The 19th edition of the Marketing Conclave (MarCon) organised by the Internet and Mobile Association of India (IAMAI) took place on November 22, 2023, in Mumbai. This year, MarCon’s focus was understanding the evolving role of technology in marketing. There were several intriguing panel discussions, fireside chats and keynote sessions that delved into a variety of topics, while encapsulating this year’s theme.
One such panel discussion spoke about how changing technology will allow new age marketers to connect with Bharat. The panel included prominent industry stalwart such as Priya Narasimhan, head of revenue and partner growth at PhonePe, Ajay Dang, president and head of marketing at Ultratech, Snehil Khanor, Director, Truly Madly, MVS Murthy, CMO, Federal Bank and Milind Pathak, chief business officer, Routemobile.
Digitization of India has been an incredible journey. Mobile phone penetration has led this growth chart. The mobile phone is a one stop shop. There is banking, payments, shopping, entertainment and even the ability to find a life partner. As per statistics, 50 percent of Indians have access to the internet today, said Narasimhan who has watched firsthand the digitization of India, having worked with PhonePe for seven years.
In a diverse market like India, catering to different groups is essential. There are language barriers, cultural barriers, tastes, preferences, etc. Adopting and using technology efficiently is the only way to tackle this. Every company has a different approach towards using tech. According to Khanor, localization is extremely important in such cases. Truly Madly, a homegrown dating app is available to use in 13 regional languages. English is a common language. However, there are two kinds of users. One who understands and uses English and the other who understands English but chooses to not use it as their primary language of communication. Thus, the app throws recommendations based on this data. If you’ve chosen Gujarati as your primary language on the app, then your recommendations will be of similar people who chose Gujarati as their primary language.
As per Dang, at Ultratech, they haven’t thought of tech and vernacular from a marketing point of view. They see their job in home-building. A person in their mid 30s who has no clue about the complex process of homebuilding. That’s where Ultratech comes in to make that process simpler. “As humans, we are too fascinated with technology. It’s right or wrong only on basis of its usage.”
Pathak had a very interesting take. He said, “Internet democratized the brand, gen AI will democratize productivity and personalization.” Today technology has given us the ability to create customized communication. We can potentially create a 100 million individually personalized messages today. Pathak predicted that in the future, with the help of evolving tech, before you can even think of a product, the brand making it will be available.
Talking on changing tech allowing new age marketers to connect with ‘BHARAT’, MVS Murthy said, “AI does not have an emotional quotient hence it cannot be sensitive towards human emotions. Only humans can understand the subtle sensitivities of any matter. While targeting Bharat, it’s important we understand and acknowledge these nuances and think regional and vernacular first, it’s a human emotion, we think in our mother tongue and then speak in English or any other language.”
The panel brought out interesting points of evolving tech and how it impact, products, consumers as well as marketing. While Gen AI might be the future, we can only wait and see how it progresses and evolves to become more efficient in day to day life.