Mumbai: Location-based targeting or geo-targeting has increasingly become an important tool in the marketer’s toolkit to deliver the right message to the right audience at the right time. While TV enables mass reach and is a key medium for national brands trying to achieve objectives such as brand awareness, salience and top-of-mind recall, geo-targeted allows advertisers to speak to the audience that is relevant to the brand.

Many new-age advertisers want to be present on TV. However, the target audience may be confined to a particular geography and effective media planning aims at having minimal or no wastage of the marketing budget which is not possible through the pray & spray approach of TV.

There are limited options for brands to target a specific market in a way that offers the scale of TV and the flexibility of targeting offered by digital. This needed gap is addressed by geo-targeted ad solutions offered by DTH platforms such as Tata Play which allows brands to target specific geographies via TV.

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“Geo-targeted campaigns work very well when it comes to test marketing in specific geographies or to boost reach in a brand’s high priority market. The primary marketing objective of a geo-targeted campaign is the localised reach with minimal cost and zero spills to non-brand markets. Certainly, geo-targeting plays a major role in the overall media mix as it uplifts the brand & communication reach by targeting the core markets with no spillover, thus facilitating prudent optimization of investments,” said Initiative’s senior vice president of business Dhirendra Singh.

Geo-targeted ad solutions offered by DTH platforms offer a vast potential to brands that are looking for advertising options that are cost efficient and deliver the relevant reach. Tata Play’s geo-targeted solution ‘search and scan (S&S)’ banner shows the brand’s ad on the TV screen whenever the channel is swapped. This solution allows brands to target specific geography, for example, brand X may only want to target Uttar Pradesh. It also allows that brand to showcase different versions of the same ad in different geographies, allowing for contextual advertising. For example, brand X shows the Tamil version in Tamil Nadu and the Hindi version in Uttar Pradesh. 

“Geo-targeted advertising gives advertisers the much-required hyper-local reach, especially if one has a creative specific to that market insight. Geo-targeting is used majorly for hyperlocal campaigns and should gain momentum as now we are seeing more localized campaigns by large brands,” said Tata Consumer Products head of media, digital & PR Taranjeet Kaur. 

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This solution has attracted brands from across categories including food delivery, retailers, consumer products, and mattress brands. Several brands such as Swiggy, Sleepwell and Ikea have invested in Tata Play’s advertising solution. 

A leading brand that leveraged Tata Play’s geo-targeted ad solution noted that it helped the brand stand out during the festive season which is usually cluttered by many brand campaigns. 

It explained, “As a local plus national brand, geography-based advertising is crucial for us when planning advertising campaigns. While newspapers and billboards are very effective, DTH ensured that we were unmissable when it came to our target group.”

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Home furniture and accessories retailer IKEA also leveraged Tata Play’s platform for their geo-targeted campaign. “Geo-targeted DTH advertising allows us to reach the majority of the TV viewing audience with the flexibility of playing a mix of long and short creative edits. Through geo-targeting, we could utilise the platform (Tata Play) in the markets we are in operation. Overall, DTH helps us overcome the limited reach of regional TV channels (especially in Mumbai) and added incremental reach,” said IKEA India’s country marketing manager Anna Ohlin.

“IKEA in India has a presence in seven cities (in four states) only so far and country-wide targeting or advertising is not an option as that will create an unnecessary spill and result in consumer expectations that can’t be met at present,” she added. “With geo-targeted media planning, we reach out to consumers in the markets we are present either through offline or online stores.”

Geo-targeted ad solutions by DTH platforms may be leveraged by brands that want to reach consumers in a specific geography or focus their ads in a location where their products are available. This allows brands to allocate their marketing budgets more efficiently.

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“Geo-targeted campaigns can benefit any brand. However, the life stage and footprint of the brand plays an important role when it comes to leveraging such platforms,” noted Initiative’s Singh. “Digital media also offers geo-targeted campaigns, but from a TV perspective, currently, there are very few opportunities and hence there is an immense opportunity to ramp up this space with newer avenues which will bolster increased participation by media and marketing fraternity.”