Mediaboss Marketing

As digitalisation grips India, and people in far-flung areas, away from urban spaces, get easy access to the internet, the need for vernacular campaigns are on the rise. This has led to an increased reach by brands and their communications have now become more relevant in tier II and tier III cities. Due to the availability of affordable smartphones, today almost everyone is on social media and other Digital platforms. So, if a national brand releases a pan-India campaign in Mumbai or Delhi, it is quite easily received by people even in the farthest corners of the country in real-time. However, many of these people do not understand Hindi and English. While dubbed content manages to convey a message, they largely fail to connect with the target audience. Thus, despite having the reach, brands cannot actually penetrate into the user base of those areas.

In an effort to connect with people from across all regions, national brands have now started paying almost equal attention to region-specific vernacular contents, apart from investing in pan-India campaigns. According to industry insiders, investments in such vernacular campaigns have increased by 20-30% in the past few years.

Iti Kaul, Head of Digital, OMD India says, India as a market is complex and is built on the back of many Indias that exist within. These pockets are unique, and therefore need to be addressed through localised strategies. Vernacular content increases the relevance of brands in these pockets and helps establish their foothold in a particular region. The demand for regional language content has risen considerably as more and more people from diverse regions are going online. In the past couple of years, we have seen a 20- 30% increase in vernacular campaign-based investments by brands depending on their focus markets and priorities.

Dheeraj Kummar, National Creative Director Brand & Consumer Experience, Motivator, GroupM says, Connecting with consumers while planning geo marketing activities make it indispensable in the Digital-era for legacy brands to create vernacular campaigns. Also, Digital media has democratized the creation, distribution, and sharing of vernacular content. In this environment of fragmentation and personalized media consumption, the only way to get consumers attention is by becoming part of the same environment.

Usha International is one of those prominent brands that has been getting aggressive with its vernacular campaigns in the recent times. Today, 40% of its overall marketing spends is on regional marketing and content. Saurabh Baishakhia, President, Appliances, Usha International says, We firmly believe that in order to inspire confidence and build brand presence and loyalty, our marketing efforts should address the diversity of our consumers. The easiest and most effective way to do so is to address consumer needs in languages that they understand. So, apart from Hindi, we have unveiled multiple campaigns in major regional languages such as Tamil, Telugu, Kannada, and Malayalam.

Brand Ushas dedicated recipe website Usha Cook caters to regional consumers in nine regional languages making it easier to connect with the local language-speaking customers. Our Digital campaigns are also widely promoted on regional news websites such as Malayalam Manorama, Dinamalar, Eenadu, Vijay Karnataka, etc., he adds.

Prashant Agarwal, Marketing Head - Health Supplements, Dabur India Ltd says, We have been doing national campaigns for the past four decades and our dubbed campaigns are also there for a long time. As far as the original vernacular campaigns with regional celebrities are concerned, we started it four to five years ago, and the trend has strengthened further over the past three years. We are now spending around 35% of our marketing budget on vernacular campaigns, and it has marginally increased over the past two years.

We have roped in regional celebrities for these campaigns. For example, we are doing a campaign of Dabur Chyawanprash in the southern states with Nagarjuna. For Dabur Honey too, we are doing similar campaigns with our brand ambassador Rashmika Mandanna. Apart from the South Indian languages, we are doing regional campaigns in Bengali and Marathi too, he says.

Amit Wadhwa, CEO at Dentsu Creative India says that the four southern languages are used by most brands to create vernacular contents and there are two main reasons behind it. First of all, these languages are widely spoken and have the highest level of understanding across those states. Secondly, the media in those markets is broadly isolatable and that makes it effective. There are other markets with vernacular traction such as Maharashtra, albeit to a far smaller extent, he says.

While a large number of brands are focusing on southern and western India with their regional campaigns, some other brands are being assertive in the eastern part of the country. Poulomi Roy, CMO at RSH Global says, We started our journey with the moisturizing category and it was patronized mostly in the northern part of the country because of its harsh winter. So, we started our national campaigns in Hindi in 2011. However, a Hindi campaign on television does have only 40% spill over in a state like West Bengal. Therefore, we decided to penetrate further in that state by going the local way in 2020 and we roped in Bengali actor, Mimi Chakraborty for the same. Its not just about understanding a language. While taking such measures, we need to understand the cultural nuances and bring relatability, keeping the ethos of the brand intact.

