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71 per cent of Indian marketers’ budgets to increase in 2022: DCMN Growth Guide
Mumbai: At least 66 per cent of global marketers expect their budgets to increase next year, with this figure rising to 71 per cent for Indian marketers alone, showed a new analysis published by DCMN, the growth marketing partner for digital brands.
The ‘Growth Guide’ released on Thursday looks at marketers’ goals, strategies and challenges going into 2022, and points to a new period of growth for the industry.
While, in India, 71 per cent of Indian marketers surveyed expect an increase in their budgets in 2022, it was 75 per cent in France and 68 per cent in the US. It’s good news for marketing and advertising agencies with the vast majority of Indian respondents – 93 per cent – planning to increase their spending on agencies in the next 12 months.
Aside from spending on agencies, budgets will go towards experimenting with new formats and advertising channels. Outside of digital advertising, the three channels Indian marketers plan to focus on and invest in the most are mobile advertising, podcasts and linear TV.
The research also shows that 62 per cent of Indian marketers are more focused on long-term branding efforts, versus 33 per cent for performance-oriented goals. This is remarkably in-line with global figures, at 65 per cent versus 31 per cent.
The new year also comes with its own challenges. As advertising campaigns grow ever more complex, marketers in India are most concerned about managing and reconciling large amounts of data across channels. Keeping up with privacy regulations comes in second place, as policies targeting iOS and the future of cookies are set to dramatically reshape the marketing world.
The research conducted by Censuswide on behalf of DCMN surveyed 600 in-house marketers in the US, the UK, France, the Netherlands, Germany and India. The results offer an understanding of how the marketing landscape has changed after a tumultuous few years and how optimistic brands are heading into 2022.
“At DCMN, we wanted to take a closer look at where the marketing industry stands right now, and the impact of a disrupted 2020 and 2021. The results are impressive, and point to a marketing rebound in the coming year – both in India and in other countries around the world. Overall, we’re seeing that branding efforts remain top of mind for marketers. It’s also clear that brands still have huge faith in linear TV, with mobile advertising and TV set to be some of the most popular channels for marketers to invest in next year,” said DCMN country head – India Bindu Balakrishnan.
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Abhay Duggal joins JioStar as director of Hindi GEC ad sales
The streaming giant brings in a seasoned revenue hand as the battle for Hindi television advertising heats up
MUMBAI: Abhay Duggal has a new desk, and JioStar has a new weapon. The media and entertainment veteran has joined JioStar as director of entertainment ad sales for Hindi general entertainment channels, adding 17 years of hard-won revenue experience to one of India’s most powerful broadcasting operations.
Duggal is no stranger to big portfolios or bruising markets. Before joining JioStar, he spent a brief stint at Republic World as deputy general manager and north regional head for ad sales. Before that, he put in three years at Enterr10 Television, where he ran the north region for Dangal TV and Dangal 2, two of India’s leading free-to-air Hindi channels. The north alone accounted for more than 50 per cent of total channel revenue on his watch, a number that tends to get attention in any sales meeting.
His longest stint was at Zee Entertainment Enterprises, where he spent over six years rising to associate director of sales. There he commanded the Hindi movies cluster across seven channels, owned more than half of north India’s revenue across flagship properties including Zee TV and &TV, and closed marquee sponsorships across the Indian Premier League, Zee Rishtey Awards and Dance India Dance. He also handled monetisation for the English movies and entertainment cluster and the global news channel WION, a portfolio that would stretch most sales teams twice his size.
Earlier in his career Duggal closed what was then a Rs 3 crore single deal at Reliance Broadcast Network, one of the largest in Indian radio at the time, before that he helped launch and monetise JAINHITS, India’s first HITS-based cable and satellite platform.
His edge, by his own account, lies in marrying data and instinct: translating audience trends, inventory signals and client demands into long-term partnerships built on cost-per-rating-point discipline rather than short-term deal chasing. In a media landscape being reshaped by streaming, fragmented attention and AI-driven advertising, that kind of rigour is increasingly rare and increasingly valuable.
JioStar, which blends the scale of Reliance’s Jio platform with the content firepower of Star, is doubling down on its advertising business at precisely the moment the Hindi GEC market is getting more competitive. Bringing in someone who has spent nearly two decades doing exactly this, across some of India’s most watched channels, is a pointed statement of intent. Duggal has spent his career turning audiences into revenue. JioStar is clearly betting he can do it again, and bigger.
