Social Commerce Will Open New Avenues: Rashmi Sehgal of Zenith
By Rachit Juneja
March 26, 2021
“Influencer marketing campaigns will require an end-to-end marketing approach by combining data and technology and making it more ROI friendly for brands.”- Rashmi Sehgal, Vice President, Zenith.
Rashmi Sehgal started her advertising journey in the year 2006. With her vast repertoire of expertise, she has worked across brands and categories like CPG, Technology, and Insurance. Currently, she is leading digital business for key CPG clients for Zenith - an ROI performance-driven global agency.
We got in touch with Ms. Rashmi Sehgal, Vice President, Zenith, to gain insights into the world of Influencer Marketing, and here’s what we found out:
How did influencer/content/advocacy become so central to your role? What’s your forte within influencer marketing?
“Almost 5 to 7 years back, we started with influencer marketing campaigns. Our approach was to launch products with renowned personalities from the industry for our CPG and technology clients.
Over the years, the digital ecosystem has significantly evolved with the rise of digital micro-influencers, a new set of platforms and formats, and a structured interface. During the pandemic, it saw a boost, where there were no ad-shootings allowed - this was the phase when the Influencers could help create custom shots for brands and leverage their networks for promotion.
For our clients, we cater to the entire gamut of influencer marketing - strategy, identifying the right platforms and influencers, ideating for a comms hook, and delivering the message in a more immersive manner for the best outcome.”
What’s your opinion on taking influencers as long-term partners? What kind of marketing objectives does it work for / doesn’t work for?
“Influencer marketing can help address brand objectives across the funnel, and the key here is to have a long-term association with the influencers to drive content across the brand journey. The drive can start with consumers discovering the product via feed to know about the features, usage by the influencers, and the invitation to special codes and discounts. Sounds easy but requires commitment and continuous innovative thinking and strategy to keep consumers engaged with creative content.
A long-term association with an influencer also builds familiarity for both parties, very similar to how brand ambassadors work. Hence our recommendation for brands, especially in the Technology space, is to have a longer-term association with macro-influencers.”
What is a recent trend in influencer marketing that you think is here to stay?
“With this space evolving, I see two upcoming trends:
Influencer marketing campaigns will require an end-to-end marketing approach by combining data and technology and making it more ROI-friendly for brands.
Social commerce will open new avenues.”
What is your opinion on Social Commerce and using influencers as affiliates to sell products?
“With brands increasingly seeking ROI than just engagement via influencer activations, social commerce would be the route to evolve next. Social commerce can be enabled by either using influencers as direct affiliates, i.e they extend a special code to their followers which can be traced back to a sales ROI. The second way is to use content to drive curiosity and exclusivity (FOMO amongst consumers) with the influencer channels and therefore drive sales as an exclusive channel prior to launch on other platforms .”
How do you see the importance of influencer marketing growing vis a vis overall content marketing?
“Both of these offerings complement each other, and we foresee them delivering parallelly. Influencers with their circle of followers will evolve in making better content, and content marketing will evolve to deliver better reach and influence of the communication. ”
What do you think is more important - campaign idea or choice of influencers? Why?
“The campaign idea is necessary as it is derived from brand requirements and helps to decide the role of an influencer. With a well-thought idea, the influencer contributes better towards the content rather than an open brief.”
Tell us about the process of shortlisting/finalizing influencers?
“Apart from standard metrics of reach, engagement, type of follower base, we also look at parameters that make them the right fit for the brand. It is analyzed based on the content that the influencer has been posting, their views on the category, and the brands that they have associated in the past. At Zenith, we have a more thorough approach to influencer selection to ensure we can deliver better “Influence Reach” for our clients. ”
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