OOH advertising looking at 20-22% spends windfall this festive season

Out-of-Home advertising is one of the most prominent forms of advertising, providing greater opportunities for brand identification, brand awareness, and brand recall. Like every year, this year, too, brands have invested considerably in OOH advertising. According to GroupM’s ‘This Year Next Year 2023’ report, OOH ad spends are expected to register a growth rate of 31% in 2023 and projected to reach Rs 3,400 crore, mostly driven by digital OOH (DOOH) and programmatic digital OOH (pDOOH).

According to experts, DOOH is no longer a ‘reminder media’ for brands, but a ‘prime media’. In the last 12-18 months, revenues generated by DOOH have gone up from Rs 150 crore to Rs 400 crore. Moreover, the number of digital outdoor screens now stands at 50,000 from 5,000-8,000. DOOH is contributing to a great extent to the overall OOH advertising expenditure this year. pDOOH is considered as the future of OOH advertising and since its availability is limited, the volume is less. It allows messaging in multiple numbers from one source. However, in comparison to over 30% digitisation of assets in other nations, in India, it stands at a mere 5-6%.

Speaking to Adgully, Rohit Chopra, COO, Times Innovative Media, highlighted how brands are tapping into the opportunity of the ICC Men’s Cricket World Cup 2023, and the festive fervour, thereby executing their OOH ad campaigns with full enthusiasm and how digital billboards have turned out to be attractive OOH advertising spaces for brands, with Times OOH witnessing a 20% increase in the acquisition of new clients.

He pointed out, “The festive season holds a special allure for the advertising industry, a time when brands eagerly allocate substantial budgets for their latest launches and special offers. Consequently, the advertising sector prepares well in advance for this opportune period. Every year brings its unique dynamics, including new clients, strategies, and emerging advertising channels. This year is no exception, with notable distinctions. Firstly, the festive season has been amplified by the World Cup, prompting brands to aggressively tap into the cricket fervour that engulfs India. Secondly, with Diwali falling in November, advertisers have a prolonged period to execute campaigns and reach their target audience effectively.”

He further added, “In the realm of airport businesses, there’s palpable excitement as metro cities and Tier 1 cities have emerged as highly sought-after advertising destinations, offering a diverse array of media formats such as Digital Out-of-Home (DOOH). Across various sectors, from apparel to automobiles to retail, brands are intensively vying for consumers’ attention, allocating substantial advertising budgets. The cricket craze during this season has propelled online gaming categories to significantly boost their advertising spending on Out-of-Home (OOH) platforms, aiming to capture the focus of the audience heading to stadiums for live cricket matches. Within the city media business, there is a thriving trend, particularly in modern platforms like Digital Billboards, which are experiencing a surging demand from brands. These digital billboards are seen as attractive and dynamic advertising spaces, offering immense potential for experimentation in the Out-of-Home (OOH) realm. During this festive period, we have observed a notable 20% increase in new clients across our assets, with existing clients also significantly amplifying their advertising budgets. It’s indeed a vibrant and promising time for the advertising industry.”

On the categories that are seeing a rise in OOH ad spends, and the regions witnessing more traction along with the major focus areas of the forms of OOH advertising, Jayesh Yagnik, CEO, MOMS Outdoor, said, “Real Estate, Jewellery, Consumer Banking, consumer durables, and Mobile Handsets have seen a rise in spending on OOH advertising. These campaigns primarily focus on launching new product lines, offering discounts, building brand awareness, and driving consumer consideration. There has been a notable spend in Tier 2 and Tier 3 cities, especially during the festive season. The Real Estate category has almost doubled its spending in Tier 2 cities over 2022. In the West and North zone’s metropolitan markets, there is a focus on using innovative and technology-driven advertising methods. This may include digital billboards, interactive displays, and other high-tech approaches to engage consumers. In contrast, in Tier 1 and Tier 2 cities, the emphasis is on highlighting the Unique Selling Propositions (USPs) of products or services through cutout and jutout displays, which are more traditional and cost-effective forms of OOH advertising.”

On the projections for OOH ad spends by brands this year, Yagnik said, “A 22% increase in spending on OOH advertising has been observed before the onset of the festive season (August and September). This is set to grow as we are getting to the peak of the festive period. We are already witnessing a crunch in media inventory and the availability of impact OOH media is already very dynamic. This is a good sign for OOH as a whole and it reiterates the faith of brands on OOH as a medium. Tier 2 and Tier 3 cities have experienced a slight, but notable increase in advertising spending compared to the previous year. The spending in these cities has risen by approximately 10-15%. This indicates a growing focus on reaching consumers in smaller cities, possibly due to the potential for increased market penetration and consumer engagement in these areas. These trends collectively suggest that businesses are strategically allocating their advertising budgets to capture the attention of consumers in Tier 2 and Tier 3 cities.”

