AI Can Never Match Human Ingenuity in Advertisement: Shri Vikram Sahay, Jt. Secy., Ministry of I&B at MarCon 2023

“Remember that advertisement is all about making a product or a service unique. Even the best of the software like ChatGPT will never offer that uniqueness. So, do not feel discouraged by them as they often compromise the quality of the advertisements,” said Shri Vikram Sahay, Joint Secretary, Ministry of Information and Broadcasting, Government of India, while delivering his keynote address at the 19^th edition of the Marketing Conclave (MarCon), organised by the Internet and Mobile Association of India (IAMAI) on November 22, 2023, in Mumbai.

Shri Vikram Sahay, Joint Secretary, Ministry of Information and Broadcasting, Government of India, delivering the keynote address at MarCon 2023

This year MarCon explored, through 30 sessions, across four tracks, the theme of “Tomorrow’s Canvas: Tech and the Art of Marketing”. The conference was co-powered by Whistle Feed.

Addressing the conference’s theme topic, Shri Sahay delved into the dynamic intersection of technology and marketing, shedding light on innovative strategies to navigate the evolving landscape of digital advertising.

In his keynote Shri Sahay also dwelt on advertising regulatory practices and underlined the importance of ethical marketing. “Today, we have certain regulatory practices and guidelines that protect us from misleading ads, especially in education and healthcare. We must stay away from such unethical practices,” he said.

MarCon 2023 brought together on one platform more than 65 industry captains and subject stalwarts to explore the theme subject 360 degrees. Over 350+ agencies, 500+ leading brands and 1500 delegates took part in the conference.

Speaking on unified measurement for digital platforms, Gulshan Verma, CEO of Jio Ads explained, “Fundamentally, measurement is the backbone of business, translating into vital components such as your business metrics, engagement metrics, and sales figures. What further adds to this process is the perception of your brand. Introducing unified measurement transforms the landscape, where context makes all the difference. Online and physical touch points make it challenging to analyse or even apply unified measurement. Unification will happen if we are able to link business numbers and other tangibles to arrive at some sort of numeric unification or one scale of measurement for digital platforms.”

Talking on changing tech allowing new age marketers to connect with ‘BHARAT’, MVS Murthy, CMO Federal Bank, said, “AI does not have an emotional quotient hence it cannot be sensitive towards human emotions. Only humans can understand the subtle sensitivities of any matter. While targeting Bharat, its important we understand and acknowledge these nuances and think regional and vernacular first, its a human emotion, we think in our mother tongue and then speak in English or any other language.”

Among other prominent speakers at the conclave were Tushar Vyas, President, Group M South Asia; Gaurav Verma, Vice President, Games 24 x 7; Arun Srinivas, Director & Head of Ads Business, Meta; Ranjana Mangla, Sr VP and Head of Ad Revenue, Sony Pictures Network Ltd; Sanket Narkar, Head of Marketing, Physics Wallah, and Shoumyan Biswas, Chief Marketing Officer, Tata Digital.

Results of the second edition of the prestigious Digital Native Brands Awards (DNBA) were announced at a gala ceremony at MarCon today. This year there were over 150 entries for DNBA, which were distributed in 19 categories. The Awards celebrate and honour businesses and brands that have harnessed the power of digital technology, epitomize the spirit of digital entrepreneurship, and leverage technology as a core driver of their success. The Best DNB Woman Entrepreneur of The Year Award went to Ghazal Alagh, Honasa Consumer Pvt Ltd (Mamaearth) and the Best Digital Native Brand Entrepreneur Award was bagged by Manish Chowdhary, WOW Skin Science.

About IAMAI

Established in 2004, the Internet and Mobile Association of India (IAMAI) is a not-for-profit industry body and the countrys only organization representing the digital services industry with over 550 Indian and multinational corporations as its members. IAMAI is dedicated to presenting a unified voice of the businesses it represents to the government, investors, consumers, and other stakeholders. IAMAI represents varied sectors such as digital payments, fintech, digital commerce, digital advertising, digital entertainment, traveltech, online gaming, edtech, healthtech, agritech, big data, ML, AI & IoT, AR/ VR, logistics-tech, D2C, EV, VC, gift cards, and so on.