We have chosen television, YouTube, social media and OTT for our vernacular campaigns. When we started out in 2020, we spent 2-3% of our overall marketing budget, and that has now increased to 10%. We are now planning to start a similar campaign in Marathi, because West Bengal and Maharashtra contribute to 20-25% of almost all important category in our skincare segment, she adds.

There are some other brands which are advertising in languages of the smaller states apart from focusing on the big markets. Jayen Mehta, Chief Operating Officer at Gujarat Co-operative Milk Marketing Federation Limited says, Amul was founded in 1946, and our first advertisement was released in English and Gujarati newspaper in the year 1956 on Amul Butter. Over the last 65 years as we grew our product range and distribution across the country, we continued to advertise through hoardings, press ads and TV ads. We started our social media campaigns in the 2000s. We have advertised in 15-20 languages including Punjabi, Urdu, Bangla, Assamese, Mizo, Odia, Telugu, Tamil, Malayalam, Kannada, Konkani, Marathi and Gujarati.

Our presence in regional TV, Print, Radio, OOH, and social media has seen a significant increase and spends have increased 2x in these markets. In Amul, there is only one brand ambassador - our Amul Girl. She can speak all the languages of our country and she has been winning the minds and hearts of the consumers in their languages, he says.

Godrej Appliances gets really aggressive during the festivals when they invest over 50% of spends in vernaculars. Swati Rathi, Marketing Head Godrej Appliances says, As a brand we enjoy a strong disposition in our upcountry audience, and hence it makes sense for us to put across more content in vernacular, particularly on Digital. Using vernaculars on e-Commerce is a recent initiative and we plan to extend this. Recently, we also released our regional ads across OTT platforms for our AC category. The ads have high views of 95 million with 47 million reach. Our exclusive outlets are located in the heartland and all the efforts for lead generation for the outlets whether online or offline are in the regional languages. We have seen that regionals work better when it comes to lead generation efforts. On an average, 20-25% of our total media spends is invested in vernacular content. During festive promotions, more than 50% of our spends is on vernacular languages.

Shekhar Banerjee, Chief Client Officer & Office Head - West, Wavemaker India says, It is a proven case that any regional communication made for a specific market always yields higher results. We have some very successful use-cases from Loreal and Mondelez. However, the challenge is in scaling up this approach. The decision finally boils down to ROI - Is the opportunity size and growth ambition for a market big enough to cover for the cost it takes to build a local market approach? On certain mediums it is scalable. For example, Digital, where you can even go dynamic & hyper-local to an extent of even pin codes. At the other end will be TV, where the entry cost for adopting the same is often prohibitive and hence, not very prevalent as yet.

Several brands however believe that vernacular campaigns are capable of ensuring better ROI than the national campaigns. Amit Verma, Head of Marketing, Rapido says, Considering that we have always used regional languages for all our campaigns, it has been proven that vernacular contents give you 20-30% more ROI than non-vernaculars, particularly in Southern regions, Maharashtra, Gujarat, and Kolkata.

We realized that there are different regions that talk in different languages with different celeb affinities. So, our approach has been to catch this affinity by choosing two celebrities, one for the Hindi-speaking market (HSM) and one for non - HSM markets. Apart from Hindi, we have launched our current campaign #EkDumAaramSe with Rajkumar Rao and Jiiva in Bengali, Telugu and Tamil. Currently 30-35% spends are targeted towards vernacular content, which includes brand and performance marketing, he says.

Echoing the same sentiment, Mukesh Mishra, Vice President Sales & Marketing at Adani Wilmar says, In the last few years, we have witnessed exponential growth registered by regional channels as compared to HSM channels. With newer mediums emerging, we foresee that vernacular or regional channels will continue to have a higher reach. A similar trend is being seen with respect to the OTT and Digital platforms too. We believe that creating a master campaign and then dubbing it in different languages, will never have the relevance and impact as cultural cues are different in each state and each language-speaking market.

