.

     

    Media wise share in advertising pie
     

    2014

    2015

    2016(P)
    TV

    38%

    39%

    40%
    Print

    41%

    38%

    36%
    Digital

    11%

    12%

    13%
    OOH

    6%

    6%

    6%
    Radio

    3.50%

    4%

    4%
    Cinema

    0.50%

    1%

    1%


    Source: PMAR 2016 & PMAO2015

     

    TV grew by 22% in 2015 and is expected to grow by another 20% in 2016 and add 1 percentile point in its share of the advertising pie.  Hindi GEC channels continue to enjoy the highest share followed by News Channels (Hindi & English). All regional language channels earned additional revenue with Tamil, Kannada and Bengali channels also getting additional share of the business.  The potential of the regional channels will be exploited by advertisers in 2016 for reaching out to rural audiences and perhaps the same has not been fully explored in the growth projections.

     

    Print, the second largest medium, grew by 11% in 2015 and is expected to grow by 10% in 2016. However, it is projected to grow by another 10% but concede 2 more percentile point of its share to other media. In the language wise highlights presented in the presentation of PMAR 2016, newspapers and magazines have been combined while in PMAO 2015, similar analysis was presented for only dailies. However, as magazines reflected a negative growth of -3% in 2015, we can presume that most of the growth in Print in 2015 came from dailies. PMAO 2015 showed most of the languages dailies suffering negative growth rate (2013/2014) apart from dailies in Marathi. Gujrati, Kannada, Telegu and Bengali languages. In PMAR 2016 a reverse picture emerged with most of the language dailies enjoying accelerated growth rates except Gujarati which showed a negative growth. Oriya and Bengali (Dailies & Magazines) showed double digit growth rates (2014/1015) which came as a surprise.

     

    Digital grew by 29% in 2015 and established itself as the third largest medium with a 12% share of the total ad pie in 2015. Digital is projected to grow at a 30% rate (2015/16) and increase its share in the advertising pie by 1 percentile point to 13%. Digital’s share in the advertising pie (11.6%) is more than the combined total share of Outdoor, Radio and Cinema (10.6%). However, the growth of Digital may have been underestimated considering the growth of smart phones and internet accessibility in India and the affinity of our youth with Digital and social media.

     

    Outdoor revenues have been recast for last three years to include Digital OOH and Malls which are growing rapidly. Total OOH revenue including transit was Rs.2665crores in 2015 and is expected to grow to Rs. 3010crores in 2016.

     

    Radio is predicted to grow to 1823crores in 2016 from 1545croers in 2015 and maintain its share of 4% in the advertising pie.  While it grew by 20% in 2015, the above prediction means only 18% growth in 2016 when we are expecting the new bunch of radio stations to be operative before the year end. Again, the predicted growth of Radio seems to be conservative rather than bullish.

     

    Cinema estimates have been revised to include advertising from various Government Agencies as well as local/ retail advertisers in 2015 as well as in the previous years. In 2015 Cinema contributed Rs. 465crores to the total advertising expenditure and is expected to grow to Rs.535crores in 2016.

     

    As always, the Pitch Madison Advertising Report 2016 is a very useful document which will be used as a reference in the industry till the next report comes out.  When we look at the ups and downs from 2007 to 2012 (chart above “A 10 Year Review”), we find it difficult to believe in the upward swing which we are witnessing over the last three years. Can the growth in 2016 be actually higher than 17.6% which we achieved in 2015? A million dollar question only time will tell.

     

    Indrani Sen is a media services veteran, having worked with JWT, later Mindshare and then with Emami. In recent years, she is an independent consultant and academic. She is Adjunct Professor in charge of the Media Management programme at the Symbiosis Institute of Media & Communication, Pune. The views expressed here are her own.

