 I would be enlightening you a bit about the concerned personality here who I would shortly be welcoming here on the stage. Straight out of college, he has started his career at Magnon two decades ago. The 300-plus member Magnon group today is part of Fortune 500 Omnicom group. Of its three agencies, Magnon EG Plus, Magnon Dysignery and Magnon Sanchez Vivek leads Magnon EG Plus across international markets, including North America, Europe, Australia and Middle East, apart from India. Vivek was named Managing Director of Magnon EG Plus in 2014 at the young age of 33. This made him perhaps the youngest ever MD of multinational agency in India. He has been profiled as a case study in the best-seller book, 30-something CEO. And he will be speaking on the topic, finding inspiration. How can digital marketers stay innovative in a world full of cliches? Please put your hands up in the air. And with a huge round of applause, let's welcome Mr. Vivek Marani, MD, Magnon EG Plus here on the Dysodars. Thank you. Thank you. It's just, I don't know where that was added, but it's really good to be in a physical event after a very long time. I'm third. And Dr. Anurag, thank you very much. The welcome was very warm, and I just couldn't refuse, and I think you have a great first mover's advantage of getting back to the real world, you know, in that sense. So thank you very much for having me over here. I know a lot of you have been sitting down for a long time. So, you know, my time may be that thing, you've been sitting too long, and when you're in a work-from-home environment, you could very easily get up and do that. So, you know, I will give you the chance to please stand up, all of you. You can stretch a little bit and move. No, I'm serious. Feel free to... It's good for your health. So, yes, okay. So do these... Okay, right. I'm sure the blood circulation starts moving now. Okay, I've switched on my timer. And I have my colleague over here who's also said that, you know, I speak a lot. I will do my best to convey what I have to do as fast as possible. All right. Okay, so it's a very non-cliché topic, and I felt it was very nice. Thank you. So the topic is very nice. It's not cliché for a change. I felt that that was, you know, the good thing. So, how do we stay innovative in the world full of clichés? So, if it's not working, it's okay. Okay, perfect. So, cliché, lack of original thought. So, how does... You know, and we're surrounded by... with a lot of clichés. And how do we break free from that? How do we innovate? How many of you, just for me to get a sense, how many of you over here have been on the agency side in the past or currently are? Okay. Okay, that's just a few hands. How many people... How many of you have been on the brand side, on the marketing side, you know, and who've been asked to do something innovative? Okay. A few more hands. All right. So, you know, innovation tends to be this constant pressure on, you know, people like us from the agency side who are like... Give me an idea. It should be the best. No one should have done it before. And it should fit my brand and it should make sense and it should be in line with what's happening in the market, you know. Usually, that's the brief. We say, sir, ma'am, give me a brief. So, that's where the original thought comes in. And, you know... And how do you actually start thinking on those lines from there of, you know, what you really need to do, you know, the original ideas that you need to do. So, the first cliché is in the advertising and agency world, the first cliché is get drunk. Right? So... Because when we talk about it, the creativity flows to the fullest. Right? It's just not with our generation. You know, I read about this with the Greeks and they used to do this. The Greeks used to actually... They used to actually take decisions or think of ideas when they were in a state of intoxication. But they also had this rule that when you're drunk, you will think of ideas, but you will pass it in the parliament when you're sane. So, you know, that used to be the practice. So, I think that is one of the clichés which surrounds our industry and that's visual from Mad Men. And I always wondered, they're always constantly drinking. They don't have tea or coffee. They only just drink all the time, you know. But I'm not sure if this is quite sustainable in terms of innovation. So, what I've been inspired by for innovation and thinking of good ideas is, you know, what I'd like to share. The pandemic, you know, made me read a few books around this subject and topic and, you know, it excited me about getting... to know how you can think of better things and what you can do, because, you know, it's a part of my job, a lot of our people back at Magnon to be innovative and to, you know, to think of good ideas. Yes, sorry, it's very laggy. I'll press it and after a few minutes, what's the solution? If there's nothing, I'll press it first. Right. So, okay, so, you know, there's this book called Where Good Ideas Come From and I was very inspired by this book and it said something like, you have these slow hunches, you know, and figure it for yourself. You probably would do that also, that you have this idea, I think I can't crack it, but it's there, something in my mind, right, that's a hunch. And then you have a lot of these slow hunches, right, and over a period of time, these