Leveraging AI to simplify advertisers’ lives: Social Pill on launching tool to ease SDC process

New Delhi: Responding to a recent Supreme Court ruling on the 'self-declaration mandate for advertisers’, SocialPill, an Indian AI-powered marketing platform, has stepped in to ease the process by developing a custom GPT that aims to help advertisers cut their time of submitting the self-declaration form to about 3 minutes or less from the traditional 10 to 15 minutes for every single advertisement. 

In an exclusive interaction with BestMediaInfo.com, Neelesh Pednekar, co-founder and head of digital media, Social Pill, explained, “The idea behind this tool was to leverage AI to simplify the lives of advertisers. We saw an opportunity to use our expertise in AI to address a real pain point in the industry.”

“We envision a future where AI plays a more prominent role in the advertising regulatory landscape,” said Rajnish Rawat, co-founder and CEO of Social Pill. “Our tool is a first step in that direction, and we believe it can significantly benefit both advertisers and regulators.”

Social Pill's solution is a free-to-use custom GPT that streamlines the self-declaration process by leveraging the power of Generative Pre-trained Transformer technology.  

Both Pednekar and Rawat expressed enthusiasm for the possibility of integrating the tool directly with the portal. They envision a future where the tool analyses creatives, flags potential misleading content, and then seamlessly submits approved declarations to ASCI through an API. 

“This would eliminate the need for manual intervention and streamline the process further. However, they acknowledge that ironing out the technical aspects and navigating potential API integrations would require collaboration with ASCI,” they said.

As long as the tool resides on the GPT platform, it will remain free for all advertisers, assured Pednekar. 

However, he acknowledged that if there's an integration with the official portals in the future, a subscription model might be explored. “But even then, the focus would be on covering server costs and ensuring accessibility, not generating profit,” he commented. 

The new regulations require advertisers to self-declare the veracity of their claims, a process that threatened to become a bureaucratic hurdle, especially for small and medium-sized businesses. 

The tool works by analysing uploaded creatives, such as display ads and carousels, and then extracting the relevant information to populate the self-declaration forms. This eliminates the need for manual data entry, saving advertisers significant time and effort.

However, the developers acknowledge that the current iteration has limitations. “While the tool functions well with static creatives, dynamic ads and programmatic advertising pose a challenge due to their variable nature. The SocialPill team is actively working on solutions to integrate video creatives and is exploring potential collaborations with the Advertising Standards Council of India (ASCI) for more seamless integration into their official portal,” the duo said. 

The founders mentioned that they observed over 50 active chats at a time on the tool. Even though the official release of the tool took place on June 20, 2024, it has already been shared for use among agencies and industry experts since June 18.

Pednekar further said that the tool works well with static elements of Google and Meta Ads, like display ads and carousels. However, challenges arise with dynamic ads and programmatic advertising due to their constantly changing nature. As a workaround, SocialPill is currently replicating existing campaigns to maintain compliance while they develop solutions for handling dynamic ads.

It's important to note that while the tool automates data entry, the responsibility for ensuring truthful declarations remains with the advertiser. They acknowledge that the onus of ensuring ethical advertising practices remains with the advertiser, and the GPT tool is designed to be a helpful assistant, not a replacement for human oversight. 

The GPT model can identify potential areas of concern within the creatives, but it cannot definitively judge the veracity of claims. As Rawat highlighted, “the ethical responsibility lies with the brand and the agency.”