     

  • Market indicators show that traditional media industry in India has good reasons to welcome 2019

    Indrani Sen: Looking back at 2018

    By Indrani Sen

     

    2018 has been an interesting and inspiring year for the Indian media industry. After struggling with the aftermath of demonetisation in 2016 and the GST in 2017, the industry saw a year without any external interruption and was able to regain the momentum of growth. We have to wait for another couple of months before we get the estimates for 2018 and the projections for the future from various industry sources, but market indicators show that traditional media industry in India has good reasons to welcome tonight 2019.

    Indian traditional media has continued to remain resilient inspite of the growth of the digital media. Globally, 2018 would perhaps go down in history as the watershed year in advertising industry when the old guard bowed down to the new generation, best illustrated by the announcement made by  WPP in November 2018 to merge the traditional agency J Walter Thompson and digital agency Wunderman to form a new agency ‘Wunderman Thompson’. Abi Dan wrote an article in Frobes on the merger where he commented “While these are positioned as mergers of equals, they are essentially a takeover by the digital agencies of their older siblings.”

    Against this global backdrop, traditional media continued to thrive in India in 2018 and the momentum is likely to last till we usher in the third decade of the new millennium in two year’s time. For Print, the oldest medium in the traditional media team, 2018 began on a high note with IRS 2017, released in January 2018, showing a growth of 9% in total newspaper readership from 2014 to 2017 and reiterating the reach and strength of the print media in the digital age. The continuous growth of the regional newspapers which sustained during 2018 indicates that Print in India is going to write its own history. The “fake news” controversy and the “#MeToo” movement made some scratches on the reputation of some publications, but did not have any lasting effect. On the other hand, digital media bore the brunt of the “fake news” more heavily and made readers turn to the printed words for assurance.

    The various new ventures and deals in the Television sector announced in 2018 showed clearly that the medium is thriving for growth. The process of merger of Dish TV India of Essel Group with Videocon D2h was completed in 2018. Essel Group announced in November 2018 its plan to divest up to 50 per cent of its stake in ZEEL to ensure disruptive technological advancement and transformation of the company into a digitally equipped media tech firm. The decision is expected to be processed and implemented in 2019.

    Reliance Jio announced in July 2018 Giga TV set-top boxes which will have the ability to use Internet to offer live TV and live interaction through Jio TV Call. This announcement was followed in August 2018 by the announcement of Jio Giga Fibre, an ultra-high speed fixed line broadband service for homes and enterprises. Jio also made substantially large primary and secondary investment in Den Networks and picked up majority stakes 51.3 per cent in Hathway Cable and Datacom Limited.

    After winning the media rights of Indian Premium League in September 2017, Star TV managed to increase the overall viewership of IPL 2018 through successful implementation of their marketing strategy in national and regional markets.

    E-Auction of DD Free Dish slots was postponed from 2018 to 2019, probably in view of the uncertainty around the implementation of the new tariff policy announced by TRAI. . The next E-Auction of DD Free Dish will play a significant role as all TV viewers will have to pay a fixed base rate for getting access to the free to air channels and then choose the pay channels as per the rate cards.

    Early in 2018 we saw Star India & Star Viay challenging TRAI’s new guidelines related to the tariff order (issued in 2016) in Chennai court. After Chennai High Court ruled in favour of TRAI, Star India made an appeal in the Supreme Court, who also upheld the order of TRAI in October, 2018.  The year has ended amid a lot of confusion related to the implementation of the new tariff order forcing TRAI to extend the deadline by a month from end December 2018 to end January 2019.  Most of the large TV operators have announced their own package deals for subscribers, but the distributors are not offering the same as TRAI has not given any guideline related to such package deals and how the revenue of the same will be shared between the TV channels and the distributors. It remains to be seen if the consumer actually benefits from the new tariff orders or emerges as the looser, particularly in small towns and rural belts.

    Radio, the older yet weaker sibling of the Broadcast media, managed to retain its share of business against the financial disruption caused by demonetisation and GST in 2016 and 2017. The same trend continued in 2018 when we saw the base of FM Radio expanding with many of the new radio stations sanctioned in the Phase III Auction going on air. FM radio stations have been actively integrating for some time their on-ground activations with digital content through innovations which has helped in their overall growth of revenue. 2018 was no exception to the same. While the growth of Radio Adex has remained moderate in 2018, the overall growth in revenues of the radio stations has probably seen a healthier growth riding on the rapidly growing digital and social media.

