By Dyanne Coelho
Creativity had an unbridled run at Zee Melt 2015. The two-day festival of creativity brought stalwarts from the fields of advertising, media and marketing — both from across India and the world — together on one platform to share thoughts, insights and plans for the future. A host of seminars, conferences, workshops and exhibitions were put together for some 1,300-odd participants and visitors. The event was organised by Kyoorius, a not-for-profit company, in partnership with Zee Entertainment, GroupM and D&AD.
A conference, held on Day One, saw speakers from all over the world like Chris Sanderson of Future Laboratory, Daniele Fiandaca of Creative Social, Christian Behrendt of Razorfish, Bo Hellberg of Brave and HeyHuman, and many others, drawing attention to the significance of innovation, creativity, uncluttering advertising and zooming out from the ‘billboard trend’. Fiandaca, for instance, pointed out the wonders that erupt when varied talent. even from the finance HR and other teams are included in the creative process. “When margins are being pulled, innovation is the only way forward,” he said.
“What would you do if you could do magic?” Andy Jaspers of Maxus asked at a seminar he shared with his colleague, Unny Radhakrishnan, head of digital for South Asia. Think big, imagine the impossible, and then make it possible he pointed out. “The best people are not the ones with the most knowledge, but the ones who can solve the problem,” Jaspers added. Both speakers stressed the importance of merging creativity with the use of technology. They have to go hand-in-hand, they said. “While a picture says a thousand words, a prototype is worth a thousand meetings,” Jaspers joked.
The consumer of the future was much talked about in the seminar entitled ‘Kinetic Future Citizens’. Consumers’ needs, wants, interests and overall behaviour was discussed in depth by an array of speakers, including Sid Talwar of Lightbox, Simon Gosling of Happy Finish, Satya Raghavan of Youtube and others.
Delegates at the festival thronged in large numbers to the activities at GroupM’s showcase space. The Loop Room and the Purple Box, which explained innovative ways to understand consumer behaviour and patterns, was a crowded space. Participants were taken through the various technologies that the company works with, including Moribus, the Behavioral Economics Lab by Maxus, global work by Mediacom and MECFresh by MEC Global. Happy Finish’s showcase displayed the latest in augmented and virtual reality. A particular favorite among visitors was the Smash it!, a cricket virtual reality experience.
The IAA Debate on the issue of whether the mobile is likely to become the primary screen for news and entertainment in the next three to four years, brought Day One to a close on a dramatic note as speakers Vikram Sakhuja and Raghav Bahl sparred with Arnab Goswami and Rajiv Lochan on whether mobile phone usage is increasingly on the rise in India. Goswami and Lochan were of the view that a period of three to four years is the equivalent of a split-second for this to be a reality, as mobile internet in India – especially the 3G network — is still a luxury enjoyed by a few since fast downloads and buffering videos are difficult.
The Zee Mindspace conference was the highlight of Day Two. Adam Ostrow of Mashable set the ball rolling with an informative take on digital culture. Other speakers included Joshua Black of GroupM, Parminder Singh of Twitter, Sir Martin Sorrell of WPP plc, among others.
The Indian media is constantly evolving to keep up with changing times. While technology is transforming the way content is being delivered to the audience, measurement systems seem to be lagging. The Think BARC India seminar brought together Jose Manuel Olivera of MarkData, Bruno Chetaille of Mediametrie, Erica Boyd of Nielsen Asia Pacific and William McKenna of William McKenna & Associates to talk about life beyond the traditional measurement methods.
The art of great storytelling through advertising and film was delved into in the seminar entitled Making the Cut – Ad Learnings, with speakers that included award-winning filmmakers Vinil Mathew of Breathless Films, Ayappa KM of Early Man Film and Vishwesh Krishnamoorthy or Corcoise Films. “Don’t tell a director how to do his job, just like you don’t tell a plumber how to fix a tap,” Krishnamoorthy explained, while talking about how agencies are sometimes put under great pressure by clients. The trio, in an interactive session, discussed the technicalities of writing, shooting, editing and budgeting as well, in order to create an ad that will engage the end-consumer and also keep the client happy.
Girish Raj of OML took participants behind the scenes of the making of the NH7 Weekender year after year in the session. The ‘Behind the Seen’ seminar concentrated on digital entertainment and experiential marketing. Other speakers included Rajesh Thomas and Vidya Sharma of RocketscienceLab, Shubhradeep Guha of SapientNitro and Saket Saurabh and Ankit Vengurlekar of #fame.
The two-day event concluded with the much-awaited Kyoorius Digital and Advertising Awards night where 48 (+2) Blue Elephants and one Black Elephant were given out.
