The future of advertising

The growth of traditional media is already dependent on what we call new media; its challenge is to blend into the digital world

The growing power of digital media versus the staying power of traditional media has been an ongoing debate in the advertising industry ever since digital media gained a foothold in the battlefield. The competitive imbalance is getting stronger year by year. Digital media advertising, which has grown by 44.5 per cent in 2014 over the previous year, has been taken aback by the television ad spendings which marked a growth of 10 per cent last year. According to a joint report published by industry lobby Federation of Indian Chambers of Commerce and Industry and consultancy firm KPMG India, digital advertising spends accounted for 10.5 per cent of the total advertising spends in India in 2014.

What is more important is to understand which media can drive potential consumers along the customer journey of your brand. The believers in digital use the rapid growth of devices, clicks, likes and impressions as evidence while the skeptics use the low marketing spends on digital as a means of debunking the theory.

India, with its 400 million internet users, rising penetration of smartphones and improving bandwidth, will grow to become the most preferred fertile ground for marketers and advertisers in the digital platform.

The truth is that this so-called "versus" is nothing but a navel-gazing exercise that the advertising industry indulges in. Now, more than ever, there is no "versus".

We do not consume a digital medium; we live in a digital world. A few trends that would be seen in 2016 are shared below:

• Social to stay sociable: We use Facebook and other social networking sites to seek and give attention, and Whatsapp, Line and SMS to stay in constant touch.
• Mobiles for mobility: We use mobiles to check train and flight timings, or order an Ola, Uber and Google Maps to navigate when our driver loses his way.
• Screens for screening: Mobile and iPad screens keep getting bigger and rivalling the resolution sizes of high-end televisions because we watch more content on these than on the regular TV screen.
• Digital ecosystems for entertainment: Our content streams to our screens through fibre networks that also deliver high-speed connectivity right to our homes. For evidence, look at Reliance Jio.
• Remote access for roaming: Remote monitoring of homes, cars and even your child from the next room, enabled by digital security systems and devices.
• Wearables to wear health: We wear wearables to keep an eye on our health stats. It's made the bastion of a health specialist a part of mainstream conversation - monitoring blood pressure, heart rate or sleep cycles. Moreover, it is a physical badge of a person's healthy ways.

Hence proved. Digital is not a medium; it is the pre-dominant way of life for the people we serve. Their behaviour is driven by the digitised world we live in.

Therefore, whether digital media is growing versus traditional isn't even a question to begin with. The truth is that the growth of traditional media is already dependent on what we call new media.

The challenge for traditional media to blend into this digital-driven world is in effect "interruption avoidance".

Unlike the earlier era where advertising found its niche between content, today it needs to find its relevance between conversations, searches, health monitoring and private content consumption. Or it has to become the content itself.

To be able to find a place for an entertaining marketing message in the midst of this "digitally enabled" life will decide the shape traditional media will take.

It is time for traditional to stop being, well, traditional!

Preethi Sanjeevi
Chief marketing officer, VML