    During 2018, OOH has recovered from the effects of demonetisation and GST but we did not see much growth in Digital OOH which was expected. Due to lack of a proper Adex system in outdoor medium, its revenue as well as growth has been getting under estimated over the years and 2018 has not seen any change in that condition.

    According to the industry sources, the cinema advertising has seen a healthy growth in 2018 riding largely on in film advertising, particularly in regional cinema. Again, this growth may not get reflected in the overall calculations of advertising expenditure in 2018 which we will get to see in another couple of months.

    As predicted, Indian digital media has grown in an exponential rate during 2018, in spite of the disturbance created by “fake news” etc. The growth has been helped by the increase in internet access through mobile internet and various forms of internet advertising.  Video Games and on line streaming of music and movies have continued to accelerate the growth. The international and homegrown OTT players have also helped in the overall process of digitization of media exposure in India.

    To sum up, 2018 has been a fruitful year for media industry in India with lot of activities across different media. It is expected that the growth will not only continue but will accelerate during the first half of 2019 riding on the upcoming General Elections.

     

     

  • This proposed amendment in our IT rules has far more serious long-term implications, but strangely till now there have been very little public views with 18 days left for commenting on the same, writes Indrani Sen

    Indrani Sen: Indian Social media in 2019: “Big Brother” to watch over users

    By Indrani Sen

    2019 will go down in the history of Indian social media as the year when the “Big Brother” started watching over Indian social media and the users lost to a large extent their rights to privacy and freedom of expressing their thoughts. As we get ready for the general elections in May 2019, the Indian government is planning to change its IT rules to control fake news and curb spread of misinformation under the pretext of maintaining the “sovereignty and integrity of India”.

    The changes in the IT rules proposed by the Information and Technology Ministry towards the end of December, 2018 and open to public comment till January 31, 2019 have sparked some protests from civil rights activists and ensued debates among select experts in cyber media law regarding its scope and interpretations. We have seen fresh news reports over the last couple of days about global social media and technology companies getting ready for legal actions against the proposed regulations.

    The new rules, when implemented, would compel all social media platforms to remove unlawful content, such as anything that affected the “sovereignty and integrity of India” within 24 hours. It calls for 24X7 surveillance of 100% of the posts, comments, chats, etc. by all users of social media in India which is estimated to be close to half a billion.  If implemented, this will increase the cost of operations of the social media platforms which eventually will affect the consumers apart from depriving them of their rights to privacy and freedom of expressions as mentioned earlier. The safe harbour protection currently available to intermediaries, which is an integral part of the way the social media business is run, is under threat of removal under the proposed rules.

     

    Please see the link https://economictimes.indiatimes.com/tech/ites/govt-plans-amending-it-rules-to-curb-social-media-misuse/articleshow/67232660.cms  for details of the proposed rules, a glimpse of which is shown below.

     

    Infographic: https://economictimes.indiatimes.com

     

    Indian social media was all set for a roller coaster ride in 2019. Read an article on January 3 in www.socialsamosa.com by Vijay Shenoy, AVP Operations South, WatConsult, highlighting four trends that we can expect to see in social media during 2019: moment marketing, video marketing, applications of augmented reality and influencer marketing in a mobile first Indian market with estimated 258.27 million social network users. The global trends showed that Facebook will have a strong growth of users from Asia-Pacific region headed by India with US accounting for only 10% of Facebook’s global base. Instagram and Snapchat are both expected to grow globally in 2019 and again India will be contributing substantially to their growths.

    In a report on the forecasts and predictions for social media in US in 2019, www.emarketer.com  commented “We expect an explosion of stories and vertical video across the digital landscape. That will lead to the inevitable swing of the pendulum toward backlash and questioning about stories’ effectiveness. Facebook will work hard to promote the format to users and advertisers, but the feed will remain the dominant way users use the app”. In India we are already seeing Facebook and Snapchat investing in the original video content and introducing new tools and features for their users.

