Ad agencies focus on data, social commerce and local languages to drive growth

Digital acceleration in advertising driven by the onset of the pandemic will continue to drive growth of agencies in 2021. Data driven marketing, digital transformation of brands, social commerce, regional content, experiential and influencer marketing have been identified as growth areas by advertising firms. The companies expect these new verticals to collectively contribute upto 10-20% to their overall revenue pie this year.

Barring digital, every other vertical in an agency has drawn barely 20% of its last year’s business (before covid) since majority of brands have cut down on offline advertising with outdoor taking the biggest hit. Therefore, agencies are looking at digital marketing going beyond moment marketing and social media promotions.

Dentsu International owned hybrid digital media agency WATConsult has decided to leverage the growing smaller town market. The agency has launched a multilingual digital marketing division ‘Bharat by WATConsult’ which will create regional language content, social media management, online reputation and technology solutions for localisation, SEO and websites. Additionally, it will also offer e-commerce and media planning and buying solutions.