According to Harikrishnan Pillai, CEO and co-founder, TheSmallBigIdea, the focus on vernaculars is also a natural progression. We are no longer under the Victorian influence. Today we, the Indians, take pride in who we are. We love our culture and we embrace our ethnicity. So the brands are also doing the same. If we have to take our own benchmark, basis the revenue that we have seen driven by TSBI Bharat that we launched in 2019, 20% of our business come from regional requirements, he says.

While brands are trying to reach out to more and more people with regional ad campaigns, certain social media services are also helping them in their efforts. ShareChat is one such multilingual, multi-format platform that helps brands establish themselves among wider audiences through language-focused campaigns.

Akshat Sahu, Director, Marketing, ShareChat says, ShareChat has more than 180 MAUs and a creator community of more than 32 million. Having such an extensive regional audience, it helps national brands to tap into emerging markets. Last year, we launched ShareChat Ads a self-serving ads platform to enable SMBs to connect with their target audience through personalized multilingual advertisements. So far, over 1000 SMBs have posted highly targeted advertisements on ShareChat and the platform has witnessed a 6X increase in the number of campaigns in less than a year.

ShareChat operates in 15 Indic languages out of which Hindi, Tamil, Telugu, Kannada, Malayalam, Marathi, Punjabi and Bengali are most used by brands. Its barely been two years since we started monetization, and over 200 brands have signed up with us and worked with us on multiple occasions. We have worked with brands such as Dettol, Amazon, Flipkart, Myntra, Facebook, Coca-Cola, Oyo, Snapdeal, Nykaa, MTR, Airtel, Pepsi, Realme, Marico, Godrej, TVS, Dream11, Vodafone, etc., he says.

When it comes to promotions and communications in vernaculars, content integration has also proven to be an effective way. Manan Shah, Director Marketing - India and SEA, Truecaller says, We are a Swe-desi brand, Swedish by birth but built in India; and India continues to be our biggest market. So, apart from putting out ad campaigns in vernaculars, we have also created vernacular content to enhance relatability in those regions using regional talents and creators. One example of such content integration is the Lolai Family with Nakkalites, a mini-series in Tamil. We have also worked with regional content creators and influencers across platforms, including ATL, digital and BTL. Today we spend almost 1/3rd of our marketing budget on vernacular content creation and distribution.

Nittin Passi, Chairman and Managing Director, Lotus Herbals says that they are also doing in-film placement of their products in a Punjabi TV show. He says, We were the sponsors for the show Disha Di Wedding on Pitara TV. We had product placements for Lotus Herbals Whiteglow Range on the show. It showed the main protagonist Disha using our products before going to the wedding. For vernacular campaigns, we have also chosen digital campaigns, influence marketing and print media. Our vernacular campaigns are yielding high ROI in their particular regions.

The end-result is a win-win for both brands and consumers. On one hand, consumers with purchasing power, living in Tier II and Tier III cities, become aware of the options they have in the market. On the other hand, brands largely gain from getting new target audiences.

Read more news about (marketing news, latest marketing news,internet marketing,marketing India, digital marketing India, media marketing India, advertising news)

See the original post here:
Breaking the language barrier: The rise of vernacular ad campaigns - Exchange4Media

What is a residential proxy?

A residential proxy is a type of proxy server. Proxy servers act as an intermediary for all the traffic between your devices and the websites you connect to. Using a proxy server means all your internet traffic looks like its coming from the proxy servers location, improving online anonymity, and allowing access to geo-blocked content such as YouTube videos not available in your country.

Normally, proxy server providers route your traffic through a data center. Residential proxies instead route your traffic through computers or phones connected to typical home ISPs. This makes residential proxies even more anonymous, better hiding the fact youre using a proxy and minimizing the chance your connection will be blocked.

Residential proxies cost significantly more than data center proxies on a per-month, per-GB basis, but typically offer better results because the proxy connection is better masked.

As an example, the Wise datacenter proxy plan from Smartproxy (opens in new tab) costs $200/month for 400GB. In comparison, the Starter residential proxy plan, also $200/month, only includes 20GB.

