Tag: Dr Bhaskar Das

The awards that Sidharth Rao won over the years do not truly reflect the greatness of the man. For the April 24 edition of Das ka Dum, we asked Dr Bhaskar Das a question on Rao. Read on…

 

If you wish to access the archives, please go to the Das Ka Dum tab on the website’s top navigation bar or click here: https://www.mxmindia.com/category/columns/das-ka-dum/

 

Q. The country has lost one of its brightest digitally first creative whizkids. Your memories of Sidharth Rao?

 

A. Honestly, I can’t claim to know Sidharth Rao very closely but interacted with him, off and on, in industry body and in some industry event where his appearances were few and far between.

 

But whenever I met and engaged with him, I found him to be a very straightforward guy who dreams, lives by anything that is digital. His views had always been futuristic. He might have looked casual in his appearance and in his outfits too, but the quality of his thinking was in a different stratosphere, compared to many other professionals in the domain. His dream gave birth to Webchutney and his agency won many awards in Cannes, apart from Goafest, if I recall right. His humility, his straightforward and humane approach made his personality an extremely endearing one. These are rare qualities these days. Even if I have a very limited interactions with him, he left indelible memories with me.

 

We thought we would have some fun with this Friday question. Our Wizard with Words gave it a very propah response. Here’s Dr Bhaskar Das in the April 21 edition of Das ka Dum. Read on…

 

If you wish to access the archives, please go to the Das Ka Dum tab on the website’s top navigation bar or click here: https://www.mxmindia.com/category/columns/das-ka-dum/

 

Q. It’s World Creativity and Innovation Day today. Isn’t having a day to observe this so very uncreative and uninspiring? Or would you say it’s fine?

 

A. Creativity and innovation as concepts will always be relevant. Imagine one has creative ability, but no innovation capability or vice versa—isn’t it absurd? To my mind, they go hand in hand. One would be meaningless without the other. It depends on how one interprets each term.

 

This day highlights the importance of applying creativity and innovation to problem-solving with respect to economic, social, business and country/ global contexts. Needless to say, it’s not a one-day activity. It needs to be practised every day.

 

So even ChatGPT knows that our Wizard with Words is the right person to ask all the right (and often wrong) questions. Here’s Dr Bhaskar Das in the April 20 edition of Das ka Dum. Read on…

 

If you wish to access the archives, please go to the Das Ka Dum tab on the website’s top navigation bar or click here: https://www.mxmindia.com/category/columns/das-ka-dum/

 

Q. We asked ChatGPT for help to give a question for today. Here goes: As someone who has held leadership roles at several prominent media companies, what advice do you have for young professionals aspiring to leadership positions in the industry?

 

A. Here are some of the indicative skills that would be indispensable for young professionals aspiring for leadership positions in the industry:

1. Being eithical and authentic

2. Problem solving ability

3. Curiosity and desire to learn, unlearn and relearn

4. Digital literacy

5. Global perspective

6. Adaptability

7. Self-knowledge for emotional stability (when faced with volatilities at work or personal front)

8. Entrepreneurial mindset

 

We asked him for a short answer, he did that. But also gave us a longer one. Here’s Dr Bhaskar Das in the April 19 edition of Das ka Dum. Read on…

 

If you wish to access the archives, please go to the Das Ka Dum tab on the website’s top navigation bar or click here: https://www.mxmindia.com/category/columns/das-ka-dum/

 

Q. It may be tough doing it in a short response, but what according to you should be the key desirables for achieving marketing effectiveness?

 

A. Brief answer: Deliver in sync with organisational aspirations in a measurable manner.

A longish answer:

1. Ability to decode business and market challenges,

2. Ability to make sense of changing customers tastes and preferences of various age cohorts

3. Competitive intelligence (not intra -category basis but also inter-category basis too and on a future-backwards basis)

4. Brand positioning on a dynamic basis (depending on changing marketing landscape)

5. How to leverage data and analytics to take informed decisions

6. Fixing key goals and metrics for every marketing activity

7. Ability to leverage all formats of social media including social listening and ChatGPT to optimise digital touchpoints with analogue craftsmanship

8. Ability to align the organisation horizontally through appropriate collaboration for delivering customer expectations.

Having been associated some of the largest media groups for four decades, our Wizard with Words is undoubtedly the best person to take the question. So here’s Dr Bhaskar Das in the April 18 edition of Das ka Dum. Read on…

 

If you wish to access the archives, please go to the Das Ka Dum tab on the website’s top navigation bar or click here: https://www.mxmindia.com/category/columns/das-ka-dum/

 

Q. A joint ad by HT, TOI, Hindu and Telegraph throws up a variety of stats including 7.4% of urban Indians read an English newspaper. Your view on the ad? It just goes on to show that English newspapering is a preserve of the English-reading elite?

