By Karthik Kumar
Digital is here to stay. And while the early birds are already in, it is still not too late to get some piece of the action. Here are four ways to navigate your way successfully through digital marketing waters:
1. A tipping point in penetration: Internet users make up nearly a third of India’s population. Confoundingly, the likelihood of the Internet becoming mainstay, rapidly, will take longer because of the environment and the seemingly-lopsided input-output relationship.
Here’s why: About 69 per cent of users claim daily usage, but only 27 per cent actually use the Internet several times in a day. Thus, usage continues to be tactical (that is, when seeking specific information or action), and not a default habit. So while the Internet is good for a score update, the preferred mode for viewing the game is still the TV.
To marketers, used to getting big bang for their buck, this leads to the perceived inability of the Internet to generate the same scale as mass media. This may, however, be a shortsighted way of looking at things. Smart money on the Internet has always been on incremental accretion, rather than big bang. Amazon, for example, does not sell one product to millions of customers, but hundreds of products to thousands every minute.
Will things change if the Internet becomes mainstay? Unlikely. Usage in mature markets shows that over 50 per cent of the Internet’s usage is on activities that are individually too small to be classified into groups – in other words, a very high level of fragmented usage.
2. Content in India languages required: Indians’ understanding of English does not always lead to a comfortable interaction in the language. The answer? Content in Indian languages. This does not mean just narrative content that makes up a large part of the web ecosystem, but also interactive content such as forms, demonstrations and such.
This alone, though, will not be enough. Local content should also be searchable – the default web behaviour. The reason Internet probably has greater traction in China is Baidu, a browser that enables searches in the local language. Thus, to complement content in Indian languages, enabling search in Indian languages would be a necessary condition.
3. Relevance of desktops will continue: The demise of the desktop that was proclaimed by some, has not really come to pass. That’s not surprising. Screen choice would be dictated by accessibility, convenience and the task. Internet usage is now multi- screen rather than single screen. Data from mature markets shows that multi-screen usage is more than 70 per cent.
Conversion rates on mobiles are lower compared to desktops and laptops. However, given that search and discovery is happening more on mobile devices, it will be critical that the transaction process needs to seamlessly move from a mobile device to a desktop or tablet so that the transaction can be monetised.
4. App strategy is critical for serious players: In the US, mobile users spend 89 per cent of their time on apps and only 11 per cent of their time on mobile web. While data for India is not readily available, usage patterns here are likely to be similar.
Thus, an app strategy will become critical, not only for online players, but anybody who hopes to reach the mobile Internet user.
Karthik Kumar is Director, Rage Communications. This article first appeared in dna of brands on February 8, 2016