“There are brands like Croma and Flipkart, who have been active around the festive season. Other categories like Media and Entertainment, FMCG, BFSI, Automobile, and Jewellery are also investing in OOH in lieu of the festive cheer. Approximately 30-35% of Adex’s spending has been in non-metro markets. This is expected to grow considering we are just at the onset of the festive season. Pre-festive and festive have always had the larger chunk of the OOH Adex investments. We expect brands to be more active this year and hence, this trend will continue. Consumers have resorted to spending post-COVID and categories like Retail, FMCG, and automobiles are seeing significant consumption growth which positively impacts the advertising industry,” noted Imtiyaz Vilatra, Managing Director, Posterscope.

Footwear brand Bata launched the Bata City Casual Collection with a campaign, titled ‘Every walk is a ramp walk’, where it conducted a flash ramp walk at the Band Stand in Mumbai. Ullas Vijay, Head of Category and Communications, Bata India, commented, “For Bata’s latest campaign, ‘Every walk is a Ramp walk’, we wanted to elevate OOH and conclude the campaign with a one-of-a-kind display of our on-trend City Casual Collection through a flash ramp walk. The culmination of #BataRampWalkChallenge at the iconic Band Stand in Mumbai, the city of style, was an embodiment of the campaign’s ideology of celebrating style and the transformative power of Bata’s latest collection that offers a range of global designs and premium footwear. Through this unique spectacle, we wanted to extend the message that everyone can be stylish and feel like a celebrity, all you need is self-confidence and a stylish pair of shoes.”

Ruchika Malhan Varma, Chief Marketing Officer, Future Generali India Insurance, said, “Staying true to our ‘Inclusion’ agenda and intent of being an ally to the LGBTQIA+ community, we expanded the definition of ‘family’ across all our retail health insurance offerings, to include LGBTQIA+ community and live-in partners. This was supported by a first-of-its-kind brand campaign that broke the norm by boldly showcasing two real-life same-sex couples – Yogi & Kabeer and Adhila & Noora – on billboards in strategic locations with high footfalls such as cafes, malls, and restaurants in Mumbai, Delhi, Gurugram, Goa and Bengaluru. We have successfully paired OOH advertising with a digital campaign by leveraging platforms such as Instagram, Facebook, Twitter, and Linkedin, partnering with real-life couples and influencers to co-create static messaging and trending reels using the hashtag, #RedefinedFamily.”

Durba Mandal, Head – OOH Business, Cheil India, noted that usually the festive season in India is the whole of H2 and 2023 is no different. One of the most popular cricketing tournaments (ICC World Cup) is being held in India between October and November, which is also the peak festive season. Hence, from August onwards, the OOH industry has been experiencing a surge in ad spending. The spends start from August and peak around Diwali. The spending starts region wise and sort of reaches a crescendo nationwide in Oct-Nov. Starting with Onam in Kerala and Ganesh Chaturthi in Maharashtra (Jul/ Aug/ Sep) it moves on to Durga Puja/ Navratri/ Dussehra in Eastern and Western States (Sep-Oct) to nationwide celebration Diwali (Nov) and then Christmas in December. Hence, OOH spends see a spike region wise. The additional OOH spends during this period could be up to 20%, depending upon the category.”

She further added, “Another trend noticed for festive campaigns are use of hyperlocal touchpoints. Though traditional touchpoints and formats are used predominantly, captive formats like Restaurants/ Pub branding, retail media branding, Pandal branding (Durga Puja), and branding on popular immersion routes (Ganesh Chaturthi) are also attracting the attention of marketers and media planners. Digital Out of Home (DOOH) is on an upward swing due to its capability of broadcasting multiple creatives/ changeovers. Brands are focussing on promoting the product as well as pushing offers. The availability of DOOH in the top cities/ towns has also enabled advertisers to allocate more budget for festive. Besides its creative broadcast flexibility, easy availability of the inventory has made this possible.”

Arnab Roy, Vice President, Marketing Coca-Cola India and South-West Asia, said, “We are going to be doing certain innovations around OOH advertising. We ran a campaign throughout the World Cup period in a core Out of Home area in Bengaluru and we are going to be activating throughout the World Cup period with that. OOH advertising helps us in getting incremental reach to a certain target audience and helps us create spontaneous awareness for a lot of new products as an incremental media vehicle. When it comes to the nature of costs, as a percentage, it will be a single-digit percentage.”

Vineet Chugh, Head of Marketing, QueueBuster said on the same: "As we embrace the festival season, Out of Home (OOH) advertising has been gaining higher traction among marketers. OOH media spending, having rebounded to pre-Covid levels, soared by 86% in 2022 compared to the previous year. This festive season promises even more growth, not only in media spending but also in terms of innovation, especially the use of technology. Gone are the days when OOH was confined to static billboards and in-transit ads. Marketers are pushing the boundaries of creativity this festival season with digital billboards, eye-catching 3D displays, and AI-generated interactive OOH experiences. Driven by Digital OOH, the overall OOH advertising is expected to grow by 34% in 2023.

Another interesting aspect of OOH media is how it can also be leveraged online. Not only does it offer high and targeted offline visibility to brands, but it also fuels social media with captivating content. OOH is not just about what you see outdoors; it is also about what you share, like, and remember."