India: Meera Sharath Chandra; Burning Bright

She’s spent 30 years in advertising and has just founded Tigress Tigress, her own cyber-centric agency, so Meera Sharath Chandra clearly knows her stuff, but says the minute she stops learning new things she’ll quit. Far from killing this cat, curiosity – and a predatory instinct for hunting down new business opportunities – is what drives her to success

Meera Sharath Chandra is out on the prowl in the world of advertising. The Indian digital entrepreneur has earned her stripes in agencies all over the globe during the past 30 years and the future is looking bright as she forges ahead with her own business, Tigress Tigress based in Mumbai. “I chose the name Tigress Tigress because it reflects two aspects of my personality. I’m predatory when it comes to hunting for opportunities and I’m fiercely protective of my team and the quality of the creative product,” she says. “It also means that my clients, most of whom are from the UK, will hear the name and know to expect an Indian woman rather than a man in a suit.”

A top cat with many hats

Chandra has worn both business and creative hats throughout her career. Until recently, she was ECD of Momentum Worldwide UK and prior to this was managing director of WPP company Syzygy UK.

She has also acted as senior CD at JWT Detriot and went on to become president and national creative director of RMG Connect India, overseeing offices in Mumbai, Delhi and Bangalore and held the post of national creative director across five DDB business units.

Chandra has been on the juries of Cannes Lions, One Show, Clio, Art Directors Club and New York Fest as well as a consistent winner at the Webbys, New York Fest, One Show, Cannes Lions, Asia Pacific AdFest and the London International Advertising Awards.

Now, she’s making time for some philanthropic endeavours as a pro bono contributor to the WWF Save Tigers Now campaign. She’s also, of course, busy leading her own digitally focussed integrated communications agency. “I really like what I do in the charity space and sometimes I don’t charge for it as I think that after 30 years in the industry you are duty-bound to give something back,” she says.

One example of Chandra’s charity work is the Put a Face on a Book campaign for Project Nanhi Kali, an organisation that educates young Indian girls. The Facebook campaign urged people to sponsor a girl’s education and, every time someone supported a child, a book cover was created with her name on it. The idea was to illustrate that education gives girls the knowledge to write their own success story.

Sibling inspiration

Chandra was a little girl herself when she was inspired to go into the advertising industry. Her older sister was working at Ogilvy India and would often bring work home. “I would look at my sister’s work and think, ‘I can do that’. Whenever she needed help I would dive in and get involved even though I was still at school,” she recalls. When I grew up, I said, ‘Ok, let me give it a whirl and see how I like it’. The minute I entered the industry I knew I was in the right place. No two days are ever the same.”

Chandra started in India as a copywriter with agency MAA Bozell, then moved to Everest Saatchi & Saatchi as senior copywriter, following that with a long stint as senior CD at JWT Detroit before her role as president/national creative director with RMG Connect India (a JWT Group company). She has lived in the UK, the US, travelled extensively and worked on campaigns for huge brands such as Nestlé, Unilever, Ford and Citibank. “I love that you see so many different cultures in advertising,” she says. “Each country approaches things slightly differently and some ideas that make an impact for one culture might need explaining to another.”

Cyber ups the ante

It was during the Cannes Lions Festival that shots managed to sit down and chat with the busy advertising pro. Chandra attended the event as a member of the Cyber jury and was obviously impressed by the quality of 2014’s shortlist.

“Since 2009, when I last judged Cyber, the category has moved up so many notches. In terms of craft and the execution of each piece, it’s reached cinematic levels of finish. I think people realise that what you stream online has to be of the highest quality because today’s consumer is seeking perfection,” she says.

“Everybody has upped their game so much; it’s a pleasure to see the entries. Earlier on, people used to put something online and think it would go viral because it was funny. Funny isn’t enough now; even if it’s comical it needs to be brilliantly executed. This year there are 56 categories in Cyber, so being on the jury is very hard work, but it gives you a one week window to see the best of the best work and gives you so many inspiring things to carry away with you.”

A desire to keep learning

Chandra certainly knows her stuff when it comes to cyber, so it’s no surprise that she was invited back to the jury panel for a third time. Tigress Tigress is a digital-first agency – it works on online content first and builds the rest of the campaign around it. She explains: “If you’re a creative person and you don’t keep learning then you tend to become stuck in the medieval ages, you’re like a piece of furniture in an agency that people can’t get rid of. You need to keep learning and if you’ve been through conventional media then one thing you can learn from is creating new media. That’s why I chose to focus on cyber.

“To jump onto the cyber wagon early has helped me so much. My company tends to start with the digital product first and I choose to work in this way because I realise that, in today’s context, cyber really is what should be at the heart of a campaign.”

Chandra believes that the evolution in digital platforms has changed the advertising industry for the better and helped to ease budget concerns, thus opening up opportunities for people who have nothing more than a fantastic idea. “You just don’t need a [big] budget anymore. So many case studies we saw on the jury ended with the words ‘and we spent zero dollars’. If you know where to put your idea and how to profile it then you really don’t need very much money – unless you’re using film,” she says.

Hunting out the best teams

As well as working with a cyber-first ethos, Chandra’s company is unique in the way that it builds a fresh team for every client and every project. Working with a core group of 75 people from all over the world, Chandra selects the best people for each job.

“All agencies generally present the same team to everyone. I found that unfair to the client and brief as the team members might not be competent in all the jobs but are forced down the clients’ throats,” she says. “I have paired up with 75 different partners, including technology specialists, music experts and songwriters from all over the world. If you brief me on something I will pull together the best people. I will bring together the best from across the world to meet your brief. If you brief me again, do not expect the same people as they may not be the best for you.”

Chandra’s company may be based in India and she is proud to be contributing to the thriving ad industry in her home country, but most of her work comes from the UK, due to the good name and good contacts she built up while working in London and Europe. “The ad industry is huge in India,” she explains. “All the big names are represented here and we are an emerging market. We have so many cultures and I think I found it easy to work in Europe because of this. India’s almost like another Europe and I find that if you can translate an idea in India you can translate it all over the world.

“Ninety per cent of my work is UK business. It works brilliantly because I think everybody now understands that the work gets done wherever you are. At the beginning, with briefing and when you’re presenting the work, you probably need to be there in person, so I visit London every two months. I love it – I don’t mind coming over as many times as possible.”

Enduring feline freshness

Looking ahead, Chandra plans to keep throwing her passion into Tigress Tigress and continue creating great campaigns. She vows that she will keep working in the industry until the day comes when she’s no longer learning from it.

“After 30 years in the industry I felt there was no point in reporting to somebody if I wasn’t learning from them,” she says. “Starting something on my own is a refreshing, new experience and my creative juices started flowing again. You should always push yourself to try something new.”