 Keynote addressed, steering this session is a woman who cares deeply about making the internet equitable and also make it a gender diverse and also has been a pioneer of the internet saathi program where they have trained over 30 million women on digital literacy. She has been part of range of experiences in technology consulting and financial services. She started her career in consulting at Deloitte Consulting in New York and worked across product development, operations, customer marketing at American Express for the US and international markets for more than a decade. A mother of eight year old twins and a constant traveler, life is never boring and she gets energy from each of her markets. She's the senior country marketing director of Google India and Southeast Asia. Ladies and gentlemen, please put your hands together and do give out your emoticons because she's going to address on the seven ways digital is shaping cultural and consumer behavior in India. Thank you so much. It's so wonderful to be here. I'm a marketer like so many of you and I'm an advertiser and I care about the same things that many of you who are listening care about. We have a lot of the same concerns and questions and thoughts in today's day and age. You might think at Google, what do we do when it comes to marketing? But we actually think extensively around how we drive our customer growth across all of our consumer products. And so I have many of the same thoughts and concerns as many of you. And today I'm going to be talking to you about what's happening on digital, the extreme amount of growth that we've been witnessing. I'm going to be talking to you about how we've seen such an incredible growth over the last few years. And what that has done in terms of how we think about the segments of users that are online and how new and early Internet users are united by digital and they're actually more alike than you might think. And that's the source or that's the focus of my presentation today. We're calling it same same but different. And it's about how new and early Internet users are united by digital and more alike than we think. I hope you can see my slides. I'm going to continue assuming that you can see my slides. So the Internet now reaches more than 500 million people across India. That is more than the population of the US, Mexico and Canada combined. I moved to India over a decade ago and if you had asked me what we have seen these numbers, I would have said probably no. But today what's happened is that there's an increasing access of digital tools across both rural and urban India. This is not just an urban India phenomenon and it's across demographics as well. And so when we think of our role as marketers, we need to understand the impact that these digital tools have had on consumer behavior. And this understanding has become essential for every marketer today to really understand the nuances. There's many a time that I hear hypotheses or I hear biased kind of views on who's online and what are they doing. And so we've spent a lot of time understanding and digging into this because there is no one set of Indian users online. They are different but they are united in many, many ways. So we determined a bunch of trends and we used the following approach. We understood through a study in 2019 by interviewing hundreds of customers across metros, peri-urban and rural areas and across different life stages. We discovered that people who have come on the Internet in the last 12 months are behaving very similarly to the people who have been using the Internet for the last 12 years. And we validated these findings then with 10 prominent industry experts and we discovered the pivotal shifts that the Internet has brought to consumer behavior and culture. And you can see here on the approach that we took and at the output of this is that we identified seven trends that are converging with consumers in both demographics, both the early and the Internet users. So what's our point of view as Google? Today I will share some of these fundamental behavioral shifts that we've seen across these two cohorts, which were traditionally thought to be very disparate. We think these trends demonstrate how digital is a unifying force that influences culture and connects people. These trends urge us to reevaluate our previous understanding of a diverse India, behaving in completely divergent ways. We see more similarities, like I said, than you might think, but at the same time there's distinct nuances. That's why we say same, same, but different, because while there's a lot of similarities, there are some distinct nuances which we have to acknowledge as well. We have also seen that these trends manifest themselves on our products, including search and YouTube. I'm going to share with you some of those highlights and show you how new Internet users searching and consuming the same things as early adopters of the Internet. I'll also walk you through some examples of how brands are staying ahead and reinforcing these trends into their messaging and their product strategy. Now we have to acknowledge that COVID has had an impact on these trends. While we did the report before COVID, we had to understand that all of this is up for a change now in this new world. We took that lens and understood just how it was changed. Crisis brings about an acceleration in trends. I think Amit was talking about this before me, that there's acceleration in trends that we've seen. We think with a rapid increase in digitization, some trends will accelerate while some might stay at the status quo. You can see here the seven trends that we've identified. I'm going to go through four of them just because of the time. For example, trends like balancing we and me, which talks about balancing family and our individual selves. It's getting a boost at this time because of the comfort that it brings about in a time of crisis. Balancing of we and me, we