You can choose the more economical Micro residential proxy plan, which is $75/month for 5GB of data. For many business applications, this amount of monthly data will be more than enough.

Residential proxies can be used by individuals and businesses for any application where they want traffic to appear as if its coming from another location. Residential proxies are used heavily in digital advertising, affiliate testing, market price monitoring, web scraping, and social media automation.

The use of residential proxies is entirely legal. Of course, you shouldnt use a residential proxy to perform any illegal activity.

For example, residential proxies are often used to make web scraping harder for websites to block. Its legal to use a residential proxy to scrape websites that are publicly available, but illegal to scrape content from private websites.

A proxy will route all your internet traffic through an intermediary device. A VPN service performs a similar role but also encrypts all the data being transferred. This is more secure but has more overhead.

Residential proxies are the best choice for those looking to perform hundreds or thousands of requests, as theyre typically cheaper and faster than VPNs at scale. VPNs are a better choice for personal use, protecting yourself from hackers, and preventing ISP tracking.

You can read more about the differences in our guide on proxies vs VPNs (opens in new tab).

A rotating residential proxy gives you a new IP address from a pool each time you make a new connection. If you run a script to scrape content from a thousand pages of web content, for example, those connections will be sent from up to a thousand different connections. This type of proxy is difficult to track and block.

With a good residential proxy service, you can set how long your IP address will remain constant before being assigned a new one. Typically, theres a maximum of around 30 minutes. Rotating residential proxies change the IP address for every request you make.

So you can better understand the roles of virtual private networks and proxies, weve put together a guide on the difference between a VPN and a proxy (opens in new tab). You can read about how VPNs keep your data safe (opens in new tab) through the use of encrypted tunnels, and our pick of the best free and paid proxies (opens in new tab) available today.

TechRadar created this content as part of a paid partnership with SmartProxy. The contents of this article are entirely independent and solely reflect the editorial opinion of TechRadar.

Read more here:
What is a residential proxy? Here's everything you need to know - TechRadar

Veterinary Antimicrobial Susceptibility TestingMarket: Overview

The drive for monitoring antimicrobial resistance in agricultural settings by public health policy makers in various countries is a key trend in the expansion of theveterinaryantimicrobial susceptibility testing market. Antimicrobial susceptibility testing (AST) is a key diagnostic approach used by veterinary practitioners in identifying most suitable treatments for bacterial infections. Developed nations have seen established guidelines for antimicrobial susceptibility testing. Some of the key livestock or animals where veterinary AST have become popular are dogs, cats, horses, cattle, pigs, and poultry. These testing technologies and methods are used by veterinary reference labs and universities. Key methods used include the disk diffusion technique and the broth dilution technique. Identifying the infecting pathogen and the possible choices of antibiotics are key to shaping the protocols in theveterinary antimicrobial susceptibility testingmarket.

The study presents a detailed assessment of key growth dynamics and emerging avenues in key consumer segments. The research authors strive to offer an in-depth, data-driven insights into new consumer propositions and the prevailing regulations in key regions.

GET A BROCHURE OF THE REPORT

Veterinary Antimicrobial Susceptibility TestingMarket: Key Trends

The veterinary antimicrobial susceptibility testing market is driven by several health imperatives. The rise in awareness about health of companion animals and livestock is one of the key imperatives for identifying the bacterial infections and treating them. Another key driver for adopting veterinary AST is mounting concern of antibiotic resistance to animals and human health worldwide. The prevalence of zoonotic diseases is another factor propelling the use of AST in helping medical practitioners identify the right choice of dosage of antibiotics and whether they are at all needed. The veterinary AST market has made strides on the back of the advances in the lab infrastructure. The focus on standardized methodologies for future national surveillance programs is a key factor that has set the tone for product advancements. This might way to commercialization of automated veterinary AST systems for emerging and developing economies.

The growing threat of life-threatening illnesses and recurrent, chronic infections in livestock has spurred the market prospects of veterinary antimicrobial susceptibility testing methods. Increasing efforts of government and regulatory bodies to raise awareness about antimicrobial stewardship programs is a key trend. Advances in culture media and accessories and consumables.

