The festive quarter has always been Indian advertising’s crown jewel, but what makes 2025 different is the scale, speed, and sophistication with which agencies across the board are approaching it. From media and creative shops to influencer, digital, and OOH specialists, industry leaders agree on one thing: the October–December period is no longer just about a seasonal spike in visibility, it is the quarter that defines annual strategies.
While some emphasise early planning and multi-channel orchestration, others highlight hyperlocal storytelling, creator-led ecosystems, and experiential formats that blur the line between culture and commerce.
Taken together, the insights paint a clear picture – festive advertising has evolved into a full-scale growth engine where innovation, agility, and cultural relevance decide who wins the consumer’s celebratory wallet.
Early Planning, Multi-Channel Agility
For media agencies, the OND quarter is the ultimate test of foresight and flexibility. Uday Mohan, COO at Havas Media India and Havas Play, explained, “The OND quarter is one of the most active periods in the media calendar. With major festivals like Diwali, Dussehra, Dhanteras, and Christmas, alongside year-end retail peaks, brands scale up their marketing investments significantly.”
He added, “This results in a higher concentration of campaign launches and media activity compared to other quarters. For us, it’s a time when performance-driven campaigns and brand-building initiatives converge, ensuring high visibility and strong audience engagement during a period of heightened consumer spending.”
Mohan continued, “Brands that spent previous seasons playing safe are walking into this quarter ready to take risks. Being visible is no longer enough — they want to be impossible to miss. The OND quarter now defines an annual strategy; if you win this period, you essentially set the tone for the entire year.”
Anushka Sen, General Manager at Madison Media Ultra, emphasised the importance of early planning and integrated execution. “Brands are no longer just looking for visibility. They want campaigns that perform across channels — from TV and digital to OOH and influencer ecosystems,” she said.
Sen added, “Planning early, maintaining creative agility, and measuring impact in real time are now central to festive strategies. Securing placements early gives brands not just visibility, but the ability to optimise campaigns across channels. Festive marketing is no longer just about presence — it’s about synchronised storytelling across media touchpoints.”
Mohan noted, “Media strategies in OND 2025 are more diversified than ever. Traditional platforms like TV and print remain important for reach, while digital, OTT, Connected TV, and experiential formats are gaining momentum. Many brands are open to trying new formats and allocating part of their budgets to explore emerging opportunities.”
He added, “The goal is to maintain high visibility while ensuring campaigns are adaptable across channels.” Sen highlighted, “Multi-channel orchestration is critical. A message that lands on TV should flow seamlessly into digital, OOH, and influencer-led activations. The brands that can achieve this coherence while staying flexible will define success this festive season.”
This quarter, campaigns are focusing on themes that resonate universally — togetherness, nostalgia, community spirit, and responsible celebrations. Mohan explained, “Brands increasingly combine pan-India narratives with regional adaptations to enhance cultural relevance. While celebrities continue to play a strong role in large-scale campaigns, there is growing use of micro-influencers and local voices to create authentic and relatable connections.”
Sen emphasised, “Creative agility now allows campaigns to adapt in-flight. Real-time learning ensures the festive story stays relevant, whether it’s through TV, social, or influencer touchpoints.”
Categories driving the highest activity this year include e-commerce, fashion, beauty, auto, and BFSI. Mohan noted, “Many clients are looking for creativity that can be adapted quickly, is data-informed, and delivers measurable results. Personalisation, faster turnaround times, and campaigns that integrate both brand messaging and performance objectives have become mandatory rather than optional.”
Sen added, “From niche D2C players to large durables, every category is experimenting with influencer-led storytelling and regional content. The quarter has become a proving ground for ideas that balance reach, relevance, and transaction.”
To stand out in this oversaturated festive landscape, agencies are deploying AI-assisted creative development, dynamic content personalisation, and interactive digital experiences. Mohan explained, “These tools help create campaigns that feel fresh and engaging. Operationally, timelines are always tight in OND, so planning and streamlining approval processes become critical to executing effectively.”
Sen observed, “The pace is relentless. Campaigns must evolve overnight to match consumer behaviour. The only way to deliver is to combine early planning with agile execution and integrated creative teams capable of responding instantly.”
Clients are primarily focused on boosting sales, increasing brand visibility, and strengthening customer engagement. Mohan noted, “The real brief is always the same: how to outperform competitors in a crowded, high-stakes window. Early planning has become crucial, with several campaigns already live before the peak festive weeks.”
Sen concluded, “Planning early and maintaining creative agility are key to making the most of the OND season. Success is no longer measured on reach alone; it is now about linking visibility to transaction and engagement, ensuring campaigns convert while delighting audiences.”