don't want to do this alone. There is that comfort that is exacerbating this. Whereas trends like watch or go independent every day, which I feel very passionate about, will maintain status quo during the crisis. There are deeper and long-term trends and they're enduring. Actually, we've seen that this crisis hasn't been great for women. Unfortunately, we won't see an acceleration of this one is what I'm afraid of. While there are seven overall, I'm going to unpack four of the accelerating trends. I think it's important to know what's changing even more than we thought before. Let's start with balancing we and me. We see that while people are getting more independent because of digital tools, there is still a need to connect with families and the community. This is a good example of an accelerating trend because the lockdown has forced families to stay at home. This forced togetherness has brought with it a realization that modern family is not just about sharing space, but it's about sharing ourselves. I think for this year, we're all going to be better at the end of it while it's been extremely hard. But I think understanding that realization that family is where you get a lot of balance is very, very important. And while there's a similarity and these trends apply to everyone, they apply to early and new internet users, we've seen that the motivation for these trends, they vary a bit. Early internet users want to connect with their family out of a sense of alienation, and they're using digital tools in a really interesting way. Whereas newer internet users who have just gotten online, well, they're getting a taste of personal independence, but they want to balance it with strong ties to their community, and they're using digital to stay close to the community. We've seen this behavior across Google search and YouTube both. There's been a 25% increase in searches for family and a 30% increase in searches for with family year over year, meaning that people are adding with family to the questions that they've had. It's amazing. On YouTube, we've seen that one of the top reasons people watch YouTube is to connect to people, even though more than 70% of online video viewers consider it as a personal screen. Bringing it to life, I'm going to use an example from Google itself. With COVID cases continuing to accelerate rapidly, the adverse impact is being felt significantly on our healthcare system and our healthcare workers. To acknowledge the contribution made by frontline workers at Google, we looked at this and we said we must acknowledge and thank them. Thank the medical workers, nurses and doctors for tirelessly working on fighting COVID-19. The film that we created then led people to a donation page because we saw that people were searching for ways that they could help. And so we use this moment as people search for ways that they could help to also support frontline workers. And this is a balance of we and me. It shows you how we brought this trend to life. It's not just about me and my individual self. We need to show concern. Our community is important. And this balancing of personal independence and independence and strong ties to the community comes together. The next trend that we've seen is never too late to learn. We see that access to the internet has made it easier for people to learn and upskill themselves irrespective of their stages in life. With people staying at home, this trend has been accelerated by the need to be self-sufficient. And it's been a much needed distraction during a time of crisis. People are embracing easy and enjoyable education, both to upskill themselves, but also to pursue passions that were erstwhile and neglected. Here again, we've seen this trend manifest itself differently with both early and new internet users. Early internet users wanting to enhance their education and upskill themselves. The motivation here is to build richer inner lives by following their passion and taking charge of their own professional development. The newer internet users, on the other hand, they've been using the internet to supplement gaps in their skills and their knowledge that will help them get ahead when we're out of this. We've seen that this behavior across Google, Search, and YouTube is real. There's been a 75% growth for queries around Learn Online and a two and a half times growth for queries around Teach Online. And that's just year on year. Four in five customers are coming to YouTube today to learn something new. Four in five. And if you look at who's bringing this to life and really tapping into this insight, it's Upgrad. Upgrad is one of India's biggest ed tech companies. They've built their business strategy on helping professionals upskill themselves to the latest industry standards. Entering a market that has been focused on exam prep, Upgrad brought ed tech courses to people across India, illustrating the breadth of India's demand for continuous learning at all levels. Upgrad's communication strategy stresses upon how one can get ahead in their careers with courses and how to take charge of your own professional development. With courses and certifications fit for adult learning now, they've brought this to life through their product and they've also brought this trend of never being too late to learn through their advertising and their marketing as well. Both are working hand in hand on this insight, never too late to learn. The third trend, entertainment for me, by me. We've seen that the draw of the internet as a place for entertainment, which is true, well, it's turned into the destination of choice to escape from a stressful day or immerse oneself in a different experience. Entertainment through content has drastically increased across cohorts during COVID. While this need was and continues to be triggered by boredom and by monotony, of course that's the case, it's the anxiety and stress with respect to COVID that's accelerating and it's amplifying