Advertising for Everyone Is Advertising for No One

In the pursuit of mass appeal, Indian mass advertising often drifts toward the safest possible middle. Familiar emotions, familiar faces, familiar visual grammar - work designed to be instantly recognisable and broadly agreeable. But recognisability is not the same as brand relevance. When advertising tries to speak to everyone at once, it frequently ends up saying little to anyone at all.

India is not a single cultural story. It is a dense network of micro-cultures, regional identities, internet-native communities and lived experiences that resist being flattened into one narrative. Yet much of mainstream advertising continues to optimise for the median - the “recognisable India”: the shaadi aesthetics, Manyavar worlds and FabIndia-coded warmth. In chipping away at plurality in favour of universal sentiment, brands often create visual white noise rather than cultural meaning. On a lighter note can't help but think about this decade old Anurag Kashyap Netflix ad.

What feels increasingly compelling today is work that resists this impulse. The most resonant cultural signals come from creators and brands embedded within specific communities. They don’t borrow culture from the outside; they participate in it. Their work carries texture, context and intent - qualities that don’t emerge from broad generalisation. Red Bull is a telling example - not just selling energy drinks, but building a cult-like ecosystem around extreme sports and active lifestyles.

Advertising doesn’t earn relevance by being inoffensive or widely palatable. It earns relevance by belonging somewhere real. In a fragmented, pluralistic culture, impact isn’t built by addressing everyone. It’s built by deeply understanding and genuinely engaging with someone.