    In 2018, social media giants had started actively implementing certain steps against fake news and misinformation generated by users. Managing the election-related interference in 2019 is an uphill task and Facebook announced in October 2018 that they are establishing a task force in India to ensure that users do not abuse their platform. Now the proposed “censoring” of all social media content by the Indian Government with a very steep implementation dead line of removing the “undesirable content” has baffled all social media owners and as per various reports in media they are busy taking legal opinions on the proposed amendments in Indian IT rules.

     

    The users of social media in India have not yet woken up to the full implications of the rules on their rights of privacy and freedom of expressing their thoughts. We have also not seen much of expert opinions expressed on the topic across different media. In 2016 when Facebook proposed their plan for introducing “Free Basics” in India, we had witnessed much more uproar in our public domain. This proposed amendment in our IT rules has far more serious long-term implications, but strangely till now there have been very little public views with 18 days left for commenting on the same.

     

     

  • Indrani Sen analyses the numbers unveiled in GroupM’s TYNY 2019 and Madison’s PMAR 2019 reports

    Indian Ad Industry: Are Happy Times Really Here Again?

     

    By Indrani Sen

     

    Indrani Sen

    Last week, the advertising and media industry probably had an overdose of data and information to chew, both GroupM and Madison released their annual reports on industry AdEx “This Year Next Year” (TYNY) 2019 and “Pitch Madison Advertising Report” (PMAR) 2019; Dentsu Aegis Network’s arm Posterscopre released a forecast for only OOH industry followed by the TAM AdEx Report and the results of the DD Free Dish e-auction held from February 11 to 14, 2019. It will not make any sense to discuss the implications of all the reports together. Let me today take a look at TYNY 2019 and PMAR 2019 released by GroupM and Madison.

    By now, industry professionals are reconciled to the reality that there is a big gap in the estimation of the size of the Indian Ad Industry by the two agencies. However, as an academic I find it difficult to explain the reasons of the same to my students. I was alarmed to find earlier that since 2016, the gap in real terms increased year on year till 2018 as shown in the chart below. It is reliving to find from the recent reports that the same is not increasing further in the estimates made for 2019 by GroupM and Madison. We can probably hope that in another few years the difference between the two estimates will be reduced to 4% to 8%, the acceptable statistical margin of error at the 95% confidence level.

    Estimated Size of Indian Ad Industry (Rs Crore)
    2016 2017 2018 2019 P
    TYNY 55671 61263 70602 80678
    PMAR 49480 53158 60908 70889
    Difference 6119 8105 9694 9789

     

    A comparative analysis of the 2018 adspends by media made in the two reports show that the main bone of contention between the two is in the estimated size and share of TV media. Apart from TV, the differences in the estimated size in rupee value of Print, Digital and Radio fall within the acceptable margin of error ranging from 4% to 8%.The estimated size in rupee value are very close for OOH and same for Cinema. The detailed analysis is given below:

    Indian Ad Industry 2018: Estimated Size (Rs Crore) & Share (%)

     Rs. Crore 2018 f   2018  
    Media TYNY %share PMAR %share
    TV 33577 48 23432 38
    Print 17970 25 19467 32
    Digital 12337 17 11706 19
    OOH 3202 5 3365 6
    Radio 2709 4 2144 4
    Cinema 806 1 805 1
    Total 70602 100 60908 100
    Growth over last year 11%   12%  

     

    In terms of forecasts for 2019, the growth rates predicted by TYNY for different media are lower than the growth rates predicted by PMAR, apart from Radio where TYNY has predicted a higher growth rate than PMAR. Both the reports agree that the highest growth rate will be in Digital media fuelled by mobile, online video and social media, followed by Cinema though on a very small base. In terms of overall growth, TYNY has pegged it at 14%, 2.4% lower than the prediction of PMAR at 16.4%.

