ITV

Category: iWorld

  • Twitter has edge over Facebook in real-time TV, says report

    Twitter has edge over Facebook in real-time TV, says report

    MUMBAI: When it comes to so-called “TV talkers”, those who use social media while watching television programs, Twitter still has an edge over Facebook, a report said Thursday.

    As per the report, Twitter is still more attractive to advertisers and marketers than Facebook when it comes to real-time TV, according to eMarketer.

    “Facebook is further behind, but it has several advantages—such as its massive size—that will, over time, make it an attractive option,” said the report.

    Still, with more than a billion users, compared to Twitter’s base of more than 215 million, Facebook’s real-time TV promise is huge. A major reason is that, compared to Twitter, it has more user data for advertisers to tap.

    Twitter, the report noted, “integrated with TV shows and networks and developed ad products that align with marketers’ television advertising.” Twitter has reported that “95% of public social conversations around TV happen on its service,” the report said.

    Twitter’ strong TV potential has become more prominent as the San Francisco-based social network moves toward going public. Analysts sizing up the Twitter offering have consistently pointed to TV as one of its core strength.

    In a way, Twitter’s TV edge is based on how it quickly emerged as “a place where people have gone to discuss what they are watching on TV.”

  • Facebook introduces an easier way to create ads and measure their impact

    Facebook introduces an easier way to create ads and measure their impact

    NEW DELHI: Facebook has redesigned its ad buying and reporting tools based on responses from businesses.

    The ad buying process will start with a simple question – what’s your advertising objective? – and the Facebook tools will recommend an appropriate ad based on that objective, and then help determine how the ads performed against the objective.

    The updates, which we call objective-based ad buying and reporting, are part of ongoing efforts to make advertising on Facebook as simple as possible. In June, Facebook announced efforts to streamline Facebook ad types and provide consistency across formats. In July, ad products were streamlined, removing online offers, sponsored results and question ads. In August and September, it became possible for marketers to upload one image size that would work for all types of ads on Facebook, and the social site started offering a preview of how they would appear across Facebook.

     

    Feedback received from businesses was that when creating an ad, they did not want to choose an ad unit – they wanted to meet an objective. Facebook then spoke with marketers of all types and sizes to uncover the objectives that matter most to them. They are: Clicks to Website, Website, Conversions, Page Post Engagement, Page Likes, App Installs, App Engagement, In-store Offer claims, Event Responses.

    In turn, these objectives have become the new starting point for buying ads on Facebook. Based on the objective a business chooses, Facebook will recommend an appropriate ad-type (i.e., a Page post link ad to drive clicks to a website).

  • Twitter and Viacom announce Twitter Amplify partnership

    Twitter and Viacom announce Twitter Amplify partnership

    MUMBAI: Viacom has announced a partnership which will see it deliver social video advertisements for its channels via Twitter Amplify.

    The collaboration will start at the 2013 MTV EMA on Sunday 10 November, and will provide followers of Viacom’s channels – including MTV, Nickelodeon and Comedy Central – with video extras of major shows and live events, including instant highlight replays, exclusive backstage interviews and extra content.

    The partnership was trialled successfully at the MTV Music Awards in August, and both partner companies see the experiment as an exciting opportunity.

    BeViacom MD ad sales unit Chris Shaw said: “We’re thrilled to be pioneering this initiative in Europe and across the world, creating a truly unique opportunity for marketers looking to join the global youth conversation around the ‘2013 MTV EMA’.”

    Twitter Amplify senior director Glenn Brown added: “We are excited to build on the success of our US Twitter Amplify partnership with Viacom by rolling it out internationally, including across the UK and Europe. The EMAs are the perfect way to start the program, allowing brands to tap into the conversations already happening on Twitter by offering people highlights and exclusive content across all devices.”

    Viacom’s programmes are already an influential Twitter presence, with the 2012 MTV EMA inspiring 5.7 million tweets, spawning 32 worldwide trending topics and at times notching eight of the top 10 trends during the show’s broadcast.

  • Now give a missed call to follow @SrBachchan

    Now give a missed call to follow @SrBachchan

    MUMBAI: Amitabh Bachchan is undoubtedly India’s most enigmatic, charming, talented, informed and witty superstar. With a fan following ranging from the age groups of eight to 80 the superstar is the heartthrob of millions across the country. The Shahenshah of Social media is followed by more than 13 million people across social media platforms including 6.5 million on Twitter.