 

A. I am not surprised. English newspaper readership has always been restricted to the upper echelons of society. This is natural because of the language and also due to controlled penetration by the publishers throughout India.

 

Having said that, the acceptance of Indian language newspapers has also gone up. In fact, the readership, even as per last IRS, has gone up significantly. Reading a language newspaper along with an English newspaper isn’t considered as infradig as it was perceived in the past. Consequently, the advertising attracting power of Indian language newspapers has also gone up. Advertisers have also started increasing India language newspapers as they are focusing on Tier 2-3 markets for increasing sales. Besides, the aspirations are going up as the younger generation don’t feel constrained due to their location in the so-called non-metros. There may be a case for increasing penetration by English newspapers beyond the classical metros. I am conscious that production, distribution would be cost-inefficient for English newspapers due to low volume. Hence a collaboration model might have to be worked out with language newspapers who have editions there. The real challenge is the business model. Even if English newspaper reading is aspirational, high cover price that meets the economics of operation at the contribution level is met up, the implementation is worth it. This initiative might fuel the demand side of the English newspaper reading, including pass-along readership. This would expand the readership of English newspapers in this country.

 

A straight question, and an equally straight answer. As it ought to be. Here’s Dr Bhaskar Das in the April 17 edition of Das ka Dum. Read on…

 

If you wish to access the archives, please go to the Das Ka Dum tab on the website’s top navigation bar or click here: https://www.mxmindia.com/category/columns/das-ka-dum/

 

Q. Uday Shankar is now on the Board of Viacom18, plus there’ve been a host of announcements on financial investments at the broadcast major. Your immediate response to the developments

 

A. Strategically, the partnership of Viacom18 with Bodhi Tree , that includes both Uday Shankar and James Murdoch, has the potential of being a huge competitive force to reckon with. Apart from the scale of investment and the possible group synergy, one can’t forget that Mr Shankar has brilliant track record of building the Star India empire in this country. And this is not to forget the strategic mind of James Murdoch. With increasing focus of Viacom18 on sports, this partnership would get further fillip to the group’s dominance.

 

A serious Friday question, but should set each of us thinking on the road ahead. Here’s Dr Bhaskar Das in the April 14 edition of Das ka Dum. Read on…

 

If you wish to access the archives, please go to the Das Ka Dum tab on the website’s top navigation bar or click here: https://www.mxmindia.com/category/columns/das-ka-dum/

 

Q. You’ve written about the need to upskill on all things digital. So which one first: Metaverse or ChatGPT?

 

A. There is no ideal prescription for digital upskilling that would have market- (read employers or for becoming an entrepreneur) attractiveness. It can’t be which one is first one to be upskilled at.

 

I can give an indicative list of skills that would accentuate the capabilities that the job market would prefer. I would hasten to add that digital upskilling has no full stop. Today’s upskilling may be tomorrow’s redundant expertise. So individuals have to be always in a beta state when it comes to upskilling as those skills have to be always at cutting edge to be in sync with anything that has repercussions on business outcomes and consumer experience.

 

Here are the possible areas for upskilling:

• Expertise in leveraging Social Media. ..

• Search Engine Marketing (SEM) …

• Data Analytics, actionable Insights generation

• Engaging Content generation for Brand and corporate provenance

• Marketing through email (permission marketing and not intrusive )

• Mobile Marketing…

• Strategy and Planning (future backwards) for business growth and its sustenance

• Web3.0 that includes AR/VR, Blockchain and Metaverse

• Leveraging ChatGPT for better engagement with various stakeholders (not to treat ChatGPT as an adversary but as a collaborative accelerator).

• Social Selling and the art of social listening (important for earned media, reputation management in a post-truth ecosystem).

 

Needless to say, this list may be outdated by next week. It may appear as an exaggeration but, as they say, only the paranoid survive. It may be noted that ideally all of the above or at least a combination of some/many of them need attention in terms of upskilling.

 

We were hoping that we could provoke him into a politically incorrect answer, but then that’s not something one can ever extract from our Wizard with Words. Here’s Dr Bhaskar Das in the April 13 edition of Das ka Dum. Read on…

 

If you wish to access the archives, please go to the Das Ka Dum tab on the website’s top navigation bar or click here: https://www.mxmindia.com/category/columns/das-ka-dum/

 

Q. Netflix has announced that will feature more electric vehicles in its films and series. Is this how sustainability campaigns must go or is it taking things a bit too far?

