What Pankaj Duhan teaches about privacy-first marketing

Influencer can be very powerful amplifiers for a great brand idea. FMCG brands still have a lot higher focus on traditional media which is TV and print. Do you think they have been able to successfully leverage digital media for brand building and generating demand? The category and the usage of different mediums is changing. The consumer is changing and the brands are trying to keep pace. Some do it better than others and some categories do it better than others. I handle a big portfolio of brands and each is at a different stage of

adoption. But for brands like Durex, Wheat, we are actually significantly ahead of the curve in terms of digital adoption. And it is not because it is the fashionable thing to do but it is because it is the right thing to do from a consumer perspective. The social conversations tend to create a lot of interest that leads to brand trial. So for brands like Durex, you know, edgy communication is very natural. How has that worked for you? It's a category. You need to go

back to the category construct and the category is a category which is a taboo category. People don't want to talk about it, at least not their sex lives. They will talk about everybody else's sex lives but not their own. But the topics are difficult to broach. Therefore, you actually need a much more simpler approach, intelligent approach, a humor-based approach to ease them into the conversation about the category. I think that is the name of the game. It requires great creatives so

that you can marry intelligence with the brand message. Right? And it requires guts because not everybody in the category is able to do it to be able to broach those topics. But you put the three things together, it works out quite well. So your make your move challenge is trending a lot in social media. So what was the inspiration behind that campaign? Which is MOVE. It is one of the big trusted brands, Analgesic Topical Pain Relief brand that we have. The purpose and the vision for the brand is to

make India a pain-free India. The first step to being a pain-free India is to have preventative care. Right? So make yourself fit so that you don't require the solutions to ease your pain. The brand provides a curative solution but preventative is the first step that you should actually do. And there we felt that the sedentary lifestyle of today is a big, big hindrance. So in our own very small way, what we wanted to do was we wanted to encourage people to make that one move. What are your thoughts on influencer-led marketing?

Do you think it has been a successful model? See, influencer is a how. Right? So many brands make the mistake of actually going straight to the how and ticking the boxes. I don't think it works like that. But influencer can be very powerful amplifiers for a great brand idea. If there is a great brand idea that delivers a fantastic benefit to the consumers. Right? And does it in an interesting way. Then you can actually have a lot of amplification power of the key opinion leaders. And that's what we are actually

learning time and again with the work that is happening on Durex, with the I Faked It Too. The entire campaign on move with the Fit India movement was actually done with a lot of influencers. But the idea was the central theme of make your move. Right? And therefore, it gives that interesting hook for people to actually come into. So you operate in a category, you know, that does a lot of cause-based advertising focused on general hygiene. Tell us how tricky is it? When you actually get into

cause-based or purpose-based or point-of-view-based marketing in a lot of the categories, etc., you need to approach it with the purity of heart. From a brand perspective. Many people will approach it purely from an ROI perspective. And when you approach it from an ROI perspective, you will never be able to substantiate or put a causal link towards the work that you're doing and the ROI that you're delivering. But if the cause helps you in achieving the vision of the brand, with or without the product, it's absolutely fine.

Because that is the vision that you wanted to achieve. If you never wanted to achieve your vision in the first place, then you will look into all the ROIs and you'll never find the causal link. So my suggestion and my thought and my experience is go have a vision that you genuinely believe in it. Go and work towards that vision and therefore the causes that matter and make measurable impact towards the vision and your brand will benefit. Ultimately, the ROI that you will get will be so fantastic that you don't need to actually go and measure for it.