"One campaign in a year can provide you tremendous thought leadership." This viewpoint of Hemant Misra
depicts clearly what the president of Mudra Communications' for northern and eastern region is focusing upon.

For Misra, who has been involved with Mudra for nearly 12 years, it's not the business volume but the quality of the client that matters most. "One account in a year is good enough provided it is a quality brand with a vision." And working on an outstanding creative product is what Misra strives to achieve for each and every brand his agency is involved in.

Misra is quite pleased with the way Mudra's operations have shaped in the recent past. According to him, the advertising industry is currently going through tough phase as agencies continue to undercut on their fees in order to lure new clients. But Misra is unfazed by this and feels the agency continues to function as per its vision, exemplified by new gains and work for brands such as Enticer and Samsung CDMA phones.

Besides agency's operations, Misra spoke to indiantelevision.com's Ritesh Gupta on how he has managed to stay with one agency for such a long duration. Excerpts:

So achieving growth in such environment must have been satisfying.
Yes, it has been very satisfying. Two significant developments last year were - wins of entire Yamaha account and Samsung CDMA business. Both are large and very good clients. It has been satisfying both in terms of new business and work. Enticer campaign won the `campaign of the year' award in the two-wheeler segment and Samsung CDMA campaign was successful too.

How has been the creative output of the agency? Any restructuring on the anvil?
Over the last three or four years, there has been an increase in demand to do work for immediate results. This has led to a whole lot of promotional creatives. However, clients have also realized unless the creative product is outstanding, sales results may not be adequate.

I am satisfied with our creative output last year, while we may not have won as many awards as we have in the past we surely made cash registers ring for our clients and that is truly satisfying to both clients and agency.

Mudra Delhi office continues to work with clients like McDonald's, Mitsubishi Lancer and Samsung. What is the strength of the agency?
Inherent in Mudra's growth is our passion to succeed, passion to make our client succeed. We do have an affiliation with DDB Needham but it doesn't contribute in any business alignments. Unlike other top agencies, we strive to gain business purely on our strengths. So it is critical for us to make our clients succeed. And accordingly the success result in strong client-agency relationship. Being more business-oriented has helped us to enjoy relationship with our clients.

Which categories is Mudra trying to work upon to diversify the portfolio?
We are working on some, but cannot disclose the details now. And yes, we do have plans for new categories. One account in a year is good enough provided it is a quality brand with a vision.

In the recent past, Mudra benefited as it capitalized on the opportunities in the telecommunication sector. The Mumbai office handles Reliance Infocomm account while we work on Samsung CDMA business.

I feel there is more growth in Delhi than Mumbai. I can't say for other agencies as it depends on the kind of portfolio an agency has. There is definitely room for growth for us.