This was the theme of the keynote speech given by World Out of Home President Tom Goddard to the Indian Out of Home Advertising Convention held in Bangalore last week.
Goddard pointed to demographic, economic and infrastructure trends which make India hugely appealing to global brands.
India has an average citizen’s age of 29, compared with 37 in China and 48 in Japan, with 65 per cent of the population aged below 35, while the country’s GDP is forecast to double by 2030 and put India third in the world economic ranking.
Furthermore, said Goddard, there is immense investment taking place in infrastructure across railways, metro and bus networks and an increase from the current 148 airports to 220 in the next two years.
All these factors provide huge growth opportunities for OOH in India, he said but compared with APAC and Europe, India under performs the league by significant margins on the majority of key OOH metrics.
The issues dragging the sector down are a lack of credible industry-wide measurement, uncoordinated AdTech development, inconsistent municipal regulations, slow digital conversion rates, fragmented media ownership (over 3000 OOH operators) and multiple OOH trade bodies, as well as sustainability being a low priority.
“With all these challenges, it’s not surprising that major international investors in OOH are conspicuous by their absence, with only JCDecaux present in the market, operating in the more controlled street furniture, transit and airport divisions, compared to the fragmented and cluttered billboard channel.”
Goddard proposed several steps the Indian industry must immediately take to overcome the deficiencies that are holding the sector back
• Unite under one trade association that speaks for the whole market
• Fund an on-going audience measurement programme
• Brands and agencies must get behind the IOAA and its members
• Coordinate AdTech strategy between the buy-side and the sell-side
• Invest more in digital transformation
• Bolster relationships with municipalities and call out unfair practices
• Build a carbon neutral sustainability roadmap
“The first thing is for the responsible and ethical players to come together in a spirit of collaboration, to develop a cohesive plan to tackle these key deficiencies.
If the industry makes an earnest start on these tasks, the only way is up” he concluded.
