Developing a new television audience rating system is a long, arduous and costly process. It has required as a prerequisite that the three major stakeholders – IBF, AAAI and ISA come together under one umbrella (BARC) and agree on a process acceptable to all three parties to ensure this major initiative is accepted by all stakeholders. The industry expects to be well along in implementing this new measurement system by the end of 2013.
The goal of BARC is to bring about transparency in the measurement system, greater accuracy while maintaining cost efficiencies and more checks and balances by separating responsibilities in the measurement process as well as countering fraud through rigorous ground monitoring. The industry recognises that no sampling technique can be 100 per cent accurate but seeks to reduce the sampling error and overcome to the extent possible the laws of small samples.
The first step in the process is to create a transparent establishment study from which the universe can be projected that will be owned by BARC and available to all stakeholders. To this end, an RFI has been issued and based on the responses, an RFP will follow. Once a firm is selected, approximate 350,000 to 450,000 households on a nationwide basis will participate in an extensive survey that will take 6 – 8 months to complete.
The establishment survey will form the base for the required number of measurement homes which are likely to exceed 25,000 nationwide. Once the number is finalised, new RFPs will be issued to select a vendor for the measurement system, and vendors for data collection and analysis and reporting. Breaking apart these tasks amongst different vendors is expected to bring greater accountability and transparency and build the most robust audience measurement system in the world. Ongoing ground monitoring will ensure that the system is not compromised over time.
Given the expense of setting up the system, the time required and the fact that all stakeholders buy into ‘BARC’, the industry expects the BARC measurement system will become the single measurement system in India. This is typical of worldwide audience measurement where generally a given market has only one accepted measurement currency.
But for television the past 10 years have packed in a lot of punch and gut-wrenching change. I will try and examine what are the 10 major trends that have characterised the past television decade. The list is not comprehensive and I am sure there are many other highlights others may want to add; but this is my effort.
The emergence of reality TV: Reality TV roared into the forefront in the past decade. The nation watched inmates in a house being cooped together in a home for around three months and their reactions to each other in that closed environment in Bigg Boss in its seasons. Celebrities and their tolerance to extreme tasks were tested in Khatron Ke Khiladi. Then, youth went around on a predefined route on bikes in MTV‘s Roadies. From the UTV stable emerged a show that shook the nation with its focus on infidelity in the form of Bindass‘ Emotional Atyachaar. Partners were discovered on TV and marriage took place on shows like Rakhi Ka Swaywamvar and Rahul Dulhaniya Le Jayega. Individuals bared their most hidden secrets to Rajiv Khandelwal in the popular Sach Ka Saamna. Past life regression was explored in Raaz Pichle Janam Ka. Talent hunts such as Sa Re Ga Ma Pa, Indian Idol, Nach Baliye, Jhalak Dikhla Ja, Dance India Dance added oodles of reality punch to enthrall Indian viewers.
On the general entertainment side, an attempt is being made to set up a programming code and ways of compliance to it by the Indian Broadcasters‘ Foundation. While there were moves afoot on the content front, the government pussyfooted its way into regulation on the distribution front.
Sport as a grand television spectacle: Cheerleaders, belles and whistles, the involvement of filmstars in teams, the decade saw sports becoming a television spectacle like nothing else. Sports – read cricket – television was serious business in the seventies, eighties and even the nineties and meant for serious students of the game. But in an effort to broadbase the sport and make it appealing to women, female commentators were brought in whose clothes made the headlines.
Close to 1,200 hours a to 1,200 hours a day of news is churned out daily by the news channels. According to an estimate, around 600 channels have been licensed to uplink from India. Of this, a majority of the applications were for channels in the news space. So much has been the rush in the news television space that even a state such as Andhra Pradesh has about 15-16 news channels in Telugu.
“Our reality shows such as ‘Pyete Hidigir Halli Lifu’ (PHHL), ‘Halli Hyda Pyeteg Banda’ (HHPB) ‘Pyete Mandi Kadige Bandru’ (PMKB) have helped bring in younger and newer audiences – the 15-24 year olds, to Kannada television. To our pleasant surprise we find that even the 25 plus age groups are glued to PMKB during the 8-9 pm time slot,” avers Chandrasekharan.
“Also to to attract the youngster, we have NGC programs with a Kannada voice over on air for an hour. We have brought in successful soaps such as ‘Lakumi’, a weekend comedy talk show ‘Maja with Sruja’, mythology shows like ‘Guru Raghvendra Vaibhava’, a weekend horror reality show ‘Shhh’, Tulu language shows, etc., into our programming mix,” informs Chandrasekharan.
Suvarna claims that it has set a record with the world‘s biggest friendship band as part of its initiative to promote the show ‘Classmates.’ ‘Classmates’ has friendship at schooldays as its core theme. It has also implemented classroom-to-classroom promotions in over 170 colleges in 10 towns.
Take for instance the Ranbir Kapoor-Katrina Kaif starrer Ajab Prem Ki Ghazab Kahani. Colors premiered the movie in December 2009, just a month after its theatrical release. The movie garnered a 7.45 TVR (C&S 4+, HSM), contributing 50.2 GRPs to the channel. On the other hand, Aamir Khan’s 3 Idiots was on Sony seven months after its release and was a table turner for the channel as it earned 91.8 GRPs (10.88 TVR) to make Sony the third Hindi GEC for that week.
Consider this: average box office office performers such as All The Best, De Dana Dan and Atithi Tum Kab Jaoge along with the box office disaster Veer managed to do favourably well on television with each grabbing an above 3 TVR.
But does this mean that movie premieres, especially the big tickets, always pull in mass eyeballs? Not really. Industry players believe that the TV viewership success of a movie is the functionality of its content and the rigorous promotion that the channel performs. And therefore, a low marketing push for box office hits like My Name Is Khan (Star Plus) and Wanted (Star Plus) on TV did just average as they drew in 2.14 TVR and 3.95 TVR respectively.
3 Idiots, on the other hand, went through an aggressive marketing process. The movie certainly grabbed a historical share of the viewership in the Hindi GEC space but the push also came in from meticulous promotional initiatives. Sony devised strategic promotional activity with the cast of the film and infused it into the programming of the channel which helped in further driving up the viewership.
These range from apparel manufacturers, airlines and TV hardware companies to gaming and DTH service providers. Everybody wants a piece of the action which comes around just once in four years.
Sony had relaunched on 26 May with a new slate of five dailies for the 8-11 pm time zone, donning the tagline, ‘Badal Rahe Hain Hum‘. The channel also lined up two weekend shows, one of which was the return of the big-ticket reality show Dus Ka Dum in season 2 with Salman Khan as the anchor. The revamp strategy also involved the axing of all its weekday prime time content except its age-old shows Boogie Woogie and CID.
Backing this statement is Tam data, which reveals that C.I.D., Boogie Woogie and Dus Ka Dum were the top contributors to the channel grades. The last five-week average TVR for C.I.D stands at 3.4, while Dus Ka Dum is at 2.1 and Boogie Woogie at 1.5.
Still believing in the power of reality, the channel went forward to launch its newest property, the Dance Premier League (DPL).