    His Birthday is a date marked on many calendars across India as a day of celebration and this year is no different. As a special surprise for his fans this year as part of global integration with Twitter India and ZipDial, any mobile user in India can now follow the actor’s Twitter account @SrBachchan by simply dialling, or giving a missed call, at +91-22- 33010007.

    Now fans across India can get access to their big screen idol’s thoughts on several topics and get a peek into the latest happenings in his life. The collaboration in association with Fluence, will allow everyone across the country to follow and engage the superstar on Twitter via SMS. The service works for all mobile users in the country with any phone or any operator; moreover it’s free irrespective of whether they have a Twitter account or data-enabled phone.

    Commenting on this service, CA Media India EVP investee operations Rishi Negi said: “The madness that is associated to Bachchan has no boundaries and to this date fans are mesmerised by a mere interaction with him. On 11 October every year millions throng outside his Mumbai residence to catch a glimpse and wish the brightest shining star of the Indian film industry a Happy Birthday. This year thanks to this technology fans across the nation who don’t access Twitter will be able to connect with their idol on his big day and read his thoughts  and sentiments about his life and the world in general and on an on-going basis on their phone.”

    Twitter India market director Rishi Jaitly said: “Twitter is live, conversational and public. Bachchan’s use of Twitter has for years exemplified the power of our platform’s ability to connect audiences directly with the people and organizations that interest them most. We are pleased to see ZipDial and Bachchan use the Twitter platform to extend his reach even further.”

    ZipDial founder and CEO Valerie R Wagoner said: “By using ZipDial, Asia’s leading mobile marketing platform with the simple user experience of ‘missed calls’, Bachchan can now reach the hundreds of millions of fans in India and internationally who have phones but do not yet use Twitter. Bachchan’s fans can now interact with their iconic hero on Twitter through the simple ZipDial interface of dialing. Our team members at the company are among Bachchan’s fans, so we are particularly thrilled that his ZipDial number 02233010007 reflects his suave and heroic ‘007’ persona.”

  • Google teams up with US, UK govt. agencies to bring internet to the common man

    Google teams up with US, UK govt. agencies to bring internet to the common man

    NEW DELHI: Government agencies in the UK and US along with Google have announced a joint venture by the name of “Alliance for Affordable Internet” to bring internet to the population of billions on planet earth.

    The initiative is a joint venture by Google, US agency for International Development and its British Counterpart and philanthropic company run by eBay Founder Omidyar, Omidyar Network.

    Other helping firms include Yahoo, Microsoft, Intel, Cisco, Ericsson and African ISP MainOne. Alliance is going to work to pursue the governments to regulate and policy formation for better internet access.

    “A4AI has a specific goal in mind: to reach the UN Broadband Commission target of entry-level broadband access priced at less than five per cent of monthly income worldwide,” said Jennifer Haroon, Principal Executive of Google’s access programme, in a blog post.
    Group is working to contact 10 countries till 2015 to negotiate on easing of import of technology and resources to kick start the internet revolution in those countries. This envisaged goal can have far reaching impact not only in those countries but on whole global scenario. It can help reshape the social, corporate and political outlook which is visible by the part played by Social Media in Arab spring.

  • India has biggest appetite for mobilecCommerce states SAP Study

    India has biggest appetite for mobilecCommerce states SAP Study

    BENGALURU:  Consumers in India are leading the demand for mobile commerce services, with 97 per cent of consumers asking for more mobile interactions with banks, telcos, retailers, utilities and other businesses. SAP AG recently announced the study findings for India which indicates an impressive traction of mobile commerce in the country with 80 per cent of the population making parallel usage of the mobile phones other than just calls and text messages.

    More than half of the consumers in India indulge in maximum mobile purchases for entertainment service like cinema, theatre shows, DVDs, sport games (53 per cent) followed by music downloads (48 per cent) says the study.

    The surging popularity of mobile commerce in the country also highlights the increase in the internet penetration with 63 per cent of consumers accessing the internet on their mobile at least once a day.  65 per cent of the users feel mobile is a convenient mode of transaction leading to a greater consumer adoption in this segment.

