‘Collaboration, audience data, quality assets key to transit media growth’

The 2^nd Transit Media Talks conference, held in Mumbai on February 6, concluded with a panel discussion on the theme ‘Are agencies willing to bet bigger on transit media?’. The session, addressed by Rachana Lokhande, Co-CEO of Kinetic India, Fabian Cowan, President of Posterscope India and Jayesh Yagnik, CEO of MOMS Outdoor Media Solutions, and moderated by Rajiv Raghunath, Managing Editor of Outdoor Asia & Media4Growth, brought forth the need for standardisation of transit media formats, and better maintenance of transit media assets.

In his presentation, Fabian highlighted that “technology is going to define the way people transit, so it is important to keep a track of the media available on the transit that it is also moving forward with technology,” he said, while adding that audience data will prove to the clincher in attracting ad dollars to the medium. He also urged the authorities, media owners and advertisers to discover collaborative ways to enhance the use of transit media. Fabian pointed out that media owners should not lose sight of the ‘power of ideas’.

To the central question of whether agencies are willing to bet bigger on transit media, Jayesh gave an emphatic “Haan” (yes). “There are 4 growth drivers of transit media -- Growth in infrastructure & media formats, Increase in scope of transit destinations, Changing consumer dynamics and DOOH & Technology integration possibilities,” he said. Jayesh also cited various innovative transit media led campaigns that were planned and executed by MOMS Outdoor Media Solutions.

Mentioning some of the advantages of transit advertising, Jayesh articulated that consumer dwell time is increasing at destinations other than airports and passenger data in the transit locations are authentic. He also said that the agency’s transit media buying increased by 63% in 2017-18 and 86% in 2018-19.

Rachana pointed out in her talk that the entire OOH medium is in ways “transit” as it is seen by people who are in transit. However, the formats vary. She underlined that transit media operators should focus on audience data to obtain sharper consumer insights for advertising.

She also suggested that media players should look to collaborate with one another. “Agencies work towards marketing solutions with lot of consumer data and research, hence it is imperative to understand if we are giving them solutions or just the medium,” she said.