 

A. I can imagine the strategic intent of Netflix is both to be a pioneer in in-content placement of EVs and also facilitate audience conviction in migrating from environment-unfriendly gasoline/gas-based vehicles to environment-friendly ones. The competitive advantage though may be lost in no time as other content creators can also result in such content placement. I am sure that none of the content creators will mindlessly shoehorn such placement in an inappropriate context.

 

My final word on this subject is that any visual medium is mimetic in nature and facilitates societal adoption faster than mere advertisements. From this point of view, the adoption curve of the new age vehicles might be faster and follow a steep diffusion curve.

 

So is our Wizard with Words an industryperson first or an academic. While, the order may still be that, he has this unique ability to look at even basic industry developments with the filter of an academic. Read Dr Bhaskar Das in the April 12 edition of Das ka Dum and you’ll figure why we are saying this. Read on…

 

If you wish to access the archives, please go to the Das Ka Dum tab on the website’s top navigation bar or click here: https://www.mxmindia.com/category/columns/das-ka-dum/

 

Q. Brands like Pepsi and Fanta and even the homegrown Appy Fizz have refreshed their identity. But if they ain’t broke, why fix the branding, right?

 

A. At the conceptual level, brand relaunch or refresh, whatever you may call it, is a normal marketing practice. This kind of initiatives are generally undertaken depending on where the brand is place in the product lifecycle (PLC).

Firstly, in case it is a mature/ stagnant/ declining marketshare growth, then a recrafting of the plc graph is critical.

Second, these days due to unique nature of various age cohorts, the micro-targeting of macro aspirations has to be synchronised however oxymoronic it may sound.

Thirdly, these days, “it aint broke, why fix it” is a legacy, complacency mindset and this comfort zone feeling can make any organisation surprised by the future.

And finally, a brand refresh or relaunch can rejuvenate internal stakeholders but can also reinvigorate the channel and end-consumer experience.

Having said all of the above, the art is when to refresh and how to refresh, depending on the micro-targeting of the ethnicities and quintessential human aspirations. At the end of the day, consumers who are perpetually distracted by parity alternatives/ substitutes and attention deficit disorder, there is no solution that can be frozen with finality. With today’s access to database and micro-marketing, the designing of a positive consumer experience is possible depending on how the insights are leveraged from an outside-in point of view.

 

We know he loves following the game, and we also know that watches almost every game in men’s and women’s cricket. So here’s Dr Bhaskar Das in the April 11 edition of Das ka Dum. Read on…

 

If you wish to access the archives, please go to the Das Ka Dum tab on the website’s top navigation bar or click here: https://www.mxmindia.com/category/columns/das-ka-dum/

 

Q. More than which team one is backing, the question that’s being asked by all is: which platform are you enjoying watching IPL on? Linear TV or Digital? What’s your preference?

 

A. I definitely prefer the big screen experience – so linear TV as also Smart TVs which operate through the Amazon firestick or broadband platforms. The online experience via mobile devices and laptops must be good, but that’s for people on the move as also millennials or Gen-Zers. To quote the Virat Kohli ad for IPL 2023, for every match, a stadium-like feeling happens only with television. I would say: the big screen.

 

We know he loves following the game, and we also know that he is always bullish about the work that our adfolk put it. So here’s Dr Bhaskar Das in the April 10 edition of Das ka Dum. Read on…

 

If you wish to access the archives, please go to the Das Ka Dum tab on the website’s top navigation bar or click here: https://www.mxmindia.com/category/columns/das-ka-dum/

 

Q. Your views on IPL thus far? Enjoy the ads? And of course the cricket?

 

A. I am a cricket junkie. And IPL offers the twists and turns that are equivalent to any Hindi masala film. So my 2.5 hours of entertainment  is a great distraction. While some ads are very good and memorable, the high frequency of repetition makes most of the ads very boring and irritating. Net-net: I am enjoying the total IPL experience though most of the ads I absorb in a mute mode.

 

Our Wizard with Words is as direct as one get. So, brace yourself. And sit up and take notice. Here’s Dr Bhaskar Das in the April 7 edition of Das ka Dum. Read on…

 

If you wish to access the archives, please go to the Das Ka Dum tab on the website’s top navigation bar or click here: https://www.mxmindia.com/category/columns/das-ka-dum/

 

Q. How and how much should a media and advertising professional equip oneself in AI?

 

A. The one sentence answer would be: embrace it or perish. Today, AI has been integrated in individual’s like – for quite some time- even without us being conscious about. So, it is for every business. Every business is a tech business today. That AI has to be an integral part of every business, irrespective of sector, is a tablestake. If any business or organisation is apprehensive of the availability of skill or applicability of it in their business, it would effectively plan for its own demise. AI doesn’t replace job or people. Job or people get replaced when AI isn’t embraced.