    The study found that India scores high in using mobile for banking transactions when compared to other countries in the world. As per the statistics, excluding voice messages, most of the mobile owners turn to their mobile phones for bill payments (78 per cent), bank transactions (72 per cent) and for setting up a new account (74 per cent).

    “The dynamic nature of business as well as the freedom to operate from different parts of the world and at odd times has created a need for mobile commerce becoming mainstreamed,” said SAP Platform & Technology Business at SAP  Head – Sales -Neeraj Athalye, “Our strategy and solutions – unwired by mobile apps and fueled by in-memory and advanced analytics – underscore our unique ability to enable companies from the boardroom to shop floors, to better anticipate, accelerate and differentiate their business.”

    Mobile Transactions in India

    The research shows how mobile based transactions have gained popularity in India and has become an integral part of the consumer’s life.

    *More than half of the consumers in India indulge in maximum mobile purchases for entertainment service like cinema, theatre shows, DVDs, sport games (53 per cent) followed by music downloads (48 per cent)

    *The other key purchases via mobile are clothes/footware/other attires (47 per cent) and books or e-books (40 per cent)

    While embracing the appetite for mobile purchase adoption, it is vital that organisations looking to develop products and services for India are able to balance the desire for ease and convenience with security requirements:

    *In the study, 57 per cent of users in the country believe that once they gain confidence in mobile security, they will increase their mobile payment activity

    *Providing services that are lower cost (24 per cent) and personalised (33 per cent) will encourage mobile owners to make more bank transfers through their mobile phones, in turn increasing the mobile based consumption in India

    *Consumers in India are driven to buy goods using their mobile phone by exclusive offers (33 per cent) and coupons (26 per cent).

    The research also reflects that ease of use is a core principle that will accelerate overall user adoption in the telecommunications industry

    *Free minutes, texts and Web use (26 per cent), personalized services (28 per cent) and lower cost services (26 per cent) will encourage consumers in India to use their mobile to check usage data for their mobile account.

    Research Methodology

    3,288 interviews were conducted with adults aged 18+ who own a mobile phone (basic or smartphone) in APAC (China n=1000, India n=1050, Japan n=651, Australia n=587).

    Respondents completed an online survey in March/April 2013. Research conducted by Loudhouse, an independent research agency based in London.

  • Scripps’ website puts popular TV shows online

    Scripps’ website puts popular TV shows online

    MUMBAI: Scripps Networks Interactive, owner of the Food Network and the Travel Channel, can rest easy as advertising spending plateaus on television and explodes on the Web. The Knoxville, Tennessee-based, lifestyle media company announced on 3 October that it was launching ulive.com, a destination site for short-form videos and for clips and full-length episodes from its half-dozen cable networks.

    A highlight of Ulive – rhymes with you give – will be its more than 70 original Web series, some with Scripps stars, like the Travel Channel’s Bert Kreischer, and some featuring newcomers. In a demonstration of digital video’s appeal to advertisers, Ford Motor will have a starring role in nine custom episodes featuring ulive talent.

    Though video advertising on the Web is still a fraction of what’s spent on television, digital is growing fast. Advertisers will shell out $5.8 billion on Web video in 2014, a 39 per cent spike over 2013, according to eMarketer. Television advertising will grow 3% next year to $68.5 billion.

    “There really aren’t enough quality video advertising opportunities,” said ulive COO Lisa Choi Owens. “Given that our content is incredibly high quality in categories that are really relevant to advertisers, they’re excited to have this.”

  • Instagram photo, video ads on their way

    Instagram photo, video ads on their way

    MUMBAI: Instagram will soon be inserting photo and video ads into the stream for its US members, the three-year-old Facebook-owned service announced Thursday. People will notice the “occasional ad” in the “next couple months,” Instagram said.

     

    Seeing photos and videos from brands you don’t follow will be new, so we’ll start slow,” Instagram said in a blog post on the change. “We’ll focus on delivering a small number of beautiful, high-quality photos and videos from a handful of brands that are already great members of the Instagram community.”

     

    The ads have yet to make their appearance in Instagram’s mobile apps, but the service is prepping people in advance of their release so as to stave off a potential backlash from the community.

     

    The change, though expected, will be a radical one for the more than 150 million people who use Instagram’s iOS and Android applications on a monthly basis. Though a boon for parent-company Facebook’s bottom line, the ads bring with them the potential to alienate active users and could stir up a controversy like the one that bubbled up when Instagram temporarily changed its terms of service at the end of last year.