Mohan added, “The festive quarter is when brands have the opportunity to connect with audiences at both emotional and commercial levels. This year, we’re seeing a healthy mix of traditional and new-age formats, enabling brands to reach diverse audience segments effectively.”
Sen summarised, “Planning early and maintaining creative agility are key to making the most of the OND season.”
Reimagining Festive Storytelling
This festive season, creative and marketing agencies are recalibrating how stories are told. Siddhartha Singh, Managing Partner and COO at Infectious Advertising, said, “It is still the busiest quarter, but the big festive film has been replaced by the big festive sale.”
He explained that changing attention spans and shopping habits are forcing creatives to rethink storytelling. “Storytelling hasn’t disappeared, it’s just been condensed into six seconds and a swipe-up. Celebrities now have to sell, not just smile. The brand film has given way to the shoppable reel.”
Singh added that regionalisation is now embedded in every brief, not treated as an afterthought. “Speed is the new currency. Long-form fatigue is real — for both brands and audiences. This year’s big bets aren’t a single blockbuster — they’re 200 small ones, customised and commerce-ready.”
Namita Shenoy, Partner – Procurement Transformation at Glassbox Ventures, said festive optimism is reflected in brand budgets this year. “Consumer brands are laying plans to increase their advertising budgets by 15–20% year-on-year as festive demand is expected to rebound strongly,” she said.
Much of this growth, she noted, is expected to come from outside metro markets. “With growing digital adoption and rising purchasing power, agencies are shifting marketing efforts to tier-2, 3, and 4 cities, expecting strong growth from these markets.”
Consumer durables are already leading the charge with cashback, EMI, and warranty-led promotions. “Brands such as Vijay Sales, Croma, Panasonic, Vu, Eureka Forbes, and Godrej are rolling out discounts, cashback offers, EMIs, extended warranties, and exchange programmes, aiming for a 12–15% sales uptick,” Shenoy said.
She emphasised that cultural authenticity remains a critical differentiator for brands this festive season. “Marketers are increasingly crafting content deeply rooted in regional traditions — dialogues, customs, attire — to build emotional resonance. Localised storytelling is what’s winning hearts.”
Multi-Tier Creator Strategies
Over the years, influencer campaigns have evolved from single-celebrity endorsements to multi-tier ecosystems, especially during festive periods. Megha Marwah, VP – Strategy, White Rivers Media, said, “The days of banking everything on single celebrity partnerships are finished. Smart brands now orchestrate multi-tier creator ecosystems where established names drive initial buzz whilst niche voices handle actual purchasing decisions.”
Himanshu Arora, CEO- Creative at LS Digital, agreed, “Celebrity creators still work for those big festive splash moments, but that is maybe 20–30% of our festive playbook now. The real magic comes from micro and regional creators.”
Managing creators has become as much about logistics as creativity. Rajni Daswani, Chief Growth Officer at SoCheers, noted, “The only way to prepare was to stay ready for weekend bookings and align early with creators. Many influencers travel during this time, so just knowing their availability was as critical as knowing which brands they’d align with.”
Innovation is no longer experimental but expected. 3D anamorphic billboards, AR filters, projection mapping, gamified pop-ups, and AI-led content rotation are now standard tools for festive campaigns. Digital-first formats, shoppable reels, and connected TV content are integrated into omnichannel strategies, reflecting how audiences interact fluidly across screens.
Marwah added, “When brands link creator compensation directly to sales outcomes, we finally measure what matters. This forces agencies to think strategically about talent selection rather than chasing follower counts.”
“Festival campaigns succeed when local creators speak in cultural dialects that resonate with specific communities. At the same time, consumer journeys split across platforms — discovery on Shorts, conversations on Instagram, and purchases closing via WhatsApp. Agencies have to map that funnel with precision,” she explained.
Celebrity creators still feature for big splash moments, but Arora said they now make up only 20–30% of campaigns. “For Himalaya, we brought in Assamese and Bengali beauty creators for Durga Puja. For a jewellery client in the South, we leaned on Tamil influencers during Navratri styling. It was less about the biggest face and more about speaking the audience’s festive language,” he said.
Turnarounds have shrunk dramatically. “A q-commerce client called us in mid-October for a 10-video series that had to go live in a week. The only way to pull that off was if creators were locked early, pre-briefed, and relationships strong enough to handle last-minute tasks,” he added.
Platform fatigue is another challenge. “By the time your reel appeared, audiences had seen a hundred Diwali videos. If you didn’t hook them in three seconds, it was gone. That’s why we mixed high-glam festive content with real-life moments — jewellery creators styling themselves at home, or q-commerce skits around last-minute gift panic.”
“The goal wasn’t to make another ad; it was to create content people would actually want to watch, enjoy, and maybe even send to their family WhatsApp group,” said Daswani.
