ITV

Category: Specials

  • Economic slump – time to introspect marketing function?

    Economic slump – time to introspect marketing function?

    Let's face it. Asian Tiger China's GDP growth rate has hit a 27-year low and is likely to end 2019 under 6 per cent. And GDP growth rate of India – the other Asian tiger has also hit a six year low and is expected to fall to 6 per cent in this fiscal year, according to the World Bank. Both these big cats are however, above the Asia Pacific GDP growth rate which is expected to be below 4 per cent. 

    2019 – year of the falling economies?

    While a steep fall in demand, direct trade disputes with the USA & political churn in Hong Kong is responsible for the 27 year low in GDP growth rate of China, to make matters worse, the Chinese government has not yet recovered from the after effects of providing stimulus to the Chinese economy for nearly a decade.  

    Back home, the real estate industry is still struggling & factory output is slowing down, resulting in slow growth in employment. However, considering the situation in our neighbouring country, while the government has taken a slew of measures – steep cut in corporate tax rate (22 per cent from 30 per cent) and an even lower tax rate for new manufacturing companies (15 per cent) to attract new foreign direct investments (FDI), the same is yet to translate into meaningful outcome and spur growth. 

    Economy in advertising

    With all this economic downturn, advertising was bound to be depressed. And it did, especially in the last two quarters. The Indian advertising industry's estimated worth was Rs 62,000 crore in 2018. Most predictions of Indian ad spend growth hovered between 10 per cent & 12 per cent riding on the wave of ad spends during the 2019 General Elections & the ICC Cricket World Cup. However, the actual growth may be lower at around 9 per cent – 10 per cent (including inflation), taking the total annual ad spend to Rs 67,000 crore. (By the way, the Asia Pacific ad spend growth rate for 2019 is predicted at 4 per cent.) 

    So what worked & what didn't? 

    Television medium growth is estimated between 9 per cent and 10 per cent in 2019. Digital medium growth is estimated between 25 per cent and 30 per cent in 2019. Print medium growth is expected to range between 5 per cent and 7 per cent and all the other media growth being under 6 per cent. So while television managed to hold its fort, print medium was marginalised in a real sense.  Meanwhile, digital medium hopscotched to pole position from where it is poised to overtake print & challenge television. And the other media chugged along.

    Role of marketing dept in slowdown

    It's all very well to acknowledge the economic slowdown, demand slump and the marketing slack. Question is, with a full team strength, what should marketing focus on during this slack period?

    For one, marketing can start adopting technology seriously. This is a challenging task for the CMO & his team, but if successful, this is the surest way of boosting marketing ROI. How? Because you can only improve what you can measure. And bringing IT into marketing is the first step towards measurement.  The objective itself is deceptively simple: bring information technology closer to marketing strategy as well as marketing operations.

    The first step can be total process automation for Marketing Depts., where every activity is included. Apart from bringing discipline, process automation will also bring uniformity & transparency.

    . Once marketing processes are automated, a central marketing database is automatically created and populated in real time.

    . This bridges the "data chasm" between Marketing, Finance & Sales, bringing data transparency.

    . This "data transparency" will result in immediate cuts in unnecessary marketing expenditure – as managers will start to spend with more caution. This itself can result in 10% to 15% immediate savings.

    . The central marketing database will also provide real time dashboard reporting to Marketing Managers for quick reviews.

    . This data can be clubbed with sales, research, share of voice … to get ROI statistics.

    . And the clubbed data can be further used for conducting analytics exercises & generating deep marketing insights.

    Marketing departments must adopt information technology. And for this, the CMO must lead & exert his influence on his team. And this is the perfect time to solemnise marketing department's marriage with information technology & contribute to the company’s savings for now & the future!
    (The author is founder, Brandintelle Services. The views expressed are his own and Indiantelevision.com may not subscribe to them.)

  • OTT & streamers 2019: Full steam ahead!

    OTT & streamers 2019: Full steam ahead!

    MUMBAI: If 2018 was big for the over-the-top (OTT) platforms, 2019 was even bigger for the ecosystem. Existing platforms pumped in in even more money into content creation, distribution and customer acquisition even as new players made a grand entry. While in the previous year, the focus was just on content creation, 2019 was about course correction, forging partnerships, striking distribution deals, entering new segments, innovating and getting to know the consumer better. Not just for the homegrown players but for the big international ones as well.

