In an ecosystem flooded with content, where attention is fleeting and indifference is expensive, the rules of advertising are being quietly rewritten. It’s no longer enough to inform or even impress-brands are now expected to move people, to create something that lingers beyond the screen and finds a place in memory. As audiences scroll past thousands of messages each day, the real battle isn’t just for visibility, but for emotional relevance-work that doesn’t just get seen, but felt, remembered, and shared.
At the heart of this shift lies a deeper return to fundamentals: storytelling that resonates, ideas that earn attention, and creativity that prioritises impact over information overload. It’s a space where logic may justify decisions, but emotion initiates them-where the craft lies in saying just enough, leaving room for the audience to complete the story in their own minds.
It is within this evolving landscape that Parikshit Bhattaccharya, Chief Creative Officer, BBH India & Propagate India, builds his thinking-one that blends cultural memory, emotional storytelling, and a sharp understanding of how ideas travel beyond the confines of a single piece of communication.
Excerpt from the interview:
With shrinking attention spans, are we overestimating how much story people are willing to engage with, or underestimating their appetite for good storytelling?
There’s a saying-what’s true, the opposite of it is also true. If you think about it, people today are paying to watch more content than ever before in the history of human civilization. And that, in turn, is pushing marketing-beyond just advertising-to take a hard look at the quality of the stories it is putting out.
People are willing to engage. And especially in a culture like India, we come from one of the oldest and deepest traditions of storytelling. Storytelling is deeply embedded in who we are, perhaps more than in many other cultures. We naturally gravitate towards compelling stories-we get absorbed in them, we seek them out, and we share them.
What’s changing now is that the importance of both the quality of the story and the context in which it is told is becoming increasingly critical. There is an overwhelming amount of content being consumed, but there’s also far more being created that simply goes unwatched. A lot of it is mediocre. So if we want people to watch our content-especially when they’re not paying for it-it has to compete with, and be better than, the content they are paying to watch.
Which brings it back to the same point-it ultimately comes down to the quality and context of the stories we tell. If those two are right, people will watch.
If you had to pick, what’s more dangerous for advertising today- being ignored or being liked but forgotten?
If your work is ignored, the other outcomes simply won’t happen. At the most fundamental level, if your work is ignored, your money is wasted. Which is why, as an industry, we can’t afford to create benign work and we cannot afford to be ignored.
In great advertising, what really makes work stick is emotional resonance and cultural relevance. That’s why it becomes critical to read the room, find the right story for that context, and present it in a way that balances surprise with relatability.
And then, you let it be. Because when people begin to tell those stories in their own way, the message is no longer just received-it is internalised, owned, and shared, often with their own additions to it. That, I believe, is where the real gold lies.
In categories like automotive, where specs are critical, what has led to this clear shift towards emotion-led storytelling? Is it a creative choice or a market necessity?
Interestingly, I think it is both. But it also goes back to the fundamentals of communication.
You can give a person a hundred reasons, and they still may not develop a positive perception or feel compelled to buy. But if you manage to move them, that’s when you can hope for a certain action. It is emotions that lead to behaviour change-emotions lead to action. All the logic, information, and specifications are important; they serve as reasons and building blocks that help justify a decision. But most decisions are ultimately driven by emotion.
So yes, it is both. It’s a creative choice because it stems from the fundamentals of effective storytelling. And it is also a market necessity. When you place our work alongside much of the category’s output, everything else tends to resemble brochures.
Which is why it becomes essential to stand out. Emotional storytelling, storytelling at its core, is what helps us differentiate in the market.
“Easy to Love” leans heavily on nostalgia- what made you confident that a reference like DDLJ would still feel fresh rather than familiar?
DDLJ is, quite simply, the soundtrack of a quintessential Indian love story – one that transcends age and generations. So there was never really a question of whether it would feel fresh. The real consideration was how we chose to use it. I believe we used it rather intelligently, allowing us to tell a story where both the track and the film’s visuals became metaphors. These cues helped people complete the rest of the picture in their minds.
To me, that is a fresh way of using a cultural reference. We didn’t use it in totality-we used just enough for viewers to pick up on it, and let their imagination do the rest. They heard just enough, and the rest got completed in their heads.
The same approach applied to the use of sunflowers. We focused only on what was emblematic of the film’s mood and fervor, and that, in turn, helped us complete the story.
In this campaign, the product almost becomes the trigger for emotion rather than the centrepiece- how do you decide how much product is “just enough”?
In this category, most communication tends to be heavily product-focused – and much of it gets ignored. Because if someone is genuinely interested in a car, they will anyway look up its virtues and specifications. Our foremost job in advertising is to create desire. And desire is built by evoking a feeling that resonates with people – something they want more of. That feeling is eventually fulfilled through the purchase or acquisition of the brand or product.
