Paul Writer launches Innovative Marketer Dialogue, 
Video interview series with CMOs highlights marketing best practices
Rahul Kansal
Executive President
Bennett, Coleman and Co. Ltd. (Times Group)
On Challenges that Marketers face today …
One of them is fragmentation of media. It is well documented that there was a time when one ‘”Mahabharat” could give you 80-85 % of all television viewers in one go, that is a far cry from what it is today. Not just that, there are different media springing up, the internet space is extremely fragmented, more and more young people and lots of marketers want to reach our young, urban consumers who are consuming different forms of media in little bits and that brings me to my second challenge.
There is a far higher degree of attention deficient for advertisements out there, people zapping away from television ads and using the internet in a highly focused way and are completely unwilling to be distracted by commercial messaging or banner ads etc. Basically churning out of your medium at the first sign of boredom, so the challenge is attention deficient and how we manage to engage people.
“The challenge is attention deficient and how we manage to engage people.”
The third challenge is today traditional systems of authority have eroded like parental authority or authority figures in society. Today, it is no longer enough even for an editor to pontificate from his pulpit, people listen to peers and others whom they believe in far more than brands or authority figures. Therefore, it is no longer adequate for brands to simply give their message on a one to many basis, they need to be progressively thinking about their marketing as creation of platforms where different consumers come together and engage with each other and with the brand. The simplistic style that worked maybe a few years ago (where you produce a television commercial twice a year and it will beam to vast number of people) is changing to a far subtler game where you need to penetrate various subsets of communities, where you need to hold their attention. You need to find them and give them a place within the communication, they will not be passive receivers but active participators in communication.