the trend today. Here we see the following motivations. Early internet users came to the internet to inform and enrich their lives, but now are turning to it for entertainment as the perfect place to escape from a hairy day and to escape and enjoy. While for newer internet users, entertainment has become the gateway to the internet, it's their destination to get out of the boredom of daily life and it's become a personal destination for entertainment and enjoyment. We've seen this behavior across search and YouTube as well. On Google search, there's been a five times growth for queries related to entertainment. On YouTube, we've seen that more than 85% of online video viewers come to YouTube to relax and unwind. In terms of a brand that's brought us to life exceptionally well, I'd give a shout out to Flipkart. Everybody knows Flipkart is India's leading homegrown e-commerce entity and it's carving our niche in the non-fiction genre, offering differentiated and interactive content which is mobile first. Flipkart video is continuing to introduce new offerings by very interesting concepts and interactive formats and they're demonstrating the insatiable appetite for Indians that have this appetite for entertainment no matter where they're located. With most people spending time indoors over the past few months, Flipkart videos continuing to be user first and believes in the importance of enhanced entertainment and engagement. Thus bringing to the life entertainment for me and by me. And the last trend I'm going to talk about today is 100% authentic. We have seen content that reflects real life is rising in popularity as consumers are no longer looking at icons and brands with wide-eyed wonder. Instead, especially during these times, they expect greater authenticity and accountability. They're seeking to engage and follow people and brands who are honest and authentic. In the times of an infodemic where you don't know what's right and what's wrong, consumers are becoming much more discerning about both the source and the quality of the information that they consume. And this is across the board. This isn't certain segments of users. In the face of fake news and rumors, both verification and veracity has become vital. Authenticity of information and authenticity of the brand becomes a big source of insurance. And it provides control and it helps to better prepare and manage anxiety during these times. It becomes even more important for brands to come across as authentic rather than opportunistic in the times that we're in. For early Internet users, after working towards achievement and accomplishment, there's a desire to project a curated image but push back on anything that lacks authenticity. Don't want it. For an Internet user, content that is recognizable and relatable appeals to them. They like to identify with what they're seeing and feel comfortable with it. On Google search, we have seen more than 60% year on year rise and average weekly searches for queries related to true story. And 55% year over year rise and average weekly searches for queries related to behind the scenes. People care, well, what's happening? What's the real truth? More than 75% of customers prefer watching content on YouTube that reflects their actual life. Now bringing to this to life, I'll use another Google example. In our campaign for Google Pay to showcase some of India's biggest payments, we took the help of real Indian icons who had changed India for the better starting with a single payment. The campaign leveraged factual stories, real people who have achieved success, real Indians who have done amazing things making the campaign more relatable but also making it 100% authentic. It's really important. 100% authentic. I'm going to wrap up all of the trends with a quick video to give you a sense of some more that we might have glossed over I hope you found all of these insights useful. We've put together a detailed report which hopefully will be helpful to many of the brands and marketers on the call today. You can find it at Think With Google. This contains not just the four trends that I shared but more and a lot of data and insights on what we're seeing. You can see where you can find it here on the linker. Use the QR code to reach it as well. ThinkWithGoogle.com India's new and early Internet users have arrived online at very, very different points in India's digital journey. One would expect that these cohorts behave differently but as our research showed you early and new Internet users are alike, unlike traditional marketing knowledge might tell us. With increased connectivity reaching even the most remote parts of our country, we'll likely see many more overlaps in online identity, use and behavior as new users find ways to make the Internet their own. Lastly, I'd like to leave you with this thought. We are in constantly evolving scenario more so now as both humans and marketers. Understanding what's top of mind for our users has a potential implication for our businesses. It is clear that businesses that identify and understand the needs of their customers now they will stand to drive sustainable growth in the long term. In many ways it's time to append our most fundamental beliefs about consumer behavior and customer service and to think differently. Same, same, but different. And with that I'd like to thank you all for being a great audience. Thank you Sapna. That was a wonderful presentation and in fact such key insights brings out a lot of questions in all of us and so our viewers have sent us many questions. I'd like to just take a few with you here on screen. So there's a question which says that real world manifestation is what makes these friends robust. In your personal or professional experience have you come across some of these trends that have been offered to us? Yeah, no it's a really great question and in my opinion the trend growing self-belief that might be closest today when