    Indian Ad Industry Forecast
    2019p 2019p
    Rs Crore TYNY %  Share Growth % PMAR % Share Growth %
    TV 38612 48 15 27649 39 18
    Print 18368 23 2 20442 29 5
    Digital 16038 20 30 15612 22 33
    OOH 3536 4 10 3750 5 11
    Radio 3116 4 15 2401 3 12
    Cinema 1008 1 25 1047 1 30
    Total 80678 100 14 70889 100 16.4

     

    Both the agencies have cited upcoming Parliamentary elections and ICC Cricket World Cup 2019 as major contributor to the growth in ad spends in 2019. While Madison have cited increase in government spending to showcase its achievements, the growth of OTT, increased spending in rural sector and India moving to a consumption society as the other reasons for predicting a high growth for the ad industry, GroupM has highlighted major trends like emerging technology, availability of data, content creation and distribution, etc. as factors contributing to the growth in advertising expenditure. There is no doubt that after two bad years in 2016 and 2017, Indian advertising industry has turned around in 2018 and is poised for further growth in 2019.

    Let me turn around and play the role of Devil’s advocate musing over what can disrupt the rosy dreams of advertising industry during next year. Over the last four days all of us are reeling under the effect of the terrorist attack in Pulwama killing 40 CRPF jawans. The entire nation wants revenge and our expectations have increased since the last surgical attack. Such attacks and counter attacks may lead to unforeseen developments affecting our economy and business.

    After the results of the last round of state elections, many political analysts think that BJP may have to depend on coalition with other political parties to run the Government in Centre after the next General Election which may affect smooth functioning of the Government. The gross overspending (Rs. 99610 crores over approved expenditure) by the Union Government as reported recently by CAG may have a diverse effect on various government approved projects in future as well as rural development.

    If RBI falls in line with the directives of the Finance Ministry, then India’s financial ratings may suffer globally and rupee may face further devaluation in its foreign exchange rate. There could be changes in the domestic as well as foreign policies of US which will have far reaching effect on the entire world and India will not be an exception. To sum up, we are living in very uncertain times when any significant change in internal or external political situations or foreign/ economic policies can adversely affect the growth of our advertising industry. Let us keep our fingers crossed and hope that the predictions for the growth in advertising in 2019 made by TYNY and PMAR will be realised without any major disruption.

     

     

    List of my articles related to this topic over last three years:

     

    Feb 20, 2018 Mind the TV AdEx Gap

    Feb 20, 2017 What is the real size of the Indian Ad Industry

    Nov 21, 2016 Post Demonetisation, it’s boom to doom for ad spends

    Feb 15, 2016 Boomtime for Media: A Review of Pitch Madison Advertising Report 2016

     

  • The TV AdEx data of 2018 by TAM Axis seems to indicate that Indian TV ad revenue is set for a roller coaster ride in 2019, writes Indrani Sen

    Gung-ho TV Advertising Trends

     

    By Indrani Sen

     

    Indrani Sen

    The recent TAM Axis report on TV advertising trends in India in 2018 published in ET Brand Equity (https://brandequity.economictimes.indiatimes.com/slide-shows/tv-advertising-at-a-glance-tam-report/68096082) on February 22, 2019 shows that contrary to the popular belief TV advertising revenue did not suffer in 2017 after introduction of GST. Demonetisation in 2016 was a big blow which crippled the growth rate, but the advertising revenue was back on its growth track in 2017 which accelerated in 2018.

    Indexed growth rate of TV ad revenue 2014-2018: Source TAM Axis (AdEx India)

    N.B. The number of channels covered by AdEx is shown under each year in the green line.

    The above table shows that from 2014 to 2015 the index rose by 16 points and after adding only 1 point in 2016, it jumped by another 16 points in 2017 followed by 20 points in 2018. Over the last five years, from 2014 to 2018 there has been an overall growth of 53% in TV advertising revenue.

