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Tag: Siddharth Jhawar

  • Indian consumers increasingly prefer streaming services and personalised ads

    Indian consumers increasingly prefer streaming services and personalised ads

    Mumbai: Moloco, a leader in operational machine learning (ML) and performance advertising, together with leading independent research company YouGov has announced the findings of the consumer Perceptions of Ads on Streamers Survey 2024. More than 1,000 consumers in India were surveyed for their perspective on advertising on streaming media platforms. More than 1,000 consumers in the US were also included in the same survey. Overall, the results signal a tipping point in consumer consumption habits as they shift from traditional TV to streaming platforms.

    “It’s important to get the ads experience right because consumers will cancel a subscription based on the ads experience. This research is a wake-up call for many streaming media platforms to transform their approach to building an ad business,” said Moloco growth initiatives general manager Dave Simon. “Consumers have a strong appetite for relevant, personalized ads that enhance the viewing experience. These ads are influencing their behavior and decision-making process. These combined trends signal the need for a more personalized approach to advertising on streamers, driven by leveraging advanced machine learning at scale.”

    “Indian consumers do not mind watching that extra ad which can lower or entirely remove subscription fee to watch content – this insight got validated when this survey showed that two-thirds of Indian consumers chose lower fees in exchange for watching ads. What’s even more interesting is that approx. 80 per cent of customers prefer personalized ads, which significantly influence their decision-making process.” said, Moloco India general manager Siddharth Jhawar.

    The study revealed that:

    1.  Consumer behavior is changing as more people move away from traditional TV to use streaming media platforms, particularly on mobile devices.
    a.  60 per cent of Indian consumers report that a mobile phone is the device most commonly used for personal streaming, compared with 26 per cent for Smart TV, 11 per cent for laptops/PCs, and 3 per cent for tablets.

    b.  34 per cent of Indian consumers report that they are cutting the cord with traditional TV services; an additional 27 per cent are considering it but have yet to do so.

    c.  66 per cent of Indian consumers would choose lower fees in exchange for watching ads.

    2.  Consumers report clear preferences for ad formats that enhance the viewing experience.

    1. 44 per cent of Indian consumers believe that ads that are interesting and relevant enhance the viewing experience.
    2. Pre- and post-roll ads are ranked most acceptable compared with mid-roll and banner or display ads.
    3. Banner or display ads and mid-roll ads are perceived as the most intrusive or disruptive.

    3.  Consumers care about the ads experience. They report that personalized ads are more compelling and more likely to result in a favorable response, such as a purchase.

    a. 41 per cent of Indian consumers have canceled a subscription specifically because of the ads experience.

    b. The majority of consumers in India prefer personalized ads, with 78 per cent indicating a preference. Of the 78 per cent total, 48 per cent prefer personalized ads based on viewing habits alone and 30 per cent prefer personalized ads based on viewing habits and personal data.

    c. Ads on streaming platforms are influential in the decision-making process for product or service purchases with 83 per cent reporting some level of influence.

    “The ads experience is clearly important, especially with consumers not just adjusting to ads on streaming media platforms but embracing ads,” said YouGov senior research manager Vanessa Khoo. “In addition, this research showed that consumers find ads compelling and influential in their overall decision-making process for product purchases. This study also showed that personalized ads can actually enhance the overall viewing experience.”

    Methodology:

    This survey was conducted online in India by YouGov focused on consumers who watch video content at least once a month, including streaming content. 1,005 respondents participated in the 10-minute online survey from 19 January 2024 – 5 February 2024.

  • “Bad ads are spam but good ads are content”: Moloco India’s Siddharth Jhawar

    “Bad ads are spam but good ads are content”: Moloco India’s Siddharth Jhawar

    Mumbai: Ad personalisation isn’t just about tailored ads, it’s about transforming them into engaging content for enhanced user experience. Moloco, a multinational adtech company pioneering machine learning, is at the forefront of this revolution. In a strategic partnership with Viacom18 and JioCinema, Moloco’s advanced capabilities are reshaping the landscape of Indian advertising.