     

    Instagram, for its part, is promising magazine-quality ads that “feel as natural to Instagram as the photos and videos many of you already enjoy from your favorite brands.” The service also said that users can, just as on Facebook, click to hide the ads they don’t like.

  • Techzone and Aircel launch Re 1 store

    Techzone and Aircel launch Re 1 store

    MUMBAI: After Techzone’s alliance with Aircel for Re 1 video store four months back, the encouraging response has prompted the launch of another promising platform – Aircel’s Re 1 store!  Powered by Techzone as their technology and platform partner, Aircel has enhanced its offerings for their users by opening the exciting Re 1 store that includes downloading videos, full tracks, images and games just for Re 1.

     

    Techzone not only offers its vast library of more than 10,000 pieces of content across multiple categories in more than 12 languages to this store but has also powered the VAS platform for Aircel. Consumers can access this latest value added service on mobile via WAP or GPRS/2G/3G and download the same on mobile handset at just Re1 per content. The social media savvy youth can also share their content preference on Facebook and Twitter along with referring the same to their friends.

     

    The content at store for Re 1 covers over 12 languages including English, Hindu, Marathi, Gujarati, Assamese, Bhojpuri, Tamil, Telugu and Malayalam amongst others. This new VAS would let the consumers download the videos across 8 genres including bollywood, Hollywood, reality shows, lifestyle, music, regional, comedy and more from a vast collection of 10,000+ videos. Along with the latest music, Techzone also offers their aficionados retro music too.

     

    To engage more customers, the Re 1 store will have ‘Goodies Section’ and Premium section where the customers can collect points on every download and later redeem those points for recharge, movie tickets and much more and Premium section will offer high on value combo offers wherein a user can avail packs for Rs 10 or for Rs 25 and enjoy different services. Users can also book mark by downloading the icon on the handset where the icon would direct them to the WAP page directly, thus making the process simpler. This service is aimed at introducing more Aircel customers to the mobile internet experience. The charges for browsing the portal is as per the data plans opted by the users.

     

    Explaining the expansion of their VAS offering, Techzone MD Naveen Bhandari said, “Increased usage of smart phones and internet penetration in the Tier II & Tier III cities, has led the VAS industry to grow leaps and bounds resulting us to provide innovative services to the customers. With approximately more than a billion subscribers in India there is a strong potential market for expansion in terms of services. Sticking to our pull based strategy our content team is constantly making an effort to add plethora of new services and features so as to reach out to those billion consumers. The VAS market, though currently facing turbulence for a short term, is likely to see an upward surge and grow by 15-20 per cent by the end of 2013. This growth is majorly due to cheaper handsets and growing digital space and we are expecting positive response for our services.”

  • Trendspotters.tv goes mobile with the beta launch of its Android app

    Trendspotters.tv goes mobile with the beta launch of its Android app

    MUMBAI: India’s first online digital channel, Trendspotters.tv, is set for a beta launch of its app that will help you stay tuned to the latest trends, wherever you are. With direct access to watch all the stories that are trending on www.trendspotters.tv, it helps you catch a quick glimpse of what’s hot this season in the world of fashion, entertainment and lifestyle. It also enables you to share interesting news in these segments with your friends, through popular social networking sites like facebook, twitter etc.

     

    Trendspotters.tv founder Kunal Kishore Sinha elaborates: “The launch of our new Android app for Trendspotters.tv is in continuation of our commitment to reach out to our target audience through the tablet, smartphone and online platform. The mobile generation today demands a way of accessing their news in a manner that is snappy and crisp without losing its relevance. The app caters to this need to be in the thick of micro trends as they happen as well as comment, review and share their feedback directly with our team.”

     

    The app is also created to enhance user engagement with an opportunity to connect with Facebook and Twitter friends via the Trendspotters.tv page. It is a whole new way of digital interaction that manoeuvres the medium of the smartphone to keep you ahead of the times. The app is push notification enabled so as to alert you with new content, as soon as it hits the page online.

     

    With Trendspotters.tv gaining favourable traction since its launch so far, its app goes a step further in empowering users to stay on top of the best of entertainment and fashion, through a platform that is quick, convenient and extremely user-friendly.