MAM
DCMN expands insights capabilities in India; onboards Akshay Kapur
Mumbai: The growth marketing partner for digital brands DCMN has announced the expansion of its insights capabilities in India. To help oversee the new expansion, DCMN has brought Akshay Kapur on board.
Based out of Gurgaon, Kapur joins DCMN from audience insights and analytics leader Nielsen, where he spent close to four years working with clients including Pernod Ricard India, DSM, Dabur, Reckitt Benckiser, and GSK.
With ad spend set to cross the Rs one lakh crore mark this year in India alone, brands have never been more aware of the need to invest their budgets in the right audiences and campaigns that will help them drive real growth.
DCMN’s insights solutions are built to eliminate guess-work from a campaign, with capabilities including:
Target group analysis: Helping brands gain a true understanding of their audiences’ socio-demographics, needs, interests, media behavior and drivers for using a specific product or service. From there, marketing teams can better adapt their messaging and campaigns to appeal to these particular demographics.
Ad concept testing: Allowing brands to see which out of a selection of creative ad concepts is the most impactful and will resonate the most with consumers. This ensures businesses are getting the most bang for their buck before launching into the costly production process.
Brand tracking: Measuring metrics such as brand awareness, consideration, usage and loyalty, among others. This is especially helpful to measure before and after a specific campaign, allowing businesses to measure upswing in key branding metrics and understand how successful a campaign really is.
“Performance metrics can only give you so much insight into how well an advertising campaign has performed,” said DCMN country head India Bindu Balakrishnan. “Our clients are increasingly focused on building brand salience and want to know what impact a campaign has had on more nuanced awareness metrics like likeability and brand recognition. These are the questions our Insights product is designed to help answer.”
“Having this overview of both sides of the coin – i.e. both the performance and broader awareness metrics – gives a fuller picture of a marketing campaign’s impact and is invaluable for charting a brand’s growth,” he further added.
To date, DCMN has worked with hundreds of businesses to help them make better strategic decisions with data-based insights, including for unicorn eSports and mobile gaming platform Mobile Premier League, and leading global caller ID app Truecaller.
Brands
DeVANS sparks buzz with self-chilling beer can April Fools campaign
Godfather stunt racks up 7 million impressions, blending humour with hype
NEW DELHI: DeVANS Modern Breweries has stirred up the marketing pot with a playful yet high-impact campaign teasing a futuristic “self-chilling beer can” under its flagship Godfather label.
What began as a seemingly bold product innovation quickly turned into one of the most talked-about brand moments online, before being revealed as an April Fools’ Day prank. The reveal, however, did little to cool the buzz.
The campaign clocked over 7 million organic impressions across platforms including LinkedIn, Instagram, Facebook and X, with users debating whether the concept was a genuine breakthrough or clever marketing theatre. Thousands of shares and comments turned the idea into a full-blown conversation, drawing in both consumers and industry insiders.
The hook was simple but effective. A self-chilling can positioned as an on-the-go convenience product tapped into the imagination of younger, urban audiences. Add the timing around April Fools’ Day, and the campaign struck the perfect balance between curiosity and scepticism, keeping audiences guessing.
Marketing experts have pointed to the campaign as a case study in leveraging cultural moments. By leaving just enough ambiguity, the brand invited audiences to participate rather than simply observe, turning passive viewers into active contributors to the narrative.
“Godfather has always been an iconic brand, but iconicity must evolve to stay meaningful,” said DeVANS Modern Breweries chairman and managing director Prem Dewan. “The ‘Self-Chilling Can’ was our way of showing up in a cultural moment with confidence and a sense of humour.”
Beyond the numbers, the campaign signals a broader repositioning for Godfather. Long seen as a legacy beer brand, it is now leaning into youth culture, digital-first storytelling and topical engagement to stay relevant in a crowded alcobev market.
In a space where attention is fleeting, DeVANS has shown that sometimes the coolest idea is the one that keeps people guessing.