    From combating ad fraud to leveraging 5G for programmatic innovation, Moloco is driving tangible results for advertisers while prioritising user privacy. With success stories like Zupee’s 5x growth and significant user jumps for Rummytime, Moloco’s vision for India extends beyond market growth—it’s about fostering innovation and empowering businesses to thrive in a dynamic digital ecosystem.

    Indiantelevision.com caught up with Moloco India general manager Siddharth Jhawar to talk about growing concerns about ad fraud and privacy in the Indian market, the future of programmatic advertising in India, and much more…

    Edited Excerpts:

    On Moloco addressing growing concerns about ad fraud and privacy in the Indian market

    We believe that complete transparency, constant vigilance, & working with trusted partners are critical to ensuring that advertisers and customers are protected from fraud and privacy concerns.

    Moloco ads reports advertising spends to the most granular level, which empowers advertisers to pressure-test the quality of their traffic for any suspicious activity. For instance, we capture timestamp data and then analyze whether the time taken between viewing an ad, clicking on it, installing an app, and making a purchase are coherent with expected customer behaviour. It certainly helps if an advertiser works only with reputed channels, because it minimizes the risk of fraudulent activity.

    First-party data is critical for a machine learning engine to become intelligent in identifying high-value users of an advertiser. Hence it becomes even more important to adopt the highest standards of safety and privacy to help companies grow while ensuring their customers’ privacy.

    On Moloco envisioning the future of programmatic advertising in India, with the advent of 5G

    Moloco ads processes seven million requests per second. We take 14 milliseconds to make a deep neural network prediction. Building this kind of infrastructure has taken us more than a decade, and it helps that network speeds are improving. The advent of 5G will support the nature of innovation that we do in terms of speed and efficiency of computational infrastructure.

    On Moloco’s approach to ad personalisation and its impact on user experience

    Bad ads are spam but good ads are content. If an ad can be hyper-personalised to a user and their context, it improves the customer experience and also gives better returns to an advertiser.

    The trends we see today are that customers want great but inexpensive service without being bombarded with ads, advertisers want maximum returns on every rupee spent, and platforms want to grow fast while also being profitable. Personalized ads address these needs by enhancing the customer experience, delivering measurable outcomes to advertisers, and boosting advertising revenue for platforms. But this is easier said than done. There are almost five billion internet users in the world today. We can not expect any two customers to be exactly the same. But when the scale is massive, 1-1 targeting becomes computationally tough. This is when companies need world-class machine learning systems to support them. Moloco uses machine learning that works on an advertiser’s first-party data and helps them show hyper-personalised ads to users while also optimising bid prices and probabilities in real-time – that is tough, but when done right, can be valuable to both advertisers and customers.

    On the strategies that Moloco employs to effectively integrate in-game and mobile advertising for maximum engagement

    Showing relevant and hyper-personalised ads to a user on a gaming app improves their engagement levels on the app. India’s gaming industry makes about one-fifth of its revenue from in-app advertising, and this trend is expected to grow further.

    On Moloco’s approach to operational machine learning and its significance in optimising ad campaigns

    Operational machine learning is special in four ways – it is autonomous, it involves real-time predictions, it can work at massive scale, and it is highly adaptable to the context. While machine learning and artificial intelligence have become household terms now, building an operational machine learning system at scale is a problem that very few companies in the world have effectively cracked.

    We use this operational machine learning system to train on an app’s first party data, identify high-value users, and efficiently bid for them on the open internet – this helps the app acquire more high-value users which can grow their revenue and profitability.

    On Moloco’s partnership with Viacom18 and JioCinema exemplifying its commitment to revolutionising the ecosystem in India

    Viacom18 is building one of the largest streaming platforms in the world and we are proud to be their ad-tech partners. The platform has immense scale and saw 32 million concurrent users during IPL 2023 – we use Moloco’s machine learning and ad-serving capabilities to serve relevant ads at astronomical scale on JioCinema.

    On any success stories or case studies where Moloco’s solutions have driven tangible results for advertisers in India

    Within a matter of 18 months, we have created a measurable impact on several industries and digital platforms in India. Moloco ads works with nine of the ten largest gaming apps in India and we have driven high-quality user growth for them. Our partner Zupee attained 5x growth and 3x return on ads spend targets using our ML engine. Rummytime from the Gameskraft group saw a significant jump in their high-value users. We also used our monetisation solution for CityMall to help them build an in-house advertising business and increase ROAS by 900 per cent. There are over 40 apps who have benefited from Moloco’s machine learning in India.

