AgTalk | We have to market ourselves to the marketers: MRUC's Shaswati Saradar

Shaswati Saradar, Director General, MRUC, has over 15 years of experience in the business of media, advertising and marketing. Her career has spanned across organisations like Zee Network, Maruti Suzuki, McCann Erickson and Ogilvy and Mather. In an exclusive conversation with Adgully, Saradar talks about her plans for the team MRUC and about the right marketing mix to promote the various insightful offerings provided by the organisation. Excerpts:

Adgully (AG): What prompted you to take on the responsibility of the Director-General of MRUC?

Shaswati Saradar (SS): Indian media continues to be among the more under-leveraged assets compared to global media. India is a crowded and fragmented market with its own set of challenges. The only way to sharpen focus is to continuously understanding "the Indian' who sees TV, reads newspapers and magazines, listens to radio, surfs the internet. My early years in mapping consumer insights is a passion that helps me even today. Having spent many years as a media planner in Ogilvy and then as a media user in Maruti Suzuki and finally working within the media function itself in Zee TV, I had a first-hand exposure from all three perspectives to the strengths and development possibilities for Indian media. This was then the most logical move.

AG: What are some of the key areas of focus for MRUC right now?

SS: We are going beyond our best-known product - IRS - to look at new areas that are relevant to media planners and advertisers as well as publishers because media consumption is now a multi-device 24x7 consumption habit. MRUC is jointly focusing improving its offerings for Digital, Radio & Magazines and also on established offerings like Single Source, IOS, and Guide to Indian Market 2011.

Another area of focus is on strengthening the brand and increasing fraternity participation and enlisting more involved members by way of subscriptions. We have to market ourselves to the marketers.

AG: What is the task on hand to build on the image of MRUC?

SS: MRUC needs to be far more visible. Much of the work we do goes unnoticed and un-monetised because of a lack of awareness. Marketers need to know that "we also do the IRS" but there's so much more they can gain from us. We need to also take cognisance of new media and track those in detail.

AG: What are you doing in building more transparency to the functioning of MRUC?

SS: We are already on to social network sites like Facebook, Twitter etc. wherein all stakeholders can directly interact with us. Next in line is an overhaul of the MRUC website to make it an interactive platform for all stakeholders with more content that is relevant and shareable.

AG: What are some of the challenges in front of you right now?

SS: The most important challenge right now us to make users understand how best to use the massive bank of data we have. Secondly to utilise technology in the fieldwork to make it robust in a market which is not well prepared to share the extra cost involved, this has always been a challenge as it causes a trade-off between price and value. Lastly we want to involve the advertisers and make them participate more with MRUC.

AG: What are some of the modifications you are planning to the Indian Outdoor Survey?

SS: We are trying to build in technology in a way that no other outdoor study has done. However it is too early to talk on the same.

AG: What are your expectations from partners in progress?

SS: Just that they understand and appreciate MRUC's mission and objective. | By Prabha Hegde [prabha(at)adgully.com]