    Top 10 sectors in TV advertising in 2018: Source TAM Axis (AdEx India)

    The Top 10 sectors and the Top 5 sectors respectively account for 81% and 61% of total TV advertising revenue in 2018. While the Top 2 sectors retained their positions, household products rose from rank 7 to rank 5 with 43% growth in TV advertising in 2018 over 2017. Hair Care and Auto ranked lower in 2018 as compared to 2017 while Laundry, Personal Accessories and Durables held on to their ranks.

    It is interesting to note that of the Top 10 categories, 3 (Toilet Soap, Tooth Paste & Perfume /Deodorant) belong to Personal Care/ Personal Hygiene sector; 2 (Washing Powder/ Liquids & Toilet/ Floor Cleaner) belong to Household Product sector; 2 (Milk Beverages & Chocolates) belong to Food & Beverage sector; 2 (Two Wheeler and Cars/ Jeeps) belong to Auto sector and 1 (Shampoo) belongs to Hair Care sector. Though Services and Personal Healthcare hold the 3rd and 4th ranks among the top 10 sectors, no category from the two sectors feature in the list of top 10 categories which collectively account for more than 25% of the total TV advertising revenue.

    Top Ten advertisers accounted for 30% while top 50 advertisers accounted for 56% of the total TV advertising revenue in 2918. Hindustan Unilever topped the list with 10% share, followed by Reckitt Benckiser (India) and ITC who rose from 8th rank in 2017 to 3rd rank in 2018. Wipro and Amazon Online were new entrants among top 10 advertisers in 2018.

    The 2017-18 Annual Report of the Telecom Regulatory Authority of India (TRAI), published last week, indicates that the subscription revenues accounted for 59.5% of the overall TV industry revenue as it rose from Rs 38,7007 crore in 2016-17 to Rs 39,3007 crore in 2017-18. The report quoted the FICCI-EY Report 2018 which indicated that TV advertising revenues rose from Rs 20,1007 crore in 2016-17 to Rs 26,7007 crore in 2017-18, at a much higher rate of 32.8 per cent than reflected in the analysis of TAM Adex data for 2018, albeit referring to a different time period.

    Regardless of different reports based on different time periods, it is a reality that with close to 200 million TV households and 836 million TV viewers In India (Source: BARC Establishment Survey 2018), the Indian advertisers will continue to invest in TV medium for reaching out to the masses. The detailed analysis of TV AdEx data of 2018 by TAM Axis seems to indicate that Indian TV advertising revenue is all set for a roller coaster ride in 2019.

  • TV channels who were early adopters of OTT platforms will enjoy a distinct advantage, writes Indrani Sen

    Will Skinny Bundles work in India?

     

    By Indrani Sen

     

    I recently read an interesting article “TV Industry Eyes Hybrid Linear, On Demand OTT services” in www.emarketer.com based on the findings of Digital TV Europe’s “Industry Survey 2019.” According to the survey, nine in 10 industry professionals worldwide had positive outlooks on the two-year growth of “skinny bundles,” or subscriptions that offer both linear and on-demand OTT services as against subscription of only SOVD services like Netflix and Amazon Prime Video.

     

    The term “skinny bundle” was first coined to describe pared-down cable TV packages in the United States. In recent times, the concept of ‘skinny bundle’ has been introduced into the digital video sphere with an aim to describe either linear OTT services that offer customizable channel packages or a service that combines linear and on-demand content, as defined in the Digital TV Europe’s survey. As the article explains “The latter definition alludes to linear OTT services like Sling TV and fuboTV, which now have subscriptions that offer additional access to premium, on-demand content from services like HBO and Showtime. But it also represents SVOD services like Hulu, which bolstered its offerings with Hulu with Live TV, a linear service. (Source: https://www.emarketer.com/content/tv-industry-eyes-hybrid-linear-on-demand-ott-services?ecid=NL1001)

     

    In the US and other European countries, there is a growing trend of “cord-cutters” every year, referring to the consumers who are cancelling their subscription to cable and opting for other digital services. There are also a significant number of “cord-nevers” among younger generation (those who have never subscribed to traditional cable). It would be interesting to wait and watch what impact the growth of mobile internet in India has in the next few years on the cable TV and Dish TV subscribers.

