Month: April 2024

Unilever’s productivity programme will drive focus, faster growth and reduce costs: Hein Schumacher, CEO of Unilever

Hein Schumacher, CEO of Unilever said “We continue to embed the Growth Action Plan, doing fewer things, better and with greater impact."

In March, Unilever announced the separation of Ice Cream and the launch of a comprehensive productivity programme. These actions will drive focus, faster growth and reduce costs, said global CEO Hein Schumacher, adding that dedicated project teams are progressing the work at pace.

Snap’s DAUs increased 10 percent YoY to 422 million; Q1 2024 revenue increased to $1,195 million

Stating that Snap Inc is focused on accelerating and diversifying its revenue growth, the company said that Snapchat+ subscribers more than tripled year-over-year, surpassing 9 million subscribers in Q1. The number of small and medium sized advertisers on Snapchat increased 85% year-over-year.

Snap is also investing in its augmented reality platform: “We continue to invest in Generative AI models and automation for the creation of ML and AI Lenses, which contributed to the number of ML and AI Lenses viewed by Snapchatters increasing by more than 50% year-over-year.”

Shakti Upadhyay, KIA India: We believe more in quality and less in quantity

Shakti Upadhyay, head - marketing and PR, KIA Motors, stated, "India within KIA Corporation, has a total contribution of about 10 percent. India is definitely one of the growth engines that Kia looks at. The kind of success that KIA brand has achieved within the last six years in the country has been phenomenal. In fact, we are proud to be rated as one of the most successful late entrants in the industry."

Shakti Upadhyay, Head – Marketing & PR, KIA India, “We won’t go by the endorser’s number of followers. If this person speaks positively about the product, what would he or she feel? What would he or she see? Is that going to be credible? So, that is the biggest filter that we take on in terms of the influencers as such.”

Bombay Shaving Company’s ‘opportunistic’, ‘desperate’, ‘laughable’ Dear-Prachi ad slammed by internet users

While moment marketing seems very exciting for advertisers, Manisha Kapoor, CEO and secretary-general, highlighted that they often slip up because in their hurry to launch their ad to ride the wave, there is very little diligence. The usual protocols of approvals within an organisation may be overlooked in a race against time. “It may also be the case that companies who indulge in mindless moment marketing do not have enough checks and balances in their creative development or approval process,” she added.

Internet users and marketing experts slam Bombay Shaving Company’s ‘Dear Prachi’ ad for its ‘desperate’ and ‘laughable’ attempt to ride on Prachi Nigam’s story of being bullied online.

Storyboard18 Visionaries – Mumbai chapter: An epic evening of celebrating marketing masterminds

Industry stalwarts like Bharat Puri, MD, Pidilite, Santosh Iyer, CEO and MD, Mercedes Benz India and Prasoon Joshi, chairman APAC, McCann Worldgroup, and CEO & CCO McCann Worldgroup India, shared anecdotes from their journeys of building iconic brands and on marketing, leadership and focus on consumers.

Storyboard18 Visionaries brought together marketing elite for a night of recognition in India’s financial and creative capital – Mumbai.

Bookstrapping: The Dirty Dozen by N Sundaresha Subramanian

The author’s track record as a hard-hitting journalist with award winning coverage in corporate and regulatory affairs, sets the tone foe the merciless, diligent number crunching in the book. (Image source: Amazon)

The chapter titled ‘Companies Cry but Owners Party,’ speaks about the nexus between the establishment and a category of defaulters. Subramanian also highlights the misuse of the ‘corporate debt restructuring (CDR)’ scheme by big organisations. Later, the book refers to how the the CDR cell shutdown overnight, after faithfully serving Indian lenders and letters for 17 years, writes Reeta Ramamurthy Gupta.

IPG reports $2.50 billion as revenue for first quarter of 2024

Philippe Krakowsky, CEO of IPG said, “The first quarter results we are reporting today represent a solid start to the year, and are consistent with our 2024 targets. Our data and tech driven media offerings, healthcare marketing, and PR capabilities continued to perform strongly, driving our growth. Marketer sentiment has begun to improve relative to the back half of last year, and the new business pipeline is more active. (Representative Image: Marc A via Unsplash)

The net income reported was $110.4 million.