Last week Mindshare’s Norm Johnston and Partha Sinha of Publicis left a challenge to the reader to name brands that have been created exclusively on digital platforms. Preethi Mariappan, executive creative director, Razorfish, Germany takes that challenge head-on. “Uniqlo, the Japanese fashion retailer, has an exclusively digital-led strategy,” she says, adding that the next Unilever will not be built like the existing consumer goods giant. “Legacy brands need change management to adapt to the digital world, but brands born today are born digital,” says Mariappan.

While her work on the digital media across countries from Dubai to Germany has won her several accolades, Mariappan recalls that her tryst with digital actually began with a failed attempt to set up an Internet radio channel while she was in Bangalore in the late 1990s. While she does not even recall the name of the venture, the lessons were invaluable. “Probably I succeeded in permanently erasing a bad memory,” she jokes, but believes youngsters in the creative profession should try something out on their own in the digital space as that experience will help them deal more effectively with client problems.

All creative processes should start from the problem that needs to be solved, is Mariappan’s firm belief. Only then the content is generated and the media (digital or television) that should be used for the content only comes later. “The content relates to the client problem. Placing content in a specific medium is a secondary issue from a creative point of view,” she says.

It’s that search for solutions to client problems that led Mariappan to invent the Bluetooth-enabled refrigerator magnet for a pizza chain in West Asia. Most consumers found that ordering pizzas over the phone a hassle, especially if the attendant on the other end confused ‘pepper’ with ‘pepperoni’. Mariappan says most consumers frequently ordered only one-two types of pizzas. So the magnet on the fridge had a button that would activate the order through your mobile phone through Bluetooth.

Consumers would then receive a confirmation on their phone through a text message making the entire task of ordering a pizza very convenient. The local pizza chain went on to win mega awards at global marketing and advertising platforms such as Cannes.

With every client expecting every rupee invested in digital media to be measured, it’s a challenge for digital agencies. But Mariappan says that agencies are accepting the challenge. Razorfish, the digital communications major that she works for, is already experimenting with newer revenue models. For example, in a recent client engagement with Peet’s Coffee in the US, Razorfish is working on a compensation that will be linked to the client’s sales revenues.

“We are living in an era of social relevance,” says Mariappan, saying that brands on Facebook have moved away from generating likes and launching Facebook apps to enabling transactions through social media. “There was a time when launching a Facebook app was a panacea for all ills,” she says.

Now she feels that most brands have moved their social media journey from being irrelevant to driving social relevance. However she is quick to add that one cannot divorce the physical world from the virtual. “All future ideas will be boundary blurring,” she says.

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