“Nearly 70% of annual spending is clustered in the festive and January–March quarters. While celebrities remained for flagship campaigns, the needle shifted. Smaller and nano creators drove the real trust. Audiences knew when an influencer was promoting something just because they were paid,” she added.
“Diwali in Mumbai looked very different from Chennai or Delhi. We broke down those traditions and crafted localised influencer content so it felt personal. Ultimately, if a campaign didn’t solve a real consumer problem or feel authentic, it risked fading into the festive chatter.”
Hyperlocal Targeting and Experiential Innovation
Outdoor advertising has also evolved with immersive formats and regional targeting. For many agencies, the festive quarter is now about reaching consumers beyond metros. Tier-2, 3, and 4 cities are driving growth, and rural activations are being reimagined with technology.
Haresh Nayak, Founder and CEO of Connect Network Inc., called OND the industry’s “Super Bowl season,” noting that 35–40% of annual OOH volumes land in this quarter. Lead times have been compressed from 3–4 weeks to 10–14 days, reflecting the need for speed in a crowded festive landscape.
Rajesh Radhakrishnan, Co-Founder and CMO at Vritti Mindwave Media, emphasised the importance of localised, contextual, and dynamic campaigns. “Campaigns succeed when they are localised, experiential, memorable, and adaptive to real-time situations. Emotional engagement is key; transactions are secondary.”
“During festive season, through its Audiowala Bus Stand platform, Vritti carried out activations for Dabur Pudin Hara across state bus stations in Rajasthan, combining product sampling with contextual, time-specific interventions to drive maximum consumer impact.”
At Times OOH, COO Rohit Chopra confirmed, “The October–November–December period is traditionally one of the busiest for the OOH industry, and a significant share of our annual volumes comes from this quarter. We see brands actively expanding their footprint during this time — not only by taking up more sites in metro markets but also venturing into new cities and experimenting with diverse formats.”
Chopra added, “Festivals are when brands are most open to experimentation — whether it’s 3D anamorphic displays, AR/VR experiences, or programmatic DOOH integrations. These high-impact formats help them cut through the clutter, command attention, and create strong PR and social media buzz.”
On client briefs and hyperlocal targeting, he noted, “We are seeing an increased appetite for hyperlocal storytelling — whether that’s innovating with media formats, creating bespoke concepts, or adding experiential elements. Brands with robust budgets typically invest in a balanced mix — using transit and city-wide media for sustained exposure, while layering in immersive innovations to spark excitement and memorability.”
Yuvrraj Agarwaal, Chief Strategy Officer at Laqshya Media Group, underscored the urgency for premium inventory. Inbound briefs are up 25% YoY, average campaign values have risen 30%, and bookings arrive 30–45 days earlier than in 2024. The festive share of FY26 OOH AdEx is projected at 35% 32% last year), with the cash-flow curve showing pre-festive build-up 10%, core festive burst 20%, and post-festive tail 5%.
“Festive-season FOMO fuelled a land-grab for prime OOH; the scramble was real and the cheques were bigger,” said Agarwaal. “Festive OOH wasn’t just advertising — it was cultural infrastructure.”
Sarabjit Singh Puri, Chairman of Fateh Rural, highlighted the importance of last-mile reach and distribution in smaller towns. “We are working on a two-pronged strategy of making a brand available in around 60–70% of the population where it was not present, and then making that brand famous in those areas so that people could start using it.”
Fateh Rural’s work spans FMCG, solar panels, electricals, cement, veterinary products, and machinery. Seasonal spikes are product-dependent; festival-driven campaigns matter primarily for jewellery, clothing, appliances, and food, while agricultural and industrial products follow crop cycles.
OOH campaigns are no longer limited to static billboards. Nayak observed widespread adoption of 3D anamorphic billboards, projection mapping, interactive DOOH, AR filters, and gamified pop-ups, while AI-powered platforms help target audiences and measure engagement.
“AI models are integrated with all these ways of branding. It certainly makes a large impact in two ways: improving ROI and enhancing the experience for people. Thirdly, predicting sales in the coming days,” noted Puri.
While experiential marketing, tactile engagement, and trust-building remain crucial in smaller towns, larger cities see a balance of traditional, tech-driven, and immersive formats. Across the board, agencies cite inventory pressure, creative complexity, and compressed timelines as the top challenges. Times OOH and Connect Network have invested in centralised creative teams, vetted vendor networks, and dashboards for real-time tracking.
A Blueprint for Modern Indian Advertising
From micro-campaigns to AI-powered personalisation, the OND 2025 quarter has tested every agency’s speed, scale, and creativity. Multi-tier influencer strategies, regional OOH, hyperlocal activations, and immersive creative formats all combine to create a market where brands can no longer just show up – they must convert, delight, and dominate.
