As Manifest turns one, we asked industry leaders in our April issue: ‘If you had the power, what’s the ONE thing that you would change in adland, and why?’

We will be sharing (in no particular order) each of their thoughts on shaking things up in the industry over the coming days.

We begin with Anupama Ramaswamy, chief creative officer and joint MD, Havas Creative India, and Devaiah Bopanna, co-founder, Moonshot...

Anupama Ramaswamy, chief creative officer and joint MD, Havas Creative India

Advertising should be bold, brilliant, and a major driver of business success.

We came into advertising to entertain, inform, and add value. In the ever-changing world of data, AI, and research we might be prone to take lesser risks and miss out on encouraging challenging creative work. What I do miss is ‘fun’. We need to bring back the mojo in advertising. Today, the reality is that the life of campaigns is short-lived. A day, or a week max. But what I think is happening is that quantity is taking over quality. Because of the short-lived nature of the content, we do not want to invest in quality. Cheap content is the need of the hour.

As an industry, we need to try and maintain a certain benchmark. Yes, we need to do more content, but it has to be good content - content that people talk about or remember. While technology and data are all things most marketers get and sometimes, get much better than us ad folks, one thing will always be our prerogative and forte - storytelling.

In the pursuit of making the most of the medium, many advertisers are forgetting the power of a story. No matter what the attention span, the consumer/audience wants to be entertained. We all laugh, cry, and feel good watching content pieces. Brands want to connect with their audiences through a funny joke, a witty tweet, a heartwarming ad, or a deep meaningful, and purpose-driven campaign. The goal is always the same—to connect with the consumer in a personal and meaningful manner. And brands that are able to tell interesting stories through powerful product connects will rule the minds of consumers.

Devaiah Bopanna, co-founder, Moonshot

I don’t think we have enough designations. We have NCDs and global creative directors, but what happens when work has to travel beyond Earth now that Elon plans to colonise Mars? We need galaxy creative directors, galaxy far far away creative directors; because, come on, how else will clients take us seriously when we say we are a forward-facing industry?

We have only 210 vice presidents and 184 presidents in servicing, yet somewhere along the way, we have forgotten the need for a commander-in-chief in the agency. Because, let’s be honest, if a commander-in-chief is negotiating with a client, the agency can justify charging a premium.

The same issue exists in the planning department. We have too few designations, which is why the Sec A mom from tier 1 urban India in a DINK household is feeling let down because there are only 32 chief planning heads - strategy, India (South and West).

So, I truly hope more designations are created moving forward - because right now, we simply don’t have enough for the industry to be taken seriously.

This was part of a feature in the April issue of Manifest. Get your copy here!