‘OOH is the soul of advertising'

Rakesh Sharma, Dy General Manager - Marketing, Bank of Baroda talks about the banking major’s approach to OOH advertising in an interview to Pray Jani.

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What role does OOH play in your marketing mix?

OOH is very prominent in the BFSI (Banking, Financial Services and Investment) segment. To show your presence, you have to leverage outdoor media and online presence can never make that impact. A message that is seen in the outdoor will always be instilled in the minds of the consumers. Now electronic media is also coming into the picture that grabs more attention. And when consumers get exposed to the outdoor campaign repeatedly, their inner sense will tell them to go to the bank and see what they have to offer. Hence, to keep your brand in a hygienic position and to get returns on investment, it is very important for a brand to be available in the outdoor advertising space. If | have to explain through an allegory, OOH is the soul of advertising.

What are the key cities that you target for your OOH campaigns?

According to our planning, we cover majority of the cities. However, depending on our product, we essentially target A-class and B-class cities in India. For these cities, if we are advertising in transit media options, around residential areas, where working population is in large proportion, we have a variety of products to offer to them. Bank of Baroda also has offerings for C-class cities. To promote our rural-based products for rural and agricultural development, we also target C-class cities. Coming back to A-class cities, we essentially target large corporates, business houses and other such economic zones.

What formats, according to you, perform best for your OOH campaigns?