So the task was to create desire. Of course, we wanted to show that the car is beautiful and has many virtues, but the challenge was to present just the right amount-enough to support the idea without visually bombarding it. The product needed to appear at the right moment, providing the necessary meaning and reason to believe in the story that unfolds.
At its core, the product creates a certain feeling, and our job is to double-click on that feeling and deliver it in a memorable way. The next action a consumer takes stems from this feeling-a positive step towards the brand, leading them to explore the product further. Ultimately, the experience of the product determines how conversion happens.
Also, in this category, you build desire while simultaneously running a layer of communication that is purely product-focused. Each piece plays its role in this larger orchestration of activities when launching a car. Not every piece needs to be burdened or stuffed with product details, and that distinction is important.
What’s harder today- simplifying a complex product into a story, or making that story actually stand out in a cluttered content ecosystem?
First and foremost, your work and your brand have to be noticed.
Today, an average person is exposed to more than 15,000 messages. In this scroll-and-tap-first environment, attention isn’t given-it has to be earned. You are essentially stopping people, even snatching their time, so it becomes incumbent on you to reward them for it.
That means creating work that genuinely rewards the time people spend engaging with it. You’re trying to capture attention, but more importantly, you need to make that attention worthwhile. When you do that, you leave people with a positive impression, which then sets off an entire chain of actions.
So both aspects are equally important. But if your work is benign, it will be ignored. And if it’s ignored, your money is wasted. And if your money is wasted, the entire ecosystem at work has failed.
A lot of ads today feel cinematic but forgettable- what, in your view, gives a piece of advertising cultural memory?
For us, the idea is to use or refer to a memory structure in a way that rearranges that memory in the viewer’s mind. When that happens, it creates work that carries emotional resonance, memorability, and the ability to sit rent-free in the mind-even if it’s just for a few seconds. If it’s good, it stays a little longer; and if it’s really good, it does an exceptional job of reshaping that memory in a way that makes you feel compelled to share it.
That, I believe, is where the real gold lies when you’re working with a cultural memory reference.
In Kushaq’s case, the way we’ve used the music and visuals of perhaps the most loved and iconic romantic film does exactly that. It subtly rearranges how you remember the film, its music, and its imagery, while also aligning with the context Kushaq is trying to build.
And that’s what is driving a favorable response-people are talking about it, and it’s helping spark more conversations.
Consumer integrations beyond screens have been a strong part of your work, so what makes an idea travel from an ad to something people actually participate in?
Today, a truly successful piece of work has to be a call to action. We often ask, “What is the call to action in this work?”-but that’s actually a flawed way of looking at it. The entire piece of work should itself be a call to action.
Now, with the possibility of building a connected ecosystem around a platform, this idea extends further. The entire ecosystem is built around that call to action. Individually, each piece of work functions as a call to action, and collectively, the ecosystem not only reinforces it but also enables that action.
Take the Octavia, for instance. There were only 100 cars, and we helped sell out in under 20 minutes because of the strong cult following. We did create an inspiring and inviting film that ran across digital and television, but once the cars were sold out, we had to think differently.
Since the cars weren’t available for fans to test drive, the question was: how do you give people the experience and feeling of the drive when they can’t even touch the car? That’s when we created something called Mind Drive. We brought in a certified clinical hypnotist to design a simulated driving experience for fans. It was likely the first time something like this was used in car marketing.
This is a good example of extending a platform into a broader experience-creating a connected ecosystem of ideas. Each idea is linked, yet independently acts as a call to action.
The same approach applied to ‘Easy to Love.’ Beyond the film, we created extensions like ice cream flavours and other experiences to truly own the platform for Kushaq. It also helped open up new white spaces for the brand-spaces where no other car is playing. As a result, it becomes easier to stand out. It creates a competitive advantage. When you build a connected system of ideas, each one a call to action on its own, they come together to form a powerful, multi-layered force that works exceptionally well for the brand.
What’s one creative compromise you refuse to make, even when business pressures push for it?
I believe business pressure is actually a good thing. It pushes you to create better creative work. In a market where growth is on everyone’s agenda, ideas become the ultimate growth engines. So it really comes down to the quality of the idea-delivered in an unignorable way, and built through a connected system. That, to me, is what matters most.
In fact, what’s far worse is a bad brief, when you don’t even know what the problem is. Compared to that, business pressure brings clarity. It creates the conditions for sharper creativity.
I see it as an opportunity rather than a challenge. As a creative, you have to be hardwired for positivity. It’s like batting-if you focus on the fielders, you’ll end up hitting the ball straight to them. But if you look for the gaps, your chances of hitting boundaries are far higher.
In that sense, pressure is not a constraint, it’s what makes creativity better.
