Driving New Conversations In Ad Land
Goafest 2019, which concluded recently, witnessed participation from leaders across advertising, marketing, technology, sports and entertainment domains.
Over the years the festival has grown beyond awards ceremony. It has now become a platform for celebrating creativity and bringing together global thought leaders who are redefining the contours of the creative domain.
Keeping up with its reputation of being amongst the leading advertising festivals, Goafest this year was special as it witnessed participation of stalwarts like Madonna Badger, Chief Creative Officer and Founder, Badger and Winters; Gordon Bowen, Founder and Global Chairman, McGarryBowen & global CCO, Dentsu Aegis Network; A. Velumani, Creator & Managing Director, Thyrocare; Ravi Desai, Director, Mass & Brand Marketing, Amazon; and Ross Jauncey, Head, Create With Google, among others.
While Velumani spoke about his inspirational rags-to-riches story, Amazon’s Desai spoke about the shift in marketing trends, highlighting how perception used to drive usage earlier and how usage drives perception now.
Bowen spoke about how creativity has and will always outshine data. Bowen himself epitomised what McGarryBowen stands for — spirited, problem solver, rebel, wonderer, collaborator, human.
Badger spoke about the powerful message #WomenNotObjects gave and urged the advertising fraternity to stand up against obectyifying women, while Ross Jauncey of Google underlined the growing relevance of technology in creative agencies and how Google is making it happen through its new platform—Create With Google.
Sharing his thoughts about this year’s fsetival, Nakul Chopra, Chairman, Goafest2019 said, “Democratization is a trend sweeping through the industry and we are proud of Goafest 2019 being an integral part of this change. It has been our endeavour to drive inclusivity irrespective of size and without the limitation of cost and opportunity.”
Echoing the sentiment, Ashish Bhasin, CEO, Greater South, Dentsu Aegis Network and Chairman and CEO, India said: “This year is a best example of the deocratisation happening where creative is not just a purview of four to five old world creative agencies. Creative solutions can come from any part and there is a clear trend of digital and it is increasing in importance and in the quality of work and it is visible from the way the awards are growing.”
For the participants, Goafest 2019 was a great learning and inspirational experience. The efforts of the festival management to make the event not about advertising people listening to advertising people but about learning from related industries such as films and music and their leaders came across strongly in Goafest 2019. The line up of speakers, the quality of participants and the overall experience of the festival brought alive this fact.
Sharing her experience of Goafest 2019, Madonna Badger said, “Any place where the industry can come together, hear new ideas and talk about things is a great place to be and Goafest 2019 has been just that for me. By organising festivals like this is the only way the industry can change.”
Gordon Bowen, Founder and Global Chairman, McGarryBowen & Global CCO, Dentsu Aegis Network belives that this festival reflects the true diversity of the creative industry. “I think the fact that this festival brings people from all over helps in a big way, adds to the diversity of the festival. There is also a level of talent that gets drawn here to speak and present and it is a perfect venue for cross pollination of ideas,” he said.