Veterinary Antimicrobial Susceptibility TestingMarket: Competitive Dynamics and Key Developments

Some of the key players in the market are

GET THE TABLE OF CONTENT OF THE REPORT

A growing number of companies developing veterinary AST are leaning on expanding their bacterial susceptibility profiles possible with their test methods. They are keen on complying with the latest guidelines. Some of the prominent companies in the veterinary AST market are bringing constant technological advancements in broth microdilution. A few aspiring players are adopting novel microfluidics to disrupt the marketspace.

Veterinary Antimicrobial Susceptibility TestingMarket: Regional Assessment

On the regional front, North America and Asia Pacific can be considered lucrative markets. The North America veterinary AST has thrived on the back of the presence of a well-established lab infrastructure for AST. Asian countries are witnessing rise in demands from the presence of a strong livestock markets. Some of the other promising regional markets are the Middle East, and Latin America. These are also considered largely untapped.

GET A DISCOUNT ON THE REPORT

About Us:

TMR Research is a premier provider of customized market research and consulting services to business entities keen on succeeding in todays supercharged economic climate. Armed with an experienced, dedicated, and dynamic team of analysts, we are redefining the way our clients conduct business by providing them with authoritative and trusted research studies in tune with the latest methodologies and market trends.

Contact Us:

Rohit BhiseyHead Internet MarketingTel: +1-415-520-1050Website:https://www.tmrresearch.com/

See the article here:
Veterinary Antimicrobial Susceptibility Testing Market Analysis Trends, Growth Opportunities, Size, Type, Dynamic Demand and Drives with Forecast to...

Laboratory Glassware and Plasticware Market: Overview

The laboratory glassware and plasticware market is expected to gain good growth opportunities across the assessment period of 2020-2030 on the back of the rising applications of plastic and glass materials for clinical purposes in research activities, hospitals, and pharmaceuticals. The growing prevalence of chronic diseases is also an important growth factor for the laboratory glassware and plasticware market.

Laboratoryglassware is made from borosilicate glass while plasticware is made from different types of plastic materials. Laboratory glassware and plasticware include pipettes, pipette tips, storage containers, burettes, flasks, slides, vials, measuring cylinders, flasks, Petri dishes, test tubes, tubing, and others. The equipment is of great convenience to the range of activities across laboratories. Thus, all these factors bring profitable growth opportunities for the laboratory glassware and plasticware market.

GET A BROCHURE OF THE REPORT

The expanding influence oflaboratory glassware and plasticwareacross a wide range of applications in research institutions, healthcare services, venture capitalists, diagnostic centers, medical device companies, contract research organizations, and others will bring tremendous growth opportunities for the laboratory glassware and plasticware market.

The report on the laboratory glassware and plasticware market by TMR Research helps the stakeholders and CXOs to explore varied aspects related to growth. The report has extensive information on a plethora of factors such as geographical dimensions, competitive trends, latest developments, and the threats across the laboratory glassware and plasticware market.

Furthermore, the report focuses on the impact of the COVID-19 outbreak on the laboratory glassware and plasticware market. The rising prevalence of COVID-19 and the economic impact of the outbreak on the laboratory glassware and plasticware market have been mentioned in detail.

Laboratory Glassware and Plasticware Market: Competitive Insights

The laboratory glassware and plasticware market is fragmented with many players in the ring for obtaining a prominent position. The players invest heavily in research and development activities for discovering novel insights. They also indulge in strategic collaborations.

Some well-entrenched players in the laboratory glassware and plasticware market are

Laboratory Glassware and Plasticware Market: Current Trends

GET THE TABLE OF CONTENT OF THE REPORT

A Rise in Chronic Disease to Add Extra Stars of Growth to the Laboratory Glassware and Plasticware Market

The growing spread of chronic diseases and infections across a large chunk of the global populace is boosting drug development mechanisms. The development of drugs among a large number of research organizations increases the demand for laboratory glassware and plasticware extensively, eventually leading to an increase in the growth rate.