    2019 was the year when indiantelevision.com evolved its Vidnet OTT confab into one which offered conferences, training and masterclasses from some of the creators of successful originals.

    New kids on the block:

    Maybe a little late in the day, but a few platforms started their journey this year and created a buzz in the market. In February 2019, Times Internet launched a new avatar of its one of the most ambitious bets, MX Player. To grab a bigger slice of the ambitious video streaming market, the OTT platform commenced its play with five MX Original Series. Shemaroo Entertainment Ltd, one of the legacy players, which owns a rich content library, forayed into the space around the same time. However, Shemaroo banked on its existing content for ShemarooMe rather than burning cash for original content. But while MX Player went totally advertising-led, ShemarooMe took the freemium route.  

    Later in the second half of the calendar year, IN10 Media, a diversified vertical of infotainment channel Epic TV launched a new subscription-based documentary streaming platform DocuBay. The last quarter witnessed another major announcement – the launch of VOOT Kids from the house of Viacom18 which has already established a significant digital play with VOOT.  Unlike its main OTT platform, Viacom18 is relying on subscription for the kids’ platform right from the get-go. 

    Moreover, the year was equally eventful in the global OTT market as well. Tech giant Apple forayed deeper into streaming with the launch of its subscription-based video streaming service Apple TV+ in November. A few days later, Walt Disney launched its much-awaited streaming service Disney+ at a very reasonable sticker price. While the former made its streaming service available in India at Rs 99 per month, what the Star Disney combine will do with Disney+ in India has to still to be worked out, considering the huge popularity of Hotstar.

    More investment in original content:

    Along with new OTT platforms entering the market, the existing platforms also increased their investments in original content.  ZEE5 from Zee Entertainment Enterprises spent the year increasing its focus on large-scale originals, franchises, digital original films and regional language shows even as it has already developed a robust original content library across languages.

    Among  the shows that struck a chord with viewers include: Rangbaaz, which was launched late 2018 soared in 2019. The Kunal Khemu-starring BP Singh-produced Abhay too made its mark after being launched in early 2019. Kaafir – an original from Siddharth Malhotra’s Alchemy Films – too was much talked about. Zeel took its successful TV show Jamai Raaja to Zee5 in the shape of Jamai 2.0 during the year.

    After banking on catch-up and sports content for a long time,  Star India’s Hotstar also decided to invest in premium original content. Reportedly, Hotstar jumped onto the bandwagon with a Rs 120 crore investment plan. The primary reason to launch originals is to convert users into paid subscribers in the face of increasing competition. Hitherto, adapting successful foreign shows by infusing local flavours had been an important aspect of Hotstar’s strategy but it is certain that the platform is not going to limit itself to adaptations.

    Another player with deep pockets, Amazon Prime Video, also scaled up its local content offering along with a stellar roster of movies. With highly acclaimed originals like Made in Heaven, The Family Man, the OTT platform has already attracted enough user attention. Moreover, the second seasons of earlier hits are also in pipeline.

    Amazon Prime Video’s international rival has gradually evolved its investment in India – Netflix CEO Reed Hastings in his latest visit revealed that it is committing Rs 3000 crore in this year and next for Indian content.

    Other homegrown players like VOOT, SonyLIV also realigning their focus on original content as they don’t have significant play in the segment.

    Innovation with pricing:

    The streamers are not only experimenting with content to make build consumer love, but they are also jiggling around with pricing  in order to find the sweet spot which appeals to consumers. Rather than directly slashing prices, the streaming platforms have opted for sachet pricing.

    All the major players – Hotstar, Netflix, Amazon Prime Video, ZEE5, SonyLIV followed this strategy.

    Hotstar launched a Hotstar VIP pack at Rs 365 a year, much lower than its premium service which is priced at Rs 999 per year. SonyLIV has already tested a weekly subscription package priced at Rs 29 only. While ZEE5 has  launched special packages in languages including Tamil, Telugu and Kannada, it is looking at a mobile-only plan as well.