     

    This model of skinny bundles can be adopted easily to suit the Indian TV industry, against our unique scenario of rapidly growing access to internet through mobile phones. Among the various options of skinny bundles shown in the above chart borrowed from the article, the option of Multiplay services (TV bundled with fixed and mobile broadband and telephone) looks like an ideal solution for Indian TV industry in near future.

     

    To sum up, it is going to be an exciting time for Indian TV industry from 2020 onwards with constant changes and innovations in the way of doing business. Needless to mention that the TV channels who were early adopters of OTT platforms will enjoy a distinct advantage.

     

     

  • Adult Indians spend almost one-third of daily media time on digital, notes Indrani Sen

    No-brainer, but shape of things to come…

     

    By Indrani Sen

     

    Recently, eMarketer conduced a global survey of the time consumers in different countries spent on media consumption per day. Adult consumers in India will spend 70.1% (3 hours, 30 minutes) of their daily media time on traditional media and remaining 29.9%, or 1 hour and 29 minutes on digital media in 2019 (https://www.emarketer.com/content/india-time-spent-with-media-2019).

     

    A large part of the growth for time spent by Indian adults with digital comes from content consumption that takes place over the mobile internet. This trend will continue till 2021 based on availability of cheaper smartphones, a growing number of smartphone users and affordable data. It is estimated that in 2019, adults will spend 1 hour, 12 minutes online, and the majority of that time (76.5%) will be via mobile devices.

    In India, TV takes the largest share of total time spent at 58.7%, or 2 hours, 55 minutes. Digital is the second most popular medium with 1 hour, 29 minutes daily, a little under one-third of media time each day.

     

    In terms of ad expenditure, digital media is lagging behind their market share of daily media time spent. eMarketer forecast that digital and traditional will, respectively, account for 20.8% and 79.2% of media ad spending in India in 2019.

     

    As per the estimates of daily media time spent, the above table shows that by 2021 adult Indians will spent on an average 5 hours and 24 minutes on media consumption. There is head room for growth in the average media time, as adult consumers in many other countries spend 8 to 9 hours on daily media consumption. In some countries, consumers have reached the limit of their time spent on media and year on year there is hardly any growth. For example, consumers in the UK will spend 9 hours, 38 minutes with media in 2019, a 1-minute increase from last year. Similar to the rest of the world, time spent with mobile becomes a major driver of digital growth in UK as shown in the table below.

     

     

    We can expect in the long run, similar trends in daily time spent on media as reflected in the above table. According to the survey, time spent by consumers with digital and traditional media will continue to grow in tandem in India, but digital will grown at a faster rate from 2019 to 2021. However, it will take Indian consumers probably another decade or more before their average daily time spent on media can touch 8 to 9 hours as the growth of time spent on digital media will depend on spread of broadband across the country.

     

     

  • Indrani Sen is back with a new season of her commentary, to focus on the issue of localisation, and more

    Localisation in Indian Digital Media Market

     

     

    By Indrani Sen

     

    Earlier this year, I was delighted to read the news that Chanpreet Arora had stepped down from the position of CEO of Vice Media to join as a Journalist Fellow in Reuters Institute for the Study of Journalism under University of Oxford. In India, only a selective set of people from industry interact with academic institutes and very few academicians act as consultants to the industry. Against that backdrop, Arora’s move was courageous and inspiring to others. Recently, I read on the internet her Fellowship Paper “The Evolving Indian Media Market: Succeeding through Localisation” and was impressed by her analysis. (https://reutersinstitute.politics.ox.ac.uk/our-research/evolving-indian-media-market-succeeding-through-localisation)

     

    When we discuss about localisation of media, our top-of-mind recall is regional publications, followed by regional TV channels and FM radio stations. Arora has presented an excellent analysis of the various factors guiding and governing localisation of doing business in Indian digital media market. Her article deals with macro economics, key global trends, digital explosion in India and models adopted by international companies in India under the section “Why India”.