we talk about our own experiences that we've had and especially in today's world. People look up to and they reach out to heroes, homegrown local heroes who still are inspiration for the larger community and so these local success stories are found to be more relatable rather than those of far away international icons. I think what's homegrown is more important and we're seeing that this trend is exemplifying the same sentiment probably during COVID as well when one's belief in self and one's abilities is needed ever more to steer clear of the crisis that we're in and so more real life heroes doing their bit to help out greater good or even setting examples of achieving success in tough times that brings comfort reassurance so I would say this growing self-belief is what I would call attention to. And that's the one that calls out to you the most as well in this time? I know personally I'd have a different one I would definitely pick everyday independence among women I think women are able to make better informed decisions for their family with digital that's why we've been spending a lot of time as Google to eradicate the gender divide that exists on the internet it's actually quite a big gap between internet users between male and female and there's a big gap that we've been trying to really get over and make progress on and so whether we're later to ways for improving family or health women are doing things really amazing things on digital and this knowledge of the world around them and the crisis that they're in and dealing with problems, helping their community helping their family that's what's adding to the everyday confidence that women have and it's interesting that their role and their contribution is now being acknowledged more but what's sad I think and why this one sits with me the most importantly is that we're seeing that the role of women is being held back during this crisis and so if digital can play any role in helping that's what we can hope for absolutely there's another question which says that in the times of an infodemic which is something that you also touched upon consumers are becoming much more discerning about both source and quality of information in the face of fake news and rumors both verification and veracity become vital so what could be the role of brands in this scenario you know I think coming back to 100% authentic authenticity of information becomes a big source of assurance to provide control to help people prepare better manage anxiety as I was saying before and so it becomes even more important for brands to come across as authentic rather than opportunistic during these times and I think yeah there's so much information out there and we're seeing with the questions that as they come to digital platform show that they're really looking for the real news and the real you know the authentic information and being more discerning around who they trust and so you need to be a brand that's trusted and be a source of assurance we have another question from Anoop who says do you think digital is growing at the right pace or is it too rapid for a market to catch up with oh okay well I have a very different point of view if you had asked me for the last you know several years was it growing at the right pace I would have said absolutely you know India's gone through a huge transformation and yes it is hard to keep up and the way we reach users it changes every day every week every month but I think what we've seen during this crisis as Google is that there's still so many people that don't have access and in a world where information is everything knowing how to get help how to take care of your family how to check on you know information around the crisis that we're in it's actually sad to me that more people don't have access today and so for me it's less about our role as marketers and our journeys on keeping up but it's more about the value to society about having you know access to information it's like a it's like water you need it and not everybody has it today so I think we have work to do still absolutely we still have a long way to go but we are moving and taking strides in the right direction so Sapna here's another question I want to quickly ask you is how has internet made a difference during this pandemic overall the internet usage of consumers if you might just throw some light on it I can only share the perspective that we have as Google people have come to Google and searched for information related to the pandemic and we've been able to work with partners from the government Ministry of Health etc to be able to share the right information the real answers that people have during this time and so it's been a source of information it's been a source of entertainment it's been a source of connection I think whether it's video calling entertainment all of these things have happened because of digital and I think back to the last crisis that we were in perhaps decades ago or if you think about other crises during the last 100 years the fact that digital wasn't there would have kept the population back not being able to connect not being able to get the information that they needed and also not allowing life to go on I think many of us are joining this call today TechMunch is doing a virtual digital conference we would have never thought actually life is going on and I look at the role of digital just helping us do our jobs and stay connected but also giving us what we need in terms of information I think for us at Google our mission is to provide universal access to information and that's been the most important thing during this time absolutely and it has definitely kept us going and moving forward in this pandemic as well thank you so much Sapna for this time and for sharing that wonderful presentation with us thank you so much for being here thank you so much for having me and wish you a great event and a great evening thank you thank you