TV continues to be a big market development tool in India: Dheeraj Sinha, FCB Group

The FCB Group CEO speaks on client demands, pushing an integrated group, and when to bet on TV.

FCB Group India and South Asia’s CEO of 10 months, Dheeraj Sinha, believes in the power of television for changing consumer behaviour and encouraging them to pay for services or goods on e-commerce platforms.

It is quite the heartening statement during a time when digital easily overwhelms all other media spends. “If you look at even my own past work, whether it's Amazon or PhonePe or Spotify, all of these brands were built through TV,” he remarks.

Sinha joined FCB Group from Publicis-owned Leo Burnett, where he served as CEO for South Asia, and from sibling agency BBH India, as its chairperson.

At his present job, he oversees the operations of three creative agencies i.e. FCB Ulka, FCB India, and FCB Interface; and one digital agency, FCB Kinnect.

The agencies have registered positive growth in FY23 compared to the year before. FCB Interace grew by 8.54%, FCB Ulka grew by 11.24%, and FCB Kinnect registered a growth of 16.90%.

Our chat started around what clients wanted for the upcoming festive season, and soon moved to him pushing the group as an integrated setup at pitches, when brands should use influencers, and him choosing from a Cannes Lions, a big client win, or higher revenue.

Edited Excerpts:

This holiday season, are your clients looking to build new consumers or going deeper into their existing markets?

A large part of the work we are doing for the festivals is around the new consumer demand this period will generate. At the same time, we have briefs stating, ‘We've got the first 50 million consumers, get us the next 50 million now.’

There are two types of work—market expansion and market capture. However, given our client base, we are currently focusing more on market capture.

The industry is saying that the FMCG and auto sectors aren’t doing as well as folks expected. What’s your take?

I think there is a bit of softness at the lower end of the FMCG market, partly due to some level of commoditisation.

The local players have moved quickly. They’ve introduced high-value products and are accelerating the premiumisation process faster than some of the FMCG giants. I would say the mid-premium and premium segments of FMCG are doing well.

Additionally, consider the auto sector from the perspective of significant pent-up demand in 2021-22, right after COVID. It’s not entirely fair to expect the same level of demand now

You say market capture work is being demanded; I think of data and how Google reversed its third-party cookies stance. Are brands now asking agencies about retail media?

Data is a big part of our offering. With FCB/Six (part of FCB Kinnect), we do a huge amount of targeted data work in the creative and media space, and they are doing well in India. I think the Indian ecosystem is still maturing on data.

The way we see the tech giants and retail media, it is a collaborative ecosystem. We work in partnerships and use everything possible within our reach to bring the best efficiencies for our clients.

Is television still the go-to method to capture new markets?

Not for all of them but television still continues to be a big market development tool in the country.

If you want to change consumer behaviour, want to get more people to trade on platforms, want to get more people to pay for music, want to get the next 100 million to come to e-commerce, television is the best return on investment (ROI).

The difference now is that you are able to activate the whole funnel. So, you put something on TV, which is your top awareness building funnel and then activate a lot of mid and bottom funnel simultaneously because that allows you full circle marketing.

When we build campaigns, we consider the entire funnel. It’s not just about making one film and doing 16 down edits.

Do you think influencers are better at influencing behaviours than a celebrity?

I feel influencers work to a certain level. If you're a startup brand and want to reach the first 10 million, influencers can be a good strategy.

However, there comes a time when the cost of influencer marketing and performance marketing becomes much higher, and the return on ad spend (ROAS) skyrockets if you haven’t built the brand and established a strong brand moat. The market has learned this lesson over the past seven to eight years.

When you want to move to the next level (beyond 10 million), that’s when you need YouTube awareness-building work and television work

A good number of your clients, be it at FCB Ulka or at FCB India, are established giants. Any plans to catch the young brands?

We just won KFC. We are doing a lot of work with Philips, Shoppers Stop, and Hero. We are lucky that we have a good share of profitable clients unlike the whole startup economy in India which is going through a bit of a cooling period right now.

The FCB Group has a legacy of retainers. Are you looking to add project work into the mix?

Any good business is a combination. Look at FCB Kinnect; it’s a healthy mix of retainers and project work.

Even when we do projects, I refer to them as relationship-based projects. It’s not just a one-off; you engage in continuous projects or undertake additional projects within your current retainer.

You’re cross-selling, up-selling, and adding more layers of nuance through projects on those relationships. The combination is the strategy, and we are happy to do both. 

However, we are more interested in continued relationship-based engagement rather than purely one-offs.

What kind of services are you cross-selling or upselling?

We have a very strong influencer offering, digital marketing, and digital media with FCB Kinnect. FCB Now is also a product where we have deep partnerships with platforms.

When clients work directly with platforms, there is often little understanding of the business problem, the brand problem, or the nature of the brand.

Therefore, this three-party arrangement, where the agency helps clients collaborate with the platforms and build solutions for business problems, is a product I am selling.

At pitches, do you push the group as an integrated setup?

Yes, completely. If you look at FCB Kinnect and the three creative agencies we have, we would be the only creative agency group in the country which can go from very high-end strategy to mainline creative, to digital creative, to CRM, to production, to data, to digital buying, to influencer marketing in one shot.

10 years back, clients were very excited about the fragmentation and they were very happy managing 17 agencies. Today, they want one throat to choke.

But, from an industry perspective, integration was not that successful.

There are two reasons for this. Integration doesn’t succeed if you don’t have best-in-class offerings in each area. 

If I tell my clients that I’m going to integrate it for them, but my digital offering is not best in class, or if my influencer offering is not best in class, then I won’t succeed.

Secondly, people talk about integration, but what often happens is that different P&L heads manage those areas. These P&L heads have their own agendas and don’t communicate internally, which is always a pain point.

The advantage here is that everything rolls up to me, so it’s effectively one P&L in that sense.

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You also brought in new people and promoted FCB folks into senior positions. What kind of people were you looking for in such roles?

We’ve made a combination of changes. We’ve created new positions. For example, there was never a Chief Creative Officer position for FCB Kinnect, nor was there a Creative Digital Partner position for the group.

There was a gap in the Chief Creative Officer role for FCB India, which we have filled.

The criteria have been people with a sharp sense of growth and vision who can drive the business forward.

Finally, we look for individuals who can integrate well with this culture and work together. FCB Ulka is legacy and traditional, FCB Kinnect is in the process of integrating and evolving, and FCB Interface has been around for a long time.

Cannes Lions, new big client, or tons of revenue?

The three cannot be for three different clients. They have to be for the same client. You need to win a Cannes Lions award for that piece of business. The same piece of work also has to win for effectiveness and be effective in the market. Then you've cracked it.

I think the problem in our business has been that sometimes we separate these elements. We say, ‘Okay, this is my bread-and-butter business. I will win Cannes Lions for something on the side, and I will find effectiveness in a third piece.’

That’s where it goes wrong. Achieving all three for one client, and making that a part of the culture, means you're winning great business.

But to do that, you will need money. Are clients paying money now?

Yes, clients are paying money. They are paying money for the value that you create.