slow hunches, you know, a hunch here, a hunch there, a hunch. There's something, but you're unable to kind of tie it together. It happens with me a lot and, you know, what I try and do is now I know consciously that, you know, this is how good ideas happen, is it starts with a slow hunch and whenever this move forward, I will reveal what those slow hunches... I think battery? Or... Okay, I'll just keep trying. So these slow hunches eventually, so you have a lot of a cluster of these slow hunches and when you have a lot of these slow hunches, they start colliding with each other and over a period of time, you get this, whoa, okay, now I know what happened. So the slow hunches came together and showed you the full vision, okay. Now it's going back slow also. Sorry, I'm just so agency-type and so dependent on a presentation because I think it brings out the, you know, brings out the story, okay. So now I know that every time I press a button, action will happen, not now, but maybe in the future. So this slow hunch is a concept, is the first inspiration. It was aware of what the slow hunch is about and eventually a vision will come up and, you know, that's the thought of how it is. The vision on this screen also will come up. The next concept, essentially, is something called adjacent possible. So adjacent possible is... it's actually by this person called Stuart Kaufman, who is written on biological evolution. Biological evolution is the biggest innovation in whatever we can imagine. It's from atoms to human beings and AI and where we've got to and it's obviously taken billions of years. So biological evolution says that innovation best happens in the immediate vicinity. So, you know, we at times get inspired by technology in a big way and we figure that the blue area is where we are now and the circles that you see on the right side are the future possibilities of everything that's possible. You know, I think one of the points that Sir was talking about is unlimited. I'll show you some of the cliches and our mind kind of starts going in those. But innovation best happens which are the most closest adjacent possible. So from how a giraffe's neck over millions of years became longer because that was evolution because it was adapting to the next evolution till the next kind of animal came into being. And that was an innovation, nature's innovation. Ideas also tend to come with these adjacent possible. I know a theory, I'll try and get a context in terms of a digital marketing piece also eventually in these slides. Now imagine a YouTube in 1990, do you think it would have been successful? There was no internet speed at which the internet penetration was bad but the concept was great in 1990 but it would have not been successful. Amazon in 2005 was there, was very well there but it's not the same as it is today. You know, we're getting Amazon packets all the time overnight because the logistics changed that, right? So adjacent possible are pieces where you can innovate in the next piece where the surroundings are right and possible and that's what needs to be done. So that's the second inspiration. The third is, there are many of these small, small hunches those circles that you saw, there are circles in the future. Now when do you really get a great idea or a good idea? Or where do you get it? One, you get it inside your brain. Basically what is the brain? The brain is neurons firing and a network of neurons called synapses and creating ideas and memories and stories in your mind. That's where every idea comes from. So inside your brain is the first place where ideas will come from and of course outside the world, you know, events and places where or offices or spaces or people or interaction or networks so there are networks inside the brain and then there are networks outside the brain, right? And the more your ideas collide with each other as hunches inside the brain or the more you talk about an idea you probably walk out during lunch and talk about some pieces around what do you think on this particular topic or this campaign or what you're doing next. So those ideas come together and that's what will lead to innovation. So those are my three inspirations. Now in the digital marketing space and that's where I'll narrow down and not give more gyan on some of the books that I read on the brain and ideas and stuff but now on the digital marketing side we see that we're surrounded by a lot of cliches. There's, you know, people talking about consumer journey, marketing, content, programmatic, VR, segmentation, UGC, you know, visual design, blockchain, AI, gosh, you know, the words don't end and why I like this topic was because year on year, you know, there may not be much change happening. Okay, sorry, I'll take that back. A lot of change is happening but the number of cliches or the number of keywords that, you know, as a marketer where shared just keeps increasing and then it becomes like our pressure to keep up with it. That do we know everything? Oh, if we don't, you know, we'll probably become irrelevant and, you know, that's the thought that keeps coming to our mind. So now this is like a keyword cloud and imagine our brain is also like that keyword cloud and imagine all these individual cliches. You may call it cliche, you may call it just a nomenclature for, you know, a concept like that but all of them now start gradually