Abhijit Laheri

IIDE Super Session Topic

The Changing Face of Advertising!

IIDE – Indian Institute of Digital Education hosted a Super-Session on, The Changing Face of Advertising with Abhijit Lahiri- Ass. Vice President – Copy, Edelman. He started by walking us through his journey from Saatchi & Saatchi followed by Mayer McCann Bratislava, to Ogilvy, to J. Walter Thompson Worldwide and the list goes on. He got us hooked when he shared how Advertising has been rooted in his family for years as he told us how his Dad used to give him Assignments to do in the early years of his life and which later got him hooked completely and made a career out of it
He told us, how copywriting is different when it comes to writing for Traditional media vs Digital media, as the size of an Ad copy plays an important role when it comes to Traditional and Digital Media because Ad copies for Traditional media can be in long formats but it`s not the same with Digital Media and hence, the writer gets restricted where he has to be as creative as he can, as the aim is to deliver the content in “fewer words but high impact”
Abhijit later shed light on how advertising has changed post- COVID, according to him pandemic has made brands more responsible and purposeful in their communication as he says, “the bigger the brand, the bigger the responsibility” and it’s true, he backed this by giving an example, on how Ogilvy India has worked with Thums Up (The Coca-Cola Company) and showed us their campaign – Toofan wahi jo sab #PalatDe and that`s how a brand does purpose-driven marketing. But it`s not the same with a newly launched brand as they can`t be purpose-driven from day one, as one is just getting started with their product or service then it would be more in the Awareness stage of AIDA
Abhijit mentioned how clients’ marketing team culture, has an impact on their marketing by giving Unilever’s example, as it always follows a Hierarchy for decades and this kept them disciplined which also impacted their marketing strategies which lead to stunning results because purpose-driven brands are indeed championed by not only great thought leaders but also their teams
He shared the campaign by Levi Strauss & Co. – Deepika Padukone and how insightful it has been when it comes to delivering minimal content which kept everyone hooked. When asked about some of his favorite Digital Ads. He mentioned Tata CLiQ as it`s on the top of his favorite list
We ended the session with Abijit`s word of advice for our students looking to start their career, especially in the creative field – he says, it`s so important to be open-minded in this world of creativity that`s a push which we give ourselves by growing and if one tries to be close-minded they can never grow as it becomes dangerous in one`s career path, because “Attitude and willingness to learn matters a lot”