 Welcome to exchange for media. With me today is a leader who in these not so good times has found reasons to be happy. He is basking in the glory of retaining a 750 crore account and winning some new ones. Please welcome Mr Ajay Gupta, CEO, WaveMaker, South Asia. Ajay, welcome to the show. Thanks, Nadia. Thanks for having me and thanks for the kind words. Thanks for finding time to do this for us. Ajay, as I mentioned in the intro, WaveMaker has recently retained L'Oreal which is a very big appetizer and an account that most agencies would want to have. Then you also won some new accounts like humanists and others. So how is the sentiment on the floor? Winning is always great. It lifts spirits and something that's very important in these times. I think we've kind of continued our winning streak. We've had a great year last year. We've been on top of the charts, the new business charts. And we continue that trend. So it is very gratifying. I am very grateful to the team who's put in a lot of effort. It is not easy to pitch in these times, preparing for the pitch without actually being physically together. And then actually making the pitch presentation is extremely challenging. I'm sorry to interrupt. Even still all the pitches are taking place virtually. There are no physical meetings. No, absolutely. All pitches are still virtual. So it is very challenging and especially when all videos are off and you're not seeing any expressions and you don't know how you're doing them and whether you're going in the right track. It is not easy. It is challenging. But in spite of that, to have put in the effort and to be successful, I think it's a lot of credit to the team and I'm grateful to the clients to have seen the value. And like I said, winning always a celebration. It lifts spirits and it has brought in a lot of joy in these very, very difficult times for a team that has worked really, really hard. Ajay, it was a very good year for you. Overall, the industry was hit by the second wave and your own parent company Group M had predicted that this year the addicts will grow at 23%. But then came this sudden second wave and it disrupted a lot of the entire ecosystem. How much has that affected industry and your business also in terms of consumer sentiment? So I think overall we are still good with that 23% prediction. We started the year with a bang and actually we took on from 2020, where the last few ones really picked up and Jan Feb March did extremely well and showed a lot of positive growth. In fact, if you remember 2020 was not COVID, Jan Feb at least. We have exceeded those numbers. So it's a very good positive trend. Yes, after the second wave hit us, there has been a reduction. But this time, unlike last time, where everyone was unsure and unaware of what they should do. I think in this particular time, we had the benefit of experience on our side. And unlike last time where everyone just stopped advertising, this time, all the people are a little more cautious. Clients are a little more cautious. It is not a pulled-up drug situation. So spends haven't dropped the way they did last time. They are lower but they haven't gone off completely. So in that sense, we are actually going quite well so far. The first half of the year hasn't been as bad as last year. We've done okay. When we spoke earlier, you were talking about the drop. And I think compared to the first quarter, April, May would be about 70% to 80% of what we expected it to be. But July, August, while it's typically a lower advertising one, and that trend will continue. So we will be in line with every year's trends, the seasonality patterns that we have. I'm very hopeful for the last quarter of the year, starting from September, actually, when the cricket tournaments that we have coming around with the festive season coming around. I think it's all going to come together very well, the way it did in 2020. And I think we are still good to go with the numbers that we predicted. We also discussed how July, August, this year looks much better or comparable to 2019. That's right. So July, August, this year will be in line with 2019. A little bit here and there, but largely in line with what we saw in 2019. And that's it, considering how 2020 went, that certainly gives us a lot of growth compared to the previous year. Ajay, but as we discussed before, the second wave was very tragic in a lot of ways. There was personal loss. All of us personally know someone who has been affected in our extended family or colleagues, etc. So how has this impacted the consumer sentiment? I'm also asking that, do you see this continue till the festive season or why can people will overcome it and things will take back to celebrations and leaving things behind? Yeah. So it's a very, very interesting question, actually. And there are a lot of trends that we've observed. We've observed some changes from the previous wave and some things which continued. So when the first wave went down, I think people got a lot more confident and people were going out and some I think some offices also reopened and things were getting back to normal. And then the second wave hit us, I don't think we were ready for it mentally because we thought that this is all behind us. But the hit was tremendous. It was a massive hit. And like you said, we've all been hit personally. And that's a very sad situation to be in. The way the consumer reacted, I think similar to last time, a lot of the media viewing went up because a lot more time spent at home, OTT viewing went up, viewing on the mobile went up. People were a lot more comfortable ordering on e-commerce, ordering online. So that continued its growing trend. Unlike last time where a lot of hoarding happened, this time, hoarding didn't happen. I think people knew that you don't need to fear that things will not be available. So hoarding didn't happen. E-commerce comfort was a lot more and that continued to grow. The other things which have continued and kept growing is the sentiment of health. E-commerce was affected because a lot of people, particularly in Mumbai and in Delhi, in a lot of cases, they had stopped deliveries. They had stopped deliveries but it is not, as in when it opened up, when it