In a bid to utilise the maximum potential of the Net as an advertising medium, Indian portals are developing new technologies to woo Netizens. Gone are the days of traditional marketing, advertising and plain vanilla banners on the Net. With the advent of the Internet Rich Media, techniques like Flash and Shock Waves have emerged to make online advertising far more effective. Says Indya.com CEO Mr Sunil Lulla:``Today, technology is available to enable the advertiser to change his ongoing advertisements by just uploading the creatives onto the publication which will then activate them on the page. `Doubleclick 'is the new ad-serving technology, which we use and it is commonly known as Dart''.According to Mr Lulla, technology today also allows the advertiser to decide on the kind of advertisements to be shown to different types of visitors.`` Thus, different creatives can then be created and exposed to different categories of viewers as part of one campaign.''
But can new advertising technologies really help to grow the Netvertising pie? According to Euro RSCG Interactive CEO Mr Probir Roy, ideas and innovations are central to Netvertising. ``Technology being ubiquitous will follow and help enable those ideas. As adoption and penetration of the Net scales and bandwidth become reliable and readily available, compression technologies of various plug-in softwares and coding/scripting optimisation capabilities will certainly improve.''
Hence, Mr Roy observes that there will come a natural demand from advertisers for innovative advertising both in narrow and broadbands. Echoing similar views on the importance of innovative advertising technology Hungama.com chief executive officer Mr Neeraj says: `` I think independent horizontal portals almost offer similar standard contents. But what stands apart is the way they present it- using new technologies. It's obviously the advertising technology which makes the surfer spend more time at a particular site.''
For effective online advertising, Hungama.com adopts new hi-tech tools like Shock Waves and Flash technology. ``Clearly, the objective is to captivate the audience with innovative audio, video and interactive technologies.We also have Rich Media banners with Java and Flash technology. Simply put, it should be a multi-media Netvertising,'' elaborates Mr Roy.
According to Mr Lulla, there's growing awareness for online advertising and an exponential growth is expected in this line in India.`` With the advent of new technologies, the banners now are more creative and catchy to attract a highly advanced audience while building interactivity as more sites and brands compete for attention and involvement on the Web servers,''In sharp contrast Mr Karthi Kumar Marshan, chief marketing officer, Sharekhan.com says : `` I think `Branding' plays a vital role for effective online advertising. If you have too many portals with similar names what's the big idea of spending so much money on hi-technology. Netizens will be too confused to visit these sites, I am sure.''
Finally, the Internet is all about new rules. With the growing awareness of online advertising, it will gain momentum with new technologies and new strategies.
Copyright © 2000 Indian Express Newspapers (Bombay) Ltd.