OOH will do really well in 2018 predicts Ashish Bhasin

A new year is around the corner and keeping in view the state of national economy and its effects on advertising, Ashish Bhasin, Chairman and CEO - South Asia, Dentsu Aegis Network expects a 12% CAGR for the industry in 2018. “The broad trend you can see when you look at the last five years or so is that we have had a compounded annual growth rate of about 12% for the advertising spends,” says Bhasin. “The ad growth as a rule of thumb is about one and half times the Indian economy’s growth. So if the Indian economy grows at 8% then advertising will grow by 12%. It works the other way around as well.”

On OOH advertising, he foresees this industry to be performing well in 2018. “As a medium it will really do well because as we build infrastructure with new airports, bridges, metros etc, more opportunities will come up. I hope that outdoor becomes more standardised and professional. If it does then it can become a strong medium as we are a young country, on the move, with slow traffic. Digital OOH will start emerging as well.”

“Penetrating deeper in rural will become very important for advertisers as will the tier three, four cities and towns. That is because in the Metros brands have reached a high level of penetration. For their growth they will be forced to go further down. Luckily we have had a relatively good monsoon this year. With beneficial government policies also there should be more money in the hands of the rural consumer”, he shares.

While talking about the measurement, he lays emphasis on OOH. “It is a key for any media to grow. You have two media - print and television - that are well measured with IRS and BARC. Some other media are unmeasured or poorly measured. Outdoor needs better accountability beyond what we at Dentsu Aegis Network do. An industry measure needs to evolve. Outdoor needs to get its act together. One medium that can gain the most by bringing in measurement is outdoor. A lot of people are on the move. Traffic is slow moving at least in the urban areas and the outdoor medium lends itself to that. As market leaders with dominant market share in OOH we have invested heavily in this area but it needs to become an industry-wide initiative”.