Vials for COVID-19 Vaccine to Propel Growth Prospects

The manufacturing of vials has increased substantially due to the large-scale production of vaccines across many countries. Many vaccines have been granted emergency-use authorization by numerous countries. These vaccines are stored in vials. Vials are made from borosilicate glass which has the capacity to withstand higher temperatures and is also resistant to other chemicals. Thus, the demand for vials is expanding exponentially.

Specialty glass maker Schott recently announced the delivery of 1 bn glass vials for COVID-19 vaccine doses. The company further stated its intentions to deliver more than 2 bn vials by the end of this year. Such developments bode well for the growth of thelaboratoryglassware and plasticware market.

Laboratory Glassware and Plasticware Market: Regional Perspective

The laboratory glassware and plasticware market in North America expects to gain a domination position during the forecast period on the back of the increasing number of research and development activities related to drug development and others. Asia Pacifics laboratory glassware and plasticware market is also anticipated to observe promising growth between 2020 and 2030.

GET A DISCOUNT ON THE REPORT

About Us:

TMR Research is a premier provider of customized market research and consulting services to business entities keen on succeeding in todays supercharged economic climate. Armed with an experienced, dedicated, and dynamic team of analysts, we are redefining the way our clients conduct business by providing them with authoritative and trusted research studies in tune with the latest methodologies and market trends.

Contact Us:

Rohit BhiseyHead Internet MarketingTel: +1-415-520-1050Website:https://www.tmrresearch.com/

Read the original:
Laboratory Glassware and Plasticware Market Overview, Analysis, Trends, Size, Outlook and Forecast to 2031 - Digital Journal

Brands are showing an increasing affinity to working with gamers for tapping into the growing demographics of the sector, which is enjoying an upward growth trajectory. There is a consensus in the industry that with increased support for the sector, gamers can help brands and products reach the right audience.

The world of gaming has clearly a lot to offer to the marketing world games and gamers form the centre but then there are developers, studios, composers, production houses, platforms, creators and others who are part of the larger process.

Animesh Agarwal, Founder and CEO, 8bit Creatives, a former esports athlete himself, points out: The growth of gaming depends on three solid pillars - gamers, the ecosystem and the infrastructure. The audience definitely wants to consume gaming content and production houses and gaming creators are coming up with newer formats of content like docu-series, web shows, and innovative streams to entertain and engage and take it to the next level. This will keep increasing the proportion of the population engaged in gaming.

Sharing similar views, Faraz Sayed, Director Media Planning, Carat India, says that due to its always-on nature, e-sports provide a perennial opportunity to drive value for the brands. Players who play competitively often live stream during the off-season as they hustle to improve and prepare for upcoming tournaments.

This means that fans are able to watch their favourite players practise all day, every day, and ask them questions whilst watching them get better at their sport. This is a tremendous opportunity for fans to engage directly with their favourite streamers, which in turn, gives brands a unique opportunity to attach themselves to fan passion points. Its a level of engagement that can be valued differently from passive traditional sports TV broadcasts, Sayed noted.

Growth Story

The Indian gaming market is set to value up to $5 billion by 2025. The domestic industry, comprising games, platforms, studios, players and talent management, attracted $350 million (approx. Rs 27,000 crore) in investments from venture capitalists between 2014 and 2020 (CAGR of 22%), with that figure ballooning up to $1.6 billion in just the first nine months 2021, a report by Maple Capital Advisors said. It should be noted that this figure was largely due to two major deals: Dream Sports and Mobile Premier League, which raised $785 million (approx. Rs 6,200 crore) and $375 million (approx. Rs 3,000 crore), respectively.

In 2022 itself, among a slew of other deals, Loco added $42 million (approx. Rs 332 crore) in funding to its already formidable kitty, while Rooter raised $25 million (approx. Rs 185 crore) in Series A funding, with the latter investing Rs 100 crore in the acquisition of leading e-sports teams like GodLike and other initiatives. Rooter has also recently acquired the media rights to all esports and gaming tournaments on Skyesports, a major host in the space.

Meanwhile, Loco, among other investments and acquisitions, has tied up with another gaming major Nodwin Gaming and secured digital screening rights for the latter's BGMI Master Series Tournament.

