Ad Campaigns
TBWAIndia looks at the elusive lives of Gen Z beyond what they portray to the world
Mumbai: TBWAIndia’s team has closely tracked and analysed changes in the world of Gen Z in their latest article, ‘The Wizards of Finding Zen’. The article offers an atypical perspective on Gen Z through the lens of social conscience, self-conduct, learning, interaction with the world and identity.
This article captures how Gen Z’s upbringing and interaction with the internet has transformed how they view the world and gain information. It further dives into what brings them a sense of belonging, what they seek and more.
Born and brought up in the internet age, today’s 17-21-year-olds are politely opinionated know-it-all’s.
Much like wizards of yore, with a swish of their wand or swipe on their phone, these young adults have answers to all the world’s pressing questions. They are self-sufficient and about the most sorted any college-going student ever has been.
This article aims to identify overarching shifts that have taken place for this ‘Wiz-Gen’ in their interaction with the world and themes for 2023 for brands to consider and act upon.
As the world around them continues to go through constant upheaval and change, Gen Z having more practice than any other group, have learnt to ride the wave to their rhythm and even cause ripples in the ocean when necessary. Here’s a generation that truly appears as frivolous as the top of an iceberg while the world keeps missing its depth.
“Every generation imagines itself as different than the others yet bears resemblance to their predecessors, if not the immediate ones. The younger gen z are strikingly different from the millennials, yes. But in their pragmatic way to negotiate change, do they have an uncanny resemblance to the baby boomers? Are they the 2023 version of the baby boomers? Worth a thought.” says TBWAIndia chief strategy officer Amit Kekre.
TBWAIndia CEO Govind Pandey adds, “Gen Z never ceases to astound us. It’s truly captivating to witness their profound influence on culture and the unconventional spaces they choose to cultivate it. From clandestine speakeasies to intimate verandahs, the locations where culture takes shape speak volumes. This paper delves into the enigmatic realms of our contemporary obsession—the generation that occupies countless conversations.”
NATIONAL: Amazon Ads has laid out a sharply tech-led vision for the advertising industry in 2026, arguing that artificial intelligence, streaming TV and creator partnerships will combine to turn brand building into a more precise, performance-driven business.
At the heart of the shift, the company says, is the fusion of AI with Amazon’s vast trove of shopping, browsing and streaming signals, allowing advertisers to move beyond blunt reach metrics to campaigns designed around real customer behaviour.
“The future of advertising is not about reaching more people, but the right people with messages that resonate,” said Amazon Ads India head and vice president Girish Prabhu. “By combining AI with deep customer insights, we help brands move from broadcasting campaigns to having meaningful conversations wherever audiences spend their time.”
One of the biggest changes, according to Amazon Ads, will be the collapse of the wall between media planning and creative development. Retail media, powered by first-party data, is increasingly shaping everything from brand discovery to final purchase, pushing marketers to design campaigns around audience insight rather than internal instinct.
AI is also moving from a support tool to a creative engine. Agentic AI, which automates and accelerates production, is expected to make high-quality creative accessible even to small businesses, compressing weeks of work into hours and giving challengers the ability to compete with larger brands on speed and scale.
Behind the scenes, AI-driven analytics will take on a bigger role in campaign optimisation, identifying patterns, spotting opportunities and recommending actions that would previously have required teams of analysts.
Streaming TV is another big battleground. With India’s video streaming audience now above 600 million and connected TV users at 129.2 million in 2025, advertisers are set to treat streaming not just as a branding channel but as a performance engine, measured increasingly by sales, sign-ups and bookings rather than just reach.
Finally, Amazon Ads sees creators and contextual advertising reshaping how brands tell stories. Creators will act less like influencers and more like long-term partners, while scene-aware ads on streaming platforms will allow brands to insert hyper-relevant offers into the flow of what viewers are watching.
Taken together, Amazon Ads argues, these shifts mark a move towards advertising that is both more human and more measurable, where AI handles the complexity, and creativity does the persuading.
