“OOH has a higher sticky factor compared to other mediums”

Brand Somany Ceramics very recently began its marketing campaign by collaborating for on-ground advertising for the T20 and Test Series between India and New Zealand that started on 17th November. As part of the association, brand Somany was displayed at perimeter Boards, sight screens and upper tier during the airing of three T20 matches and two test matches.

The brand is pretty upbeat about continuing its association with cricket and has already signed up for the India South Africa series in January. Says Minal Somany, Brand Custodian, Somany Ceramics, speaking about the collaboration, “As we all know cricket has a very large viewership and following in our country; it’s literally like a religion and cuts across all demographics of people, and ours is a product that needs a very high top of the mind recall so we will continue to focus on it.”

Speaking further about the on-ground campaign and how it works particularly in the context of cricket, she says, “I feel on-ground is a more definite way of getting noticed. We get real feedback and data and we know that it was viewed so many times during a particular match. So in that sense, it offers a more tangible and measurable way of recording visibility than say, a hoarding or any other medium. Plus when it’s associated with an event like cricket,  it gives us mileage on all fronts, - TV, OTT, etc, besides the on-ground visibility.”

Sharing the brand’s experience with other OOH avenues like airports, Minal explains,  “We are very aggressive at the airports and we will continue to be so. We have already  got the four major airports in India and we are focusing on getting some more strategic ones like for example Goa during the coming holiday season or in other holiday destinations. But right now we are very focused on the major airports like Mumbai, Delhi , Bangalore , Kolkata and Hyderabad. In airports, we are open to all kinds of mediums, whether digital or static. Airports have given us a lot of eye balls and we are very happy with that medium.”

Further speaking about traditional formats like hoardings, she says,  “Outdoor formats like hoardings work very well when we work in conjunction with showroom opening. So we need to have a 360 degree approach.“

The brand has also leveraged bus branding by having its own branded buses travelling  across the country along a charted route. Says Minal talking about it, “We are looking at relaunching it as it worked really well. It went into interior parts of the country where hoardings and airports don’t play a role. Also, it wasn’t just a bus; it was also interactive in that you could go in and select sanitary wares and tiles. So it also functioned like a mobile store which was well branded. We are thinking of relaunching it now because we are actively looking at tier 3-4 cities where the major shift is happening.”

So are there any specific challenges that the brand faces in the OOH space? Minal replies, “I think the major challenges are pricing, measurability and maintenance of properties. There is no regular upkeep and  review of the creatives, and in terms of the pricing, there is so much of fluctuation. We would obviously want to confine to our budget because ATL is not the only spend we have in marketing. We have a lot of BTL and digital spends too.”

But despite these challenges,  Minal feels OOH is not a medium one can ignore. “A larger-than-life presence always makes a brand look grander and bigger. Also, I feel that there is a higher sticky factor in outdoor when it comes to a product ad, than say any other medium like radio, print or TV . ” Minal also agrees that OOH has a greater ability to drive trust in a brand, conveying a sense of  being in the big league.

As for innovation in the OOH space, Minal feels the main innovation needed would be in terms of measuring the responses and better maintenance in terms of the quality of printing and OOH for longer lasting presence.

So in effect, when it comes to spends, Minal is pretty sure that as long as the advertising budgets go up, OOH will surely get a big chunk of it.