“Adrift Communications and Influencer Marketing is a boutique communications firm based out of Gurgaon, Haryana, India. We handle PR (traditional and online), content services, Influencer Marketing and social media services for our clients.
I started Adrift in 2017 after spending 17 years in the communications world, including holding leadership positions in global PR firms in India – as Associate Managing Director, Cohn & Wolfe India and Senior Vice President, Fleishman Hillard, India. Having managed most roles in my communication experience, I decided to challenge myself and take the next big jump of starting my own venture.“
What made you start Adrift Communications? Would you call Adrift a modern PR Company or a marketing company?
Adrift is a modern, boutique PR & Influencer Marketing firm. We are intent on doing high-end strategic and quality work for our clients. We currently offer some services like PR and content but we are looking to build our digital capabilities over a period of time.
I started Adrift after realising that there is a vaccum in the market for brands entering the market but could not afford to pay high fee to large global firms and because they could not pay such high fee amounts, they did not get the senior level of counselling that they actually needed. The core idea of setting up Adrift was to offer an alternative to these clients – a strategic firm offering services at same level as global firms without being expensive. At Adrift, the team is handpicked from global PR firms and we ensure senior level servicing to all our clients.
Its very interesting that you mention targeting new brands/startups (need not be just tech startups). What would you say is an ideal duration for a new brand’s first PR campaign (I understand good PR works 24/7, but in case someone has limited budgets)?
Ideally, a start-up can look at a three or six months activity which should suit the budget and can be a good starting point. However, I would urge start-ups to look at PR Campaign objectives and goals measurement versus duration. More than any other brand (which may be established), a start-up needs PR support the most hence the request for start-ups to invest in PR right from the start instead of looking it as a quick fix tool for product launches etc.
Tell us about your work. Do you also build creative campaigns for your clients?
We handle the entire mandate for our clients – so if a client needs PR, we do it and if they need other work such as content writing or videography, we do that too. Creativity is the need of hour for PR & Communication world and we believe in being creative in everything we do – even if it’s for the smallest project or job. For e.g. our client may ask us for a press write-up on a topic but we could go in an offer a creative blogger programme or an Instagram activity. Creativity is the hero of the work we do and there is no reason why PR cannot be creative – it’s a complete myth.
How exactly does influencer marketing work? (Give us one of your best performing examples).
Influencers are an important part of the communication mix now. There are brands or products that require more social media presence and this is where Influencers are far stronger than any other medium. We work with influencers across categories to communicate a brand’s message. For example, we did a mommy influencer activity for one of our education app clients – MarkSharks wherein we offered the app for review to the mommy bloggers and they wrote about the app on their blog.
In India, Influencer Marketing is going strong and we intend to expand our services in this space. The rise of micro-influencers and regional influencers is something to watch out for.
What does Adrift Communications do which sets it apart from other digital agencies?
We are largely a PR firm right now but will be looking at increasing our digital footprint. We already have clients asking us to manage their LinkedIn pages and social media channels, produce content etc and we are working on building up our digital capabilities to cater to this demand.
Like I said, we believe in doing high-end strategic work for our clients. We choose not to take on projects and assignments where the requirement is low-end, mass execution kind of work and we get a lot of these requests but somewhere we have to take a call on who we want to be and what our clear offering will be.
Were there any particular role models for you when you grew up?
I believe we are surrounded by some amazing people who can teach us a lot personally and professionally. Personally, my role models are my mother – for her tenacity and no fear attitude in life which has taught me to never be afraid of anything; and my brother – for being ambitious and extremely well-thought and planned! I am more of a play by ear kind of person, so that’s one attribute I would really like to develop.
Professionally – It will have to be two ex-bosses – Tara Kapur and Charlotte Chunawala. I started my career with Tara and I attribute everything I learnt to her. She taught me what PR is and I think I am doing well. Charlotte was also my boss and she taught me to be frank and stand up for what you want – irrespective of what others think. This is one of the most important qualities anyone can have. You have to be who you are and you have to stand up for what you believe in.
I also have to add that I learnt a lot from my ex-clients, Sangeeta Sharma, Head of Marketing, Lufthansa and Deepika Arora, Founder & CEO, Rosaoui Hospitality. Both these women have insane drive and energy and don’t know the word “No”. Working with them inspired me to start believing in my own capability to achieve any goal.
Who was the most influential personality on your career in Brand Building?
I wouldn’t say any one person in particular but yes, the role models mentioned above have played a strong role in my personality building. I also would like to add Donna Imperato, Global CEO, Burson Cohn & Wolfe as someone who inspires me. Donna is very down to earth for the position she is in, very hands-on and very frank in her approach. I my three years at Cohn & Wolfe were one of my strongest years professionally.
What are the most critical elements needed to make a good PR campaign?
Adrift Communications is part of thenetworkone– the world’s leading independent agencies network and I am happy that I was nominated as Jury member for Consumer Lifestyle PR category for INDIE AWARDS SUMMIT 2019 .
Like I mentioned in the awards jury video, apart from clear objectives, goals and measurement, some of the elements needed for a good PR campaign are Boldly creative; simplicity in messaging; disruption (breaking patterns/barriers/innovative use of technology) and overall impact of the campaign. I also see use of social media as an integral part of PR campaigns going forward since most of our consumers now are young millennias who are largely active on social media.
Sometimes PR may be needed urgently for crisis or reputation management. Can you share a good example of such work? (Could be work from your company or an outstanding example in general).
Crisis Management is taking on a new meaning and importance now. Crisis itself is being redefined and companies & PR agencies are looking at new crisis scenarios which require new approach and strategies. The current COVID -19 crisis is a perfect example where companies have never faced such a situation and the implications could be huge for a brand. From employees who are uncertain to companies tackling investor confidence, the crisis management teams have a lot to work on. This will be an interesting learning phase for PR & Communications who have to take the lead in managing the crisis ranging from health concerns to business continuity to employee mental health and welfare.
A crisis that I personally worked on and happens to be my favourite case study on how brands should tackle a crisis was with a European Airline brand where the pilot of the group airline deliberately crashed a plane with over 300 passengers onboard. The parent airline group is one of the most trusted aviation brands worldwide and the incident could threaten the existence of the brand. Immediately after the crash, the airline group’s Global CEO stepped up and addressed the media and relatives of passengers on a daily basis apprising on incidents, developments and immediate measures being taken by the brand. The brand handled the incident with transparency, honesty and a clear way forward to ensure that this was never repeated. Leadership by Global CEO, taking onus & responsibility and deft handling of the crisis, including taking care of relatives of passengers worked for the brand and reinstated customer faith. The airline started operating within a month with passengers on-board . This is one of the best PR crisis case studies I have seen but such crisis handling requires a lot of planning and preparedness in advance.
Whats your dream campaign? (Could be a brief/brand/person etc)
I haven’t thought of it really since there are so many good campaigns possibilities but it definitely would have to be something around use of data and technology for climate change or environment.
Mac or PC?
MAC
Who would you like to take out for dinner?
Mark Ruffalo (American Actor)
What’s on your iPod?/Spotify?
Alan Walker
Whats your Twitter Handle? Instagram?
@Megha75 (Twitter)
@Megha_megha1 (Instagram)
I am also an avid traveller and run my own travel blog : (@walkwithmegha on Instagram)