For Ashwin Suresh, Founder, Loco and Pocket Aces, this progression of the gaming industry in India is the same as abroad but at a much-accelerated pace. Gaming investors who had previously invested in markets like the US and Japan are now coming to India as this is where the new audience is. Its also important to remember that gaming markets in the West were built on the back of PCs and consoles and gaming rigs, which were expensive and already set a barrier to entry.

India, he says, is firmly a mobile-first market and has skipped that step. Hence, it is leading the world in the mobile gaming market. You can get a decent phone on which you can play any popular game for under Rs 10,000. Data is cheap and increasingly accessible across even remote parts of the country. All that is required to become a skilled gamer is practice and young people are seeing the opportunities for that in a hugely expanding market.

Piyush Kumar, Founder, Rooter, says India has provided a unique opportunity for international gaming conglomerates. In India, almost every household has a 10 to 25-year-old, who regularly plays games on the phone, and the market size is huge. Thats why you have huge companies that have never made mobile games before, making mobile versions for the Indian market, which then also do really well.

"Close to a million people are gaming content creators that log into Rooter every day, and that's the bottom of the pyramid. Then we have a roster of 3,000-5,000 popular professional creators to whom we have contracts with, and pay monthly salaries to create content for our channels. And the third tier is exclusive sponsorships that we've got with the top gaming and streaming talent in the country, says Kumar, saying that this adds up to a huge pool of consumers.

Mitesh Kothari, Co-Founder and CCO, White Rivers Media, believes that every platform, big or small, is looking to drive engagement and grow its user base, collaborations with up-and-coming pro-gamers are the way to go, and exclusive partnerships are just the beginning of the hopeful transformation Indian gamers have been waiting for.

Rishabh Bhansali, Co-Founder, FanClash, which recently raised $40 million (approx. Rs 318.17 crore) in Series B funding, points out that there are 500 million core esports viewers globally, growing at 20 per cent CAGR. In India, this number stands at 100 million and is expected to grow threefold by 2025.

Brands that are building fan engagement platforms, athletes and teams help them gain access to the fan community and help in faster adoption of the brands proposition. While for the gamers, the current conventional form of fan engagement is limited to fan interaction during streams, cheering through social media and a few LAN events.

Partnering with brands can broaden this fan engagement in a tangible way. For example, the concept of fantasy within esports transforms an avid fan from a passive viewer to an active team manager who can create his own imaginary team of real-life players and win cash/prizes based on the real-life performance of the chosen players in tournaments across the world, Bhansali added.

According to Suresh, investment companies, as well as advertisers (endemic and now, non-endemic) are increasingly turning to platforms like his, and others, because they are at the centre of this entire ecosystem. We work with gaming studios, their distribution channels, users themselves who download and play the games, a subset of whom stream videos of themselves playing the games and a smaller subset that plays competitively. And these competitive players have audiences and followers that reach up to the millions, and advertisers want to reach out to them.

Influencers are, without a doubt, one of the most indispensable and organic marketing agents today. They offer a unique human connection that helps brands relate to viewers and retain their interest. From the looks of it, weve got a lush abundance of credible influencers in the Indian gaming scene. While pro-gamers and esports athletes can enjoy the lucrative fruits of this multi-billion-dollar industry with these deals, brands can reach their desired audience, attract more traffic, and engage them in creative ways, says Kothari, pointing out that its truly a win-win for all involved.

Talking about gaming gaining acceptance in the country, Abhishek Aggarwal, Founder and CEO at Trinity Gaming, says in the past two years, parents have gone from complaining to him over email, calls, and personal interactions about the time their children waste on playing video games to lauding his gaming marketing and talent agencys efforts.

With gaming and esports becoming competitive events at international events like Commonwealth Games, Asian Games, and soon Olympics, coupled with the growth and chances for success in the field, many parents are now happy to encourage their kids to pursue gaming as a viable career option, says Aggarwal. Trinity Gaming will soon be doing outreach programs at colleges and universities to bring on board the next generation of pro gamers and creators, he added.

Read more news about (marketing news, latest marketing news,internet marketing,marketing India, digital marketing India, media marketing India, advertising news)

The rest is here:
Level up: How gaming has the potential to drive engagement for brands - Exchange4Media