     

    Next is a section on “Doing Business in India” covering from localisation of content and delivery to regulatory framework.  Arora argues: “India is one of the largest, most dynamic and growing markets in the world and is too big to ignore for any global player. Unlike its biggest neighbour, India’s primary attraction lies in its massive market size and open market policies for digital players. There is a viable demand for every solution. However, sharp segmentation is the key to success… If a company wants to come into India without any localisation then it will only be able to capture the top 1% of the Indian consumers who are highly affluent and have similar exposures as that of the western audience.”

     

    In her article, Arora presents some key aspects of building a robust business and localisation in India as understanding of Indian business culture, creating a strong local leadership, building a strong digital product with ability to focus on consumer segmentation, creating content in regional languages beyond Hindi, focus on video and audio, innovative content, metrics developed for Indian conditions and finally revenue diversification beyond advertiser led revenue model.

     

    The article deliberates on how to develop a healthy ecosystem and the various adjustment factors which an international company investing in India has to deal with. In conclusion, she elaborates on building a successful internet news media company for the future in India and shares her own industry experiences in the end note.  To sum up, it is a very good guideline for international companies interested in investing in Indian digital media market.

     

    I found Arora’s analysis lacking in only one aspect. Indian media today is vulnerable to administrative excesses and political pressure to a degree which International organisations are not used to dealing with. Arora has completely ignored this aspect of doing media business in India, though digital media in future will have to deal with many such situations.

  • Indrani Sen analyses the rumoured move in the UK…

    Okay for media agencies to help clients take media & planning inhouse?

     

    By Indrani Sen

     

    According to the grapevine, some global media agencies are contemplating a move to allow clients to take media and planning inhouse. Noted one report suggesting that information coming in from the UK suggest a certain large networked agency is in for a significant restructure that may possibly include the group launching a separate business to help clients take their media and planning inhouse. This would have been unthinkable even in the first decade of the twenty-first century when the media agencies went on an integration drive to offer as many services as possible from one stable to their clients.

     

    But times have been changing and changing at a very first rate. Globally, consulting agencies have started competing for a share of the media (planning and buying) business and have started enjoying a high rate of growth. In order to counter competition from the consulting agencies, media agencies have rewritten their profiles as consultants and have started offering to their clients multiple choices for doing business. But their woes do not end just with countering the move by the consulting agencies. The bigger threat is coming from the clients themselves, many of whom are planning to move some of the agency work in-house.

     

    The above trend has set in from first decade of this century with clients initially hiring media executives and managers to interact with their media agencies for ensuring better ROI. The move gradually expanded to clients shifting some of their marketing services in-house. The 2017 RSW/US New Year Outlook Report indicated that 84% of the marketing businesses themselves were planning a transition which may result in assigning on an average 20% less work to agencies.

     

    Source: 2017 RSW/US New Year Outlook Report

     

    In this changing business climate, what could be a better move than launching a consultancy business to help clients to take media and planning inhouse? Data monitoring and gathering, transactional capabilities, like programmatic planning and buying, optimisation through SEM and SEO, can easily be shifted in-house to give clients scope for driving efficiencies guided by the consultants from media agencies. This move will help to kill two birds with one stone, to counter the consulting agencies by providing data strategies to brands and to establish a better client-agency relationship which is essential for retaining the accounts in the long run.

     

    It may be difficult for individual clients to keep pace with technological changes like AI, VR, Voice, etc. The media agencies can play a role in providing clients with solutions for applications of such new technologies. In other words, the business of media agencies may shift from media planning and buying to creating solutions to marketing problems and application of the solutions across various technologies and platforms for reaching the target audience with least wastage.

     

    In the last quarter of twentieth century, creative agencies were focussed on creating big ideas, but their ideas were not data driven. The media agencies at the same time were focussed on data based strategies, number crunching and negotiating for best rates and deals. They were not interpreting data in creative ways, on weaving a story with data analytics. The future of media agencies lies in marrying creativity with data and analytics, a lesson which they should learn from the newer digital agencies who have gone back to the good old full service mode under one umbrella.