was physically possible. And I think at no point of time did essentials go off. That continued. So that kind of comfort people had, they were not worried about not being able to access stuff that is essential. Even the food delivery continued. Even the food delivery continued. So those things were taken care of very well. And also the other non-essential deliveries came back on pretty soon this time compared to last time where. So I was saying that one of the key trends is the consciousness towards a healthy lifestyle. So the number of searches around healthy eating, healthy recipes, the number of searches around yoga, the number of searches around healthy habits, that went up phenomenally. So that whole trend has continued and has possibly grown. So that's one thing. And I think brands could use this very effectively by leaning or finding ways to talk about how they could benefit from a health perspective or associate with that trend that we have seen. The other thing you would have noticed, the very, very interesting thing is in the earlier phase there was a lot of sharing happening. I have made this coffee, I have cooked this new dish, I have learned this new trick, all of that. That happened a lot in the first wave. It didn't happen in the second wave. The second wave was a lot more about caring for others, about having done something, about asking for help. I think one was the intensity of it. And the second is I think having gone through the first wave, people were a lot more conscious of the situation that is going around them. So I think that was another big thing that changed. So first is the consciousness towards health, the being more value conscious. So value for money became a lot more important. And therefore this was a trend observed in the previous wave also where established brands and brands with a lot of equity benefited a lot more in terms of sale. And that has continued. So that has continued in this wave. Media consumption has gone up a lot more. OTT subscriptions have gone up a lot more people. And I think this time there's a lot more content on OTT. So there were a lot more new series which did quite well. A lot of new fail OTT only releases which came up. And I think all of these grew. The other two areas that we have seen a lot of growth is gaming. So gaming, unlike earlier where it was once in a way and may not be too many people involved, this time we've seen a lot more serious gamers, people who spend a lot more time gaming. So that is another key trend we've seen. And the other one is from a media perspective is audio. So podcasts have taken a lot more space. I think people going for walks, you know, putting on their earphones, those kind of things, the health thing and then the related Edutek also is another trend which has taken off. I think people have begun to believe that you can do a lot more with your screen than earlier. So I think that's another one which has gone up. Another thing is hyperlocal. So a lot of media consumption, which is local. So a lot of language, local language consumption of media, a lot of wanting things to be delivered to you quickly and therefore usage of the local network to buy stuff. So those kind of things are called happiness. So those kind of things have very clearly been I also asked you if this has affected consumer sentiment and you think people may not shock the way they used to continue the festive season? I think when the wave was at its peak, when the second wave was at its peak, yes, consumption went down dramatically. But we are seeing things coming back for most categories in the FMCG space. I think FMCG space hasn't been affected. You're talking about space like banking, finance, all of these areas have continued to flourish. Areas which, you know, categories in the retail space have very badly been affected. Categories in the hospitality space have been very badly affected. I think these two, three areas are where they have been affected. But in general, otherwise, consumption is not, you know, is not that badly affected this time as it was last time. And I believe things will, as festive comes back, I am hopeful and I believe that normal consumption will come back into play because finally, you know, everyone is looking to come out of this. And one of the ways to feel liberated is to spend and to feel good about the fact that you can do something. So I believe we should be out of it. I just pray that the third wave doesn't hit us. If that is safe, then I think we don't need anymore. We're fine with WaveMaker. That's the only way we want. So, you know, you WaveMaker launched a new AI-powered Peter Panning platform called Maximize. Not much has been spoken about it, you know. How is it different from the platforms that other agencies have launched? What are its USPs and if you can, and how is it rolling out in India, if you can shed more light on that? So, Maximize is something, you know, that I'm really proud of. It's a massive differentiator and something that will help clients make better investments. This has been launched globally and currently in India, we are rolling it out with the teams. A lot of this training going on at a massive scale and we're getting our teams used to using the platform. We're also, you know, taking this to some of our clients and working with them to start getting them to get a feel of the platform. What is great about Maximize really is its ability to look at multiple situations at the same time. I'd explain that a little bit more. So, as an advertiser, I need to make decisions around which target consumer do I go after? Decisions around which medium do I target? When I decide my medium, how much do I invest in which medium? We also have a proprietary way of looking at the consumer journey, which is called momentum. In momentum, we say there are four stages. There is a priming stage when you're not actively looking to purchase something. But at the same time, your mind is open to input coming in from advertising or from anywhere else. So, take an example of maybe a of a car. You may have just bought a car and you're not looking in the market for a car, but then you keep seeing advertising. You're some friend, relative buys a new car, it registers in