Adman to put more focus on digital media

“Today, social-network communities like Facebook, YouTube, Twitter and Instagram are playing an increasingly significant role in the marketing-communications industry. These communication tools are also used for gaining response and interaction from the target audience,” Parames Rachjaibun, chairman emeritus of the AAT, said yesterday.
Though advertising expenditure via free-TV channels, at Bt106 billion last year, remains strong at 59 per cent of the total, advertisers and marketers are beginning to integrate their marketing communication with new media, Parames said.

The association has witnessed rapid changes in consumer behaviour, particularly in strong Internet penetration in the Kingdom at 24 million users. Adman Awards and Symposium 2012 will, therefore, emphasise advertising in digital media. Under the theme of “Truly, Madly, Deeply”, the event will introduce new award categories, namely “Best of Digital” and “Digital Agency of the Year”.
Wiboon Leepakpreeda and Passapol Limpisirisan, joint chairmen of the judging panel for the event, said the number of advertisements to be submitted for the awards would be between 1,100 and 1,200, similar to last year.
The event will be held on October 10 with two key parts. First will be the announcement of the Adman Award 2012 winners in different categories such as film commercials, print, outdoor and ambience, radio spots, graphic design, innovative use of media, public relations and event marketing, integrated marketing communication, interactive and digital media, and “Ad that Works”.
The second part will be the “Adman Symposium” seminar for creative youth and university students who are interested in working in the advertising industry. This part will be co-organised by the AAT and the University of Thai Chamber of Commerce.
In addition to consumers’ behavioural change due to digital-media development, Nielsen Thailand revealed yesterday that more than seven out of 10 Thai digital consumers claimed to compare prices of household or grocery goods and read product reviews online. Meanwhile half of those who scoured the Internet for product information reported to have done so on a daily basis.
Suresh Ramalingam, managing director of Nielsen Thailand and Vietnam, said that with Internet penetration increasing exponentially throughout Asia, a growing number of consumers were turning to the Web for everything from reading fellow consumers’ experiences with various products and services to making actual purchases online.
With this growth expected to continue, the Internet represents a huge opportunity for retailers and manufacturers to tap into a broader consumer base and increase engagement levels, Nielsen said.