    On Moloco’s plan to further expand its footprint and partnerships in the Indian market moving forward

    India is a unique region for Moloco. Not only is the India market a small yet fast-growing region, India is also emerging as an innovation hub of Moloco. The entrepreneurial activity and scale in India make it an exciting place to develop machine learning products. For this reason, we are also building a global engineering centre in Bangalore, so that we can build products in India that can be scaled to the rest of the world.

  • Moloco & Viacom18 forge multi-year partnership for ad serving on JioCinema

    Moloco & Viacom18 forge multi-year partnership for ad serving on JioCinema

    Mumbai: Moloco, a leader in operational machine learning (ML) and advertising technology, has announced a strategic partnership with Viacom18 and JioCinema in India. As part of this multi-year partnership, Moloco is using its advanced machine learning and ad serving capabilities to build a powerful monetization solution for Viacom18/JioCinema, and it began with the Tata IPL last year. The Tata Indian Premier League, featuring 74 matches, providing the ultimate opportunity for streaming media monetization, with advertisers reaching massive global audiences of engaged sports fans. Last year, 449 million cricket viewers watched Tata IPL on JioCinema from March to May 2023. Supported by the Moloco ad-serving technology, JioCinema served targeted ads to a peak concurrent viewership of 32M users.

    Moloco streaming monetisation is an enterprise software solution that empowers streaming services to transform how they monetize content and media in order to unlock profitable growth. Moloco works with streaming platforms to maximize the value of each ad impression from price-driven decisioning to outcome optimization. The rise of streaming video globally coupled with the complexity of serving ads at live events makes this partnership an exciting opportunity to innovate, by delivering engaging ads and profitable advertiser ROI.

    “As the streaming media industry continues to focus on monetization, we’re excited to partner with leading players such as JioCinema to develop their performance advertising engine,” said Moloco’s chief business officer Sunil Rayan. “We have leveraged Moloco’s deep experience in advertising technology over the last decade to build an ad serving solution for JioCinema that ensures stability at scale and improves user experience during peak times. Looking ahead to Tata IPL 2024, we anticipate an even bigger opportunity to engage millions of viewers while also creating measurable value for advertisers,” he added.

    JioCinema CPTO Akash Saxena stated, “By using Moloco’s advanced algorithms and highly optimised ad serving infrastructure, we were able to deliver ads to 32M viewers concurrently during Tata IPL 2023 and offer new monetization opportunities to our advertisers.”

    Speaking on the announcement, Moloco’s general manager for India Siddharth Jhawar said, “India’s 700 million digital population has shown a growing preference for consuming video content online. As streaming platforms scale and look for more monetization opportunities, Moloco Streaming Monetization can help them grow profitably.”

  • Zomato’s Mohit Gupta bids adieu

    Zomato’s Mohit Gupta bids adieu

    Mumbai: In a sundry of exits at Zomato, Mohit Gupta has put in his papers as co-founder.  He had been with the food delivery company for about four and a half years.

    Gupta’s departure marks the third high-profile departure from Zomato. Earlier this week, the food delivery major’s head of new businesses and former food delivery chief Rahul Ganjoo, had put in his papers. Also, Siddharth Jhawar, who held the position of vice president of global growth and head of the Intercity Legends service at Zomato, called it a day.

    Gupta joined Zomato in 2018 as the head of food delivery. He was subsequently elevated to co-founder in 2021 to oversee new businesses when Ganjoo was made the CEO of food delivery. Before joining the food delivery major, Gupta was the chief operating officer of travel portal Makemytrip. He has also worked at PepsiCo during his career.

    Kamayani Sadhwani, a director at Zomato-owned quick commerce company Blinkit, has taken over from Jhawar as the head of the Intercity Legends service. Prior to taking on the role at Blinkit earlier this year, Sadhwani has also worked at Coca-Cola India, Bain, Accenture, and McKinsey.