coming together and these are something that we see inside. So let's adapt. So that's the digital space. You saw some of the cliches. Now these inspirations adapted to how you can innovate and we'll probably, I'll probably talk you through an example that, you know, these were some of the cliches that we as an agency were facing. We work with Nestle. Nestle is one of our, you know, clients and they wanted us to do something innovative. Every client wants us to do something innovative but this was a particular example that I picked up where, you know, we needed to do something innovative. So the whole thought started with there's a lot of content around, right? We faced this. There's a lot of content around the last two sessions. I think we were centered around content. There's a lot of content that all of us are consuming. We know this. Now this content is creating something called the messy middle, right? This is, you know, Google came up with this report called Decoding the Messy Middle and they basically said that the consumer journey is not linear anymore. It's very messy. So the trigger to purchase, now imagine yourselves that when you think of buying something you are influenced by a lot. First the product shows up on your Facebook, Insta, you know, on Amazon, wherever you heard about it. So, you know, the product shows up. Then you look at reviews, you read reviews, then you're sent more content, you're re-marketed that content, you're given more content. So the brain essentially now is being fed a lot of content, right? And how the brain operates is now necessarily that I knew before, then I considered, then I purchased it. It's become more complicated like that. But to simplify the messy middle it is that our brain evaluates where, you know, it explores, so you expand your options. So you want to buy a phone, you will look at five, six, seven phones, you look at budget and then you'll start doing filters and then you'll narrow down on your options, right? You'll see blogs, you'll read reviews, you'll see what people are saying about it. You'll do a lot of stuff, right? And then you will narrow down your choices, you will evaluate. So this is like an infinite loop. So for people like me, my wife says that about me, that my decision making is slow. So basically I get lost in this loop. So when I thought I would buy it, and until I bought it, it took a lot of time. But then I also have a lot of friends who, you know, are able to do this very fast, right? So you get into this loop. So as a marketer's job or a brand's job, it is to identify those triggers and get people out of the loop to make them buy, right? That's what a marketer is something that we do. Now, within the same report, Google identified that, you know, there are six biases and this is very interesting, okay? Now figure this out, that all your brains are coded in the same way. There are six biases that will change, that will happen in our mind to drive us to that purchase. The first is a category heuristic, they call it. So, in the same example, or, you know, what's the processor speed? Those are things that you will look at. Then you look at, oh, what is Rajiv Makhani saying about it? Or, you know, what is so-and-so expert, which is an authority bias, you know, looking at it. What are my friends talking about it? Or somebody who knows about mobile phones, what is he thinking about it? Is that it's a social influence, a social proof is what I will look for. Power of now, will I get it tomorrow? Oh, this one I'll get after 10 days. No, no, I'll just get this one. It's the power of now, right? A scarcity bias. I'm looking at the time. Okay. A scarcity bias. You see those sites? Only two left, only three left. Right? So, it makes us think that, oh my God, I'll run out. That's called a scarcity bias. Right? And then there's the power of free. Anything I do, I see a lot of cameras have come up. It's actually a great report. You should read this report by Google. The power of free is, what am I getting along with it for free? It is a big influencer. So, these six biases play on our mind. Then we also know video rules. Now, this is all cliches. These are all things that are playing on our mind when we're thinking about that idea for Nestle. Now, we've also been told that there's a big focus on something called urban. Is rural plus urban, right? Because bottom of the pyramid in India is urban. Now, 90% of people coming onto the internet are speaking vernacular languages. My colleague over here and friend for 15 years, Naveed, is an agency called Magnon Sancus, which is a group agency which is only a language specialist agency. So, now there's consumer segmentation in the country. That's how our country is divided. We speak 22 different languages in our country. We probably know this but the unfortunate piece is that brands or agencies just speak in English at best in Hindi. But consumers speak all other languages. I would say the content ecosystem for news channels is far more evolved than it is on the agency or the brand or the marketing side because that evolution is yet to happen. So, that's like the kind of consumer segmentation that is there. We also see that regional content is more sticky. There's this Kerala based animation studio which essentially has more views of 600 percent more views of their Malayalam content versus English content. English