    Even ALTBalaji is also likely to consider having sachet pricing in the next two years.

    Most importantly, Netflix in an industry-first move launched a mobile-only pack in India priced at Rs 199. Maybe the myth that Indian consumers are shy to pay for content has been broken but the players have also realised Indian consumers are value-conscious.

    Experimenting with new partnerships:

    At the same time when the platforms were trying to differentiate in the crowded space, they also forged interesting partnerships. The new entrant MX Player stitched content tie-ups with Sony Liv, Arré and Hoichoi. Hotstar did a deal with Hooq to make its Hollywood offering stronger. But the most interesting one was the betrothal announcement between ZEE5 and Alt Balaji. It went way beyond content syndication – more towards content sharing, an arrangement that includes co-creation of a number of premium originals which will be available to subscribers of both the platforms.

    Although telco-partnerships have proved to be helpful for OTT platforms, the profitability of platform-to-platform alliances in the long-run yet remains to be tested.

    Key people movements:

    Along with changes in business plans, content strategy, the OTT platforms reshuffled their teams in 2019 as well. Netflix continued expanding its Indian team with TV and streaming veterans being hired locally,  including the appointment of Voot content head Monika Shergill, and the BBC’s Myleeta Aga. VOOT on its part recruited its new COO Gourav Rakshit from Shaadi.com keeping its subscription business in mind. After Uday Sodhi quit, SPNI handed the reins of SonyLiv to television vet Danish Khan. Ekta Kapoor-led ALTBalaji has seen high profile exits as CEO Sunil Lulla and COO Sunil Nair quit the organisation this year.

    2019 was exciting for the OTT platforms undoubtedly. The cloud of content regulation over the platforms also seems to be clear as the government has reportedly agreed to allow the streamers to self regulate.

    But a few of the old issues like lack of OTT measurement systems, lower broadband penetration, content piracy are still proving bothersome.

    In addition to that, the global and Indian economic crises, a hike in telecom and data tariffs may prove a dampener for the industry, if not in the long-term, at least for the first half of the next calendar year.

    So the challenges will continue to dog the streamers as they plod on to conquer a nation’s TV junkies.

  • 2019: The year industry got hit in the gut

    2019: The year industry got hit in the gut

    MUMBAI: The year of churn. Gut-wrenching churn like the industry has never experienced before. That’s how the media and entertainment history books will describe the year 2019. CEOs of media companies had to develop cast-iron stomachs to see it through.

    “We are struggling to just survive,” said a CEO of a leading news broadcaster to indiantelevision.com. “I am praying that I can see through the next 12 months with my head above the water.”

    In the backdrop of an impending global recession sparked off by the trade spat between two presidents – the US’ Donald Trump and China’s Xi Jinping – and the dreaded Brexit chaos under Boris Johnson, the industry had to deal with the cautious mind state that crept into the business on account of the slowdown. Add to this the lending phobia that has become endemic in the banking system, courtesy the implosion of a few financial institutions and banks. Net result: cash evaporated in the economy, leaving many organisation cash strapped.

    The year started with a new TV pricing order which was finally enforced, sending the pay TV broadcast, cable, satellite industry into a tizzy. While welcomed by all, the manner in which it was rolled out was questioned as the distribution fraternity, for the most part, was not geared up for it.  Subscribers vanished. What were considered important genres once were hit by an earthquake that saw ratings plummet. Niche regional language channels suddenly raced to the numero uno spot, thanks to the fact that they were free to air.

    Mergers shook the landscape globally, including India, as the year 2019 and were all set to hit the Indian landscape as the year was ending with Mukesh Ambani having parleys with Sony to merge with his TV18 and Viacom18 venture. Disney went through with the execution of its merger globally with Fox reflected in India in the form of Star absorbing Disney India. Unlike the rest of the world where Disney was the primary driver of the union. Viacom merged with CBS in a deal that could have repercussions worldwide. The promoters of Zee Entertainment Enterprises bit the bullet on ownership, in order to pay off hungry creditors. They chose to sell their equity and retain a minority position, and paid off creditors through the proceeds but keep India’s largest indigenous broadcast network in play amongst the top three.  Free to air channels flourished and blossomed, even as the pay TV sector groaned under the changing paradigm brought about by the new tariff order. However, the entire pay TV sector acknowledges openly that the NTO is the best way forward for the entire industry. On the advertising front, WPP sold 60 per cent of its stake in Kantar to Bain Capital.

