MUMBAI: Digital is becoming an increasingly important part of the media mix for Godrej Consumer Products, the FMCG group, but a leading executive has said mobile is underexploited while measuring investment effectiveness remains a pressing issue.

Speaking to exchange4media, Sunil Kataria, COO, Sales, Marketing & SAARC, said that Godrej's spending on digital had risen sharply in the past year and now accounted for between 5% and 6% of its total spend.

He highlighted the rapid uptake of smartphones along with the spread of 3G. "[The] smartphone has become a 'complete personal confidante' for today's consumer," he said, but added that the device was "still under-leveraged by marketers".

That chimed with the view of last year's IAMAI Mobile Internet Conference. Rising mobile internet usage was transforming the communications sector in India, Warc reported, a shift that would force growing numbers of marketers to adapt their strategies.

In addition to mobile, Kataria observed people consuming content through a number of other media such as social and experiential platforms like malls as well as traditional TV, radio and print.

And he thought that one of the major issues facing the rapidly growing digital industry was metrics. "Multiple and changing platforms do not lead easily to a single currency of measurement," he mused. "Any investment requires a measurement for it to explode and this is something which will need to evolve sooner than later".

The growing number of consumer touchpoints also meant brands were having to consider integrated marketing campaigns if they were to successfully reach and engage potential buyers.

Kataria felt that Godrej had "used social media platforms pretty innovatively", pointing to Aer, its air freshener brand, which had used Twitter to crowdsource a quit-smoking song.

And when repositioning Cinthol, a toiletries brand, "digital was the key as we are a youth brand". He said that the response to a series of inventive campaigns, such as the Alive is Awesome bathing project, had been "tremendous".

For the future Kataria expected that while overall adspend would grow at 15%, digital advertising would increase more than twice as fast, at around 40%.

Data sourced from exchange4media; additional content by Warc staff