content is full of brands. There's so much of it. Hindi content there's a lot of it. But regional content is very little because brands have not yet they have but they are increasingly waking up to it. So, we realize that regional content potential. Now, just coming back, I'm just threading where we started. Now, these are all the ideas that are influencing our mind. That video vernacular regional content, cognitive biases all of this together. And then what we start doing is it's not necessary to take everything. We have to apply AI and blockchain. It's not really I mean, it's not about just being cool. It's about getting some things right. So, we stack a bunch of those thoughts and ideas together. And what we identify is that, okay, let's create video content which is vernacular by regional content creators is the most logical thing that we come up with, right? And from there, that's so if you're a marketer, you've probably got it by now. You know, we've tied it down together. So, say, okay, get regional influencers and marketers. But now, we go a step further and we collide with a liquid network. Okay, my time's up. Ten minutes. Okay, we collide with a liquid network and which is Talent Track, which is India's largest talent aggregator of creators, right? And Talent Track has essentially more than 450,000 creators, content creators, sitting out there, 15,000 media companies, you know, looking for talent from their 5,500 influencers. So, we basically work with Talent Track and we say that listen, this is our idea. What do we do? How do we take this content to the next level? So, they give us an idea about what good content is and they tell us that good content is which is engaging. Now, imagine yourself, the content that you actually watch on TV. I'll just finish this for the... Okay. Is it okay if I take 5 minutes? Okay, thanks. You know, I indicated to my friend over there in a way that if I'm boring, everyone should signal like this. So, I'll... So, content engagement, like, I mean what I'm talking about, the content engagement and content relevance. So, genetics and social engagement. But basically, influencer content, it's a little bit salesy. Everybody realizes that the influencer has given money, they tell him to put this content. You know, or speak about my brand. Now, that is not necessarily good quality content. It's not engaging. It's good quality, high quality production value, high quality brand alignment, but not necessarily good quality content. It's video content. So, what we came up with this whole concept of professionally user-generated content, right? It is not influencer content, it is not fully professional content, but it is content at scale which is unique, which is non-salesy, which advocates brand love and perpetuity and content with same. And then we put in the biases over there and we say that this is the content which actually has social proof. We know that the brand didn't give money, it's not salesy. We've got some examples, but I don't think I have time. And then there's the whole brand-led content and influencer content which kind of doesn't add up. So, what do we need to achieve this? You need vernacular capabilities, you know, as somebody, as an agency, if you want to do this for a brand, hyper-local insights and scalability quotient. So, we collided our ideas together with Magnon Sankers, which is the most famous hyper-local insights from Magnon Designery and Talent Track which got in the scale because what we needed was more than 200 content creators and I'll give you an example I'll show you a brief example of how we created video content across 200 video pieces of content for an insight that we got for Milkmaid. So, this was for Milkmaid. You guys know Milkmaid, they want to do something interesting. Baking is like a big trend but they said, baking in every part of the country is different. In that state, what is going on in culture is different. So, we got insight. We got a lot of creators, Talent Track helped us do this and got us insights from all over the country from hundreds of creators. We got insights from our designery team. A Kerala baker. Influencer base is not much but content is organic over here. We created videos and we got to know that Banofi Pie in Kerala is trending at that time and we got her. I don't know if this video will play but it's in Malayalam I think there's an audio thing but you see there's a very subtle integration of the brand over there that you see and she's not saying much Malayalam and most of you will still not understand but she's just saying I'm using milk made and then it's the whole recipe of how to make Banofi Pie in Malayalam and imagine seeding that kind of content in hundreds is what we achieved with the brand and we came up with this whole idea around Pugc is how we use professional user generated content and that from our mind was a long term idea and we moved from just a cliche to an innovation and with the journey in between from hunches to creators to ideas colliding with each other and then of course we had a drink and celebrated. So thank you very much that's a little bit about our agency we're a part of the Omnicom Group and EG Plus is Omnicom's production hub we are the India business called Magnon we were acquired ten years back and you know those are our three agencies we are about 350 people here in India thank you very much