    2019 will be noted as the year when advertisers tightened the noose on promotional spends, what with consumer off-take slowing down. Almost every category of product witnessed reduced or stagnant custom.

    The top agencies also splurged to improve their digital expertise. Havas Group acquired UK management consultancy Gate One, UX agency Think Design, and digital agency Langoor.

    It was the year of elections – both at the centre and in different states. But strangely for the news channels, the advertising dollars did not shower on them as expected.

    A relatively insipid festival season meant that not enough cars were driven out of the showroom; not enough consumer – both fast-moving and durables – were bought like it used to be. Estimates were that the advertising industry would have grown at around the pace of the economy.

    Cricket, cricket – it was the year of cricket. 2019 witnessed a host of high-end cricket events rolling outright from the World Cup to the IPL to India’s tours domestically and internationally. And of course, they sucked in a fair bit of ad spends, across Star and Sony.

    But optimism continued to run high as channels continued to hit uplink stations and playout facilities. The Epic group launched a free to air channel and was in line to introduce more. Zee TV was also pacing the sidelines with its new regional language offerings.

    On the distribution front, Airtel flirted with the acquisition of DishTV, which was still recovering from the indigestion it suffered following its swallowing loss maker Videocon d2h. Tata Sky on its part emerged as the satellite platform, which knew where it was headed thanks to the strong leadership, which has instituted discipline in its deal making with content providers and a very strong customer orientation.  The distribution platforms started pushing devices which in turn had the streaming services installed in a bid to retain consumers.

    Streamers gathered steam as the platforms swore to spend big on churning out eye-popping content, even as they continued to focus on customer acquisition and retention. And they tossed around money for productions like a gambler with a winning streak on the casino floor, giving birth to a new breed of producers, creators who let loose cutting edge content, much to the delight of a select bunch of OTT viewers.  Following in the footsteps of their global brethren, the Indian streamers as well acquired or commissioned producers to create exciting local shows. Global leaders in turn had to reorient their pricing strategies and introduce low level value packs in line with that of the Indian OTTs and more suitable to Indian incomes.

    On the people front, the year witnessed upheaval of sorts. The bad economic clime apart, which led to companies focusing on productivity, saw head counts falling. Then there was the merger pressure, which led to attrition. Estimates are that almost 2,500 media executives lost their jobs in 2019.

    Senior executives said sayonara to their companies. Amongst the high profile departures included: Raj Nayak, CEO of Colors, Sunil Lulla at Balaji Telefilms, Sanjay Gupta at Star India, Sunil Nair at Alt Balaji, Ashok Venkatramani at Zee Media, Barc India CEO Partho Dasgupta,  Sneha Rajani at Sony Pictures Networks, Uday Sodhi at SonyLiv, Nikhil Gandhi at Zoom, among several others. 

    Other executives got reappointed: Punit Goenka as the head honcho of Zee Entertainment for the next five years (despite the fact that he – along with his brother Amit and father Subhash Chandra – is a minority shareholder today), and Jawahar Goel as the chief at Dish TV India.   Even as the year was ending, Uday Shankar found a real cool way to fill the mighty big shoes of Sanjay Gupta. He handed over the entire TV operations of Star Disney to his long time regional language colleague K Madhavan, while temporarily retaining control of Hotstar. Apparently, a senior executive with long experience in both television and streaming is slated to be announced as the new Hotstar lead very soon, if insider info is to be believed. Voot hired a new CEO in Gourav Rakshit, who filled in a seat which had been left vacant with the departure of Gaurav Gandhi in 2018.

    Dentsu Aegis Network found a new India CEO in Anand Bhadkamkar as incumbent Ashish Bhasin moved to Singapore to lead as APAC CEO. Its daughter company SVG Media suffered a big human loss with the untimely demise of its CEO Anurag Gupta. Erstwhile COO Deven Dharamdasani was promoted to the vacant post.

