BW Momentum 2024 Charts Course For Marketing's Future

The BW Momentum and BW Merit 2024, organised by BW Marketing World in association with BW Businessworld concluded on a high note with insightful discussions on the next chapter of modern marketing and recognition of outstanding achievements in the field.

Key Takeaways
In his opening address at the Momentum, Dr Annurag Batra, Chairman & Editor-in-Chief, BW Businessworld & Founder, exchange4media emphasised the evolving nature of marketing while highlighting enduring principles. "The world is changing, but the more the world changes, it stays the same. The rules of building brands stay the same. The tools available to us are much more," he remarked.

He identified key trends, including the growing importance of narrative control in brand building, the rise of millennial consumers, and the increasing significance of cause-based marketing.

H.S. Bhatia, Managing Director of Daewoo India shared insights from his 30-year career, highlighting the rapid transformation of marketing. "Marketing has not just evolved but transformed and it changes every two years to something," he observed. Bhatia stressed the importance of following customer trends and leveraging data and AI in modern marketing strategies.

Sandeep Mahajan, Chairman and Managing Director of Goodyear India focused on global market perspectives and future trends. "In any MNC today, there are five or six clusters globally where growth happens. India, China, Southeast Asia, US to an extent and everyone is expecting India to be a growth driver today," Mahajan stated. He highlighted the growing importance of digital marketing, AI and machine learning in market segmentation and personalisation.

Modern Marketers
The Momentum 2024 brought together leading minds in modern marketing. It featured four tracks namely - AdTech/MarTech, Digital Commerce, Influencer Marketing and Artificial Intelligence.

Industry leaders including Tom Stany, Sr. Brand & Category Marketing Manager, Boult Audio Akhil Sethi, Head of Digital Marketing, Harman / JBL Kapil Thukral, General Manager - Digital Marketing, Tally Solutions, Ishwindar Singh, GM Marketing, Pernod Ricard, Harshdeep Singh, AVP- Marketing, Droom and Rohan Tyagi, Product Head, NDTV imparted their thoughts in panel discussions on topics ranging from the power of adtech to decoding digital campaign metrics.

The Digital Commerce track saw participation from Rajat Tuli, Vice President Marketing, VLCC Group; Ketan Bhatia, Group Brand Director, Good Glamm Group; Madhur Acharya, CBO Aqualens & Vice President Ecommerce, Lenskart; Shivam Ranjan, Head - Marketing Asia Pacific, Motorola Mobility; Ashish Tiwari, CMO, Home Credit; Neelima Burra, Chief Strategy Transformation and Marketing Officer, Luminous Power Technologies; Sai Narayan, CMO, PolicyBazaar; Saibal Biswas, SVP and Head of Marketing, PR, and Partnership, Medibuddy and Alok Bhargava, CMO, Prudent Insurance Brokers, discussing conversational commerce and consumer behaviour in digital spaces.

Kunal Sharma, AVP Marketing, Modern Trade & Ecommerce, KRBL; Vikramjeet Bhayana, Head of Marketing, Bajaj Allianz General Insurance; Niki Mehra Madan, Fashion Influencer and Nisha Khatri, Head of Marketing, Libas joined in for the Influencer Marketing track exploring the role of influencers in brand growth.

The Artificial Intelligence track featured discussions on AI's role in business growth and the promises and perils of generative AI with industry experts namely Unny Radhakrishnan, CEO, Digitas India; Sameer Saxena, Director Marketing, Group Legrand India; Somesh Surana, Head - Digital Business Group & Marketing, HDFC ERGO General Insurance; Pankaj Krishna, Founder, Chrome DM, Vipin Yadav, Director Marketing, Hisense and Sarvesh Tiwari, Chairman, Public Relations Society and Founder PR Professionals.

Winners Spotlight
The conference was further followed by BW Merit awards, honouring excellence across 35 categories, with 93 Merits presented including 33 Gold, 34 Silver and 26 Bronze. Notable Gold winners included Bisleri International, Siemens, State Bank of India, Tata Motors, and Kotak Mutual Funds. Vermillion Communication was crowned 'Best Indian Creative Agency Of The Year 2024'.