Making the most of the media giant that is IPL

IPL has gone on to become one of the biggest media properties in India in recent years. It is only natural. Few other sporting events see the entire country tune in on streaming services, TV sets, and in stadiums to cheer big league players, new names, and favourite cities. Marketers have had a great opportunity through IPL these last few years to reach diverse audiences across metros, tier 2 towns, and beyond.
With all the marketing investments that marketers have planned for IPL every year, the demand for ROI has been resounding in recent years. For the last two years, we have had insightful conversations with many of our client brands about their business and marketing needs in the IPL season. There are two aspects of IPL marketing that holds immense potential and demand immediate focus from the entire marketing ecosystem

• Attribution and measurements
• Audience insights

Attribution in Indias very own Super Bowl

US advertisers bring out the best creatives, placed at exorbitant costs, during Super Bowl every year. Indian advertisers follow suit during the  IPL season. Digital co-presenting on Hotstar this year is going at a whopping INR 50 Crore a markup of almost 70% from last year. The going rate for associate sponsorship is INR 25 Crore. Last year, broadcaster Star India raked in INR 1,750 crore across TV and digital and expects a 15% increase in ad revenue this year too. But is the ROI from these spends measured accurately? Even as Star India integrates geo-targeting into the package, measurement is still limited to traditional metrics such as TRP, views, and exposures. Surely when the stake for brands is as high as it is in IPL season, measurement and attribution must level up too?

For every TV ad, every stadium billboard, every masthead exposure, and every digital campaign, there should be a ready measurement model that takes into account real-world store visits as the key outcome. While brand recall may well be one of the key factors behind IPL investments, quantifying it by measuring driven footfalls will be key to uncovering the true ROI on the vast amount of money invested. With location-based attribution and measurement, IPL marketing is all set to be far more impactful this season.

Millions of viewers are all set to gather in stadiums to cheer their teams. How well do marketers really know them?

Apart from TV and digital campaigns, a significant catchment area for marketers through the game season are the stadiums around the country. In fact, IPL matches have become social and family experiences that bring busy, middle- to high-income professionals and their families back into stadiums. In fact, in 2018, the 10 IPL venues had a total capacity of nearly 400,000 and were running at maximum capacity through the matches, especially for the critical games.

Marketers across industries and verticals such as F&B, retail, CPG, and more have an opportunity to target thousands of stadium viewers in a single day with relevant offers and promotions. But to be able to target and engage these viewers, it is important for marketers to understand their journeys and interests on match days and otherwise. Marketers need to be able to answer questions like

• Who these viewers are in the real-world- such as their demographics and affluence levels
• Which retail brands score highest among this set of users
• Which retail categories do they visit most frequently, and which one they visited most recently
• On match days specifically, where do these viewers go before and after the game

Having deep insights into these behavioral aspects of live IPL viewers helps brands deliver contextual and personalized campaigns to them and capture their mindshare on a day they are most likely to indulge themselves. For example, these insights can help a QSR brand understand whether live viewers are likely to go out for a post-match bite and what kind of meals they would look for.

Brands are levelling up their IPL marketing strategy with location intelligence

Location intelligence is informing the biggest IPL advertisers of the two most crucial aspects of marketing audience insights and ROI outcomes. It is little surprise then that many B2C brands are adopting location intelligence and data to make optimal marketing decisions and get a bigger bang for their buck this IPL season. Are you ready to level up your IPL game? We are here to help!