The relevance of digital marketing in today’s highly volatile, challenging and competitive market cannot be emphasized enough. Big brands with a keen insight of its reach and reliability have already started cashing in on this emerging trend, with many smaller and new businesses fast tracing their footsteps. Even though it can still be said to be in its nascent stage, it has proved that compared to conventional marketing it is a cooler, faster and easier way to reach potential customers.

With this in mind UpGrad, an online higher education program, along with Click Asia Summit, Social Samosa and Blogadda presented a Digital Marketing Conclave at Nehru Centre, Worli. It boasted of speeches and a panel discussion by industry stalwarts like Ronnie Screwvala, Ashok Lalla, Arunabh Kumar, Pankaj Parihar, Kavita Jhunjhunwala, Bidisha Banerjee, Kunal Jeswani and Mayank Kumar. Sounds good, yes?

Part curious, part excited, I went to this conclave with an open mind, hoping to learn something worthwhile. I’m glad to say I wasn’t disappointed. Right from the start when Kavita took the mic, it was clear that although the speakers had quite a lot to share, audience participation was an unambiguously crucial part of the whole exercise.

Ronnie Screwvala was the first to speak and was followed by Ashok Lalla. Both of them have pocketed years of experience and expertise in their respective fields and had some specific pointers for newbies trying to find their feet in the corporate world as well as for seasoned marketers who have their reservations or perplexities and are yet to explore the great wide world of digital marketing. They skillfully handled the Q&A session and gave suitable answers.

The most engaging part of the afternoon was the panel discussion. As Kavita rightly pointed out, collectively they had more than 100 years worth of experience between them, and it showed. While Arunabh Kumar got his point across to the audience with his jovial approach, Kunal Jeswani, Viral Jani etc spoke more eloquently and impressed one and all with their knowledge. Some points that they made were:

Try your best, but be prepared for failure too.

Digital marketing is a faster medium, but it isn’t magic.

Staying online 24*7 won’t necessarily do you any good.

Whatever your age, you must be ready to learn and unlearn.

Do not shy away from paying for stuff you get online.

There was a lot more, but you get the gist. The Q&A session after the panel discussion invited so many questions that the mics had to be called back, literally. With them hitting sixes on all googlies, I’m sure everyone was convinced why each panel member was at the peak of his or her career.

UpGrad then presented information about their Digital Marketing Program that has been designed keeping in mind the opportunities in the digital marketing industry.

Conventional marketing is slowly but surely graduating to digital marketing. It goes without saying that a budding digital marketing industry can provide umpteen opportunities for business development and present excellent career prospects for professionals of all ages and designations. The important thing is to be bold, creative and passionate.