Airtel forays into advertising; launches Airtel Ads

Sunil Mittal-led telecom operator Bharti Airtel on Wednesday entered India's $10 billion advertising industry with its advertising platform 'Airtel Ads', which will connect brands to customers of the telco.

The company, in a statement, said, "Airtel Ads allows brands of all sizes to curate consent-based and privacy safe campaigns to one of the biggest pool of quality customers in India."

These ads will be featured on various Bharti Airtel platforms. Among Airtel's customer base of 320 million subscribers, 190 million use its music streaming app Wynk, OTT video content Xtream; and around 17 million use its DTH service. Bharti Airtel does not plan to cater to customers from outside.

Adarsh Nair, Chief Product Officer, Bharti Airtel, said, "Airtel's data research and analytics will help identify and connect target customers to brands selling products or making offers on the platform."

"For instance, let's say you come on Airtel Thanks app for a recharge, and you see Zomato's offer of a 40 per cent discount. We take that Zomato offer and present it to you while you are doing the transaction. Airtel's research is dependent on what you do next," Nair added.

Using Airtel's deep data science capabilities, Airtel Ads allows brands to create engagement and campaigns to the relevant customer groups, the telco said. This also means that Airtel customers receive only the most relevant brand offerings and not unwanted spam, it added.

Airtel Ads has already enabled campaigns for more than 100 brands across categories like FMCG, BFSI, digital startups, among others. It has collaborated with firms such as Zomato, CRED, Apollo 24.7, Tata AIG Insurance, PepsiCo, Lenskart, Cars24, Vahan, Gameskraft, and Harley Davidson.

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