MAM
Google’s quick move to boost brand sales with Commerce Media Suite
MUMBAI: When it comes to India’s shopping habits, “add to cart” is now often followed by “arrives in 10 minutes” and Google is making sure brands don’t miss the ride. The tech giant has launched its Commerce Media Suite, an AI-powered solution designed to help brands and merchants tap into the surging quick commerce and e-commerce markets. The suite works through Google Ads, letting advertisers reach high-intent shoppers across Search, Shopping, Youtube, Display, Discover, and Gmail, directing them straight to product listings on marketplaces like Blinkit, Swiggy, Zepto, and Myntra.
The timing is no accident with the festive season around the corner, competition for eyeballs (and wallets) is fierce. “Today, consumers demand immediacy and convenience, clearly demonstrated by the rise of quick commerce,” said Google India director for omni-channel businesses Bhaskar Ramesh. “Commerce Media Suite opens fresh pathways for discovery across Google and Youtube, driving stronger results for brands during peak demand seasons.”
Early adopters are already seeing gains worth bragging about. ITC Aashirvaad Select clocked a 4x return on ad spend on Blinkit, while Renee Cosmetics reported an 11.5 per cent bump in sales and a 48 per cent drop in cost per order.
For Blinkit, the solution is a match made in delivery heaven. “Google’s Commerce Media Suite offers brands a significant opportunity to cut through the noise and connect with the modern consumer,” said Blinkit director of ad monetisation and pricing Anish Acharya calling it a “game-changer” ahead of the festive rush.
Beyond just reach, brands get Google AI-driven performance, first-party marketplace data, product-level measurement, and self-service transparency effectively marrying campaign spend to actual sales impact.
Or as Renee Cosmetics head of eCommerce Jitendra Rawal put it: “It’s allowed us to efficiently connect with customers looking for our products and significantly drive incremental sales.”
With India’s quick commerce sector in overdrive, Google’s latest play might just help brands click with customers in more ways than one.
AD Agencies
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.