your head. That's the priming stage. Then there's a trigger where your car gets old or there's a sudden income increase, which allows you to make a new investment in a new car. And then you're in the active stage. So, there's a trigger and then there's the active stage. In the active stage, you behave very differently. You go to showrooms, you go and search, you go and ask questions, very different. You're not passive. You're very actively searching. And then you make your decision and you buy. Now, what stage do I really need to invest in? Where is my brand today? Is my brand a brand that is actively in the consumer's mind? And therefore, I don't need to really invest there, but I need to invest when they're searching for me, when they're looking for me. Or is it a brand which needs a little bit more priming, which needs a little more priming bias, then I need to invest in the priming stage? Now, all of these investment decisions, there are millions of permutation combinations. I invest in the priming stage or in the active stage. I invest on television or radio or influencers or whatever. There are so many permutations, combinations that can come through. What this tool does is it looks at various consumer groups. It looks at various, at the four stages. It looks at various media and tells you how to invest in each of these variables. So it's a multi-dimensional tool, giving you investment levels across each piece that I mentioned. Have you started using it for your clients in India or is it still in the rollout phase? So we have started with a few clients and we are still looking at how the results are and we are training our people to use it. So I guess in the next one or two months, we should be able to go out to all our clients and all our people will be in a position to use the Maximize. The beauty of this really is that one is the data which goes behind it. So GroupM has M-platform, our platform which we have 380 million user IVs on, which is a massive base, which I think is the largest base that you can get in the country. And on top of that, we have what we call Life Panel, which is a panel of about 25,000 people, which is linked on M-platform. So Maximize works on the Life Panel. So the data is very, very robust and the information is real time and nothing like this exists anywhere else. And I think the given thinking and given the kind of robust data that goes behind it, we have a winner in our hands. And right now what we are focusing on is making sure that every WaveMaker is fully trained and equipped to use this better for our clients. So that's the stage we are in. So globally, business is kind of picking up with a lot of pitches that were held back in 2020 and now on right now. We have been hearing even like some of the biggest brands are on pitch. How much do you see India gain from it, from the overall momentum? I certainly hope a lot of it comes our way, WaveMaker's way and GroupM's way. But there is a lot of momentum happening in the industry right now because in 2020, I understood that a lot of pitches were not held and they were just either retaining their existing agencies or just pushed it to the next year. So all those which were on hold are now, they've been called. One of your colleagues told me, one colleague is not from WaveMaker, from your industry counterpart told me that this has been the most active pitch season in the last 10 years. So is it correct? Yes, at WaveMaker, we've had a very active pitch season and like you've seen quite a lot of wind coming through. You started roughly around June, July or April, June or when? No, honestly, we've been at it since January. I think there's been no time in the last six months where there is at least one pitch on at any point of time. So that's the way it has been. Yes, so I think to answer that, yes, 2020 was a time when a few pitches got postponed but now there is a fair bit of action going around and so far we've benefited from it. So I look forward to it. Ajay, this series we have named it on resilience because this was a difficult year for all of us. I mean, last one and one more than a year now, we're all going through very different times. What kind of initiatives with your agency take on building trust with and hope for co-workers and more about the human side of the agency and see if you can elaborate on that. This has been really tough. And honestly, I believe that no matter what we try to do and how much ever we try to support, it just is not enough because the kind of personal loss that people have gone through cannot be compensated by anything we do. We've tried our best to support people in whatever way we could when the peak happened. So and I love the way it wasn't just that the management is trying to do it, but the teams got together on our WhatsApp groups. It was buzzing with people trying to help with beds, trying to help with oxygen, trying to help each other. And I was really heartened to see that happening. And we at our end also tried our best to help and support in whatever way we could, but it has been hard. It has been very, very hard. We try to do small things, very small things, given the magnitude of the challenge. And the small things include a few holidays here and there, supporting in terms of mental and physical support from training in yoga, people to talk to health services. We've done all of that. And we hope that we've been able to help our people. But I personally feel that no matter what we do, this kind of situation is just overwhelming. And I really feel for our people. And I'm so proud that we've been able to stick together and hold hands and kind of come through this together. I wouldn't say completely unscathed because a lot of us have personally been hit. But at least we are coming out of it together. I think the biggest thing is that we are really very, very conscious of the challenge. And in whenever there is an opportunity to support in whatever way we try our best to do whatever we can. Ajay, thank you so much for taking our time and speaking to us. We wish you many new accounts in 2021. And just stay in touch. Keep us informed every time you win something new. We'll do. We'll do. Thanks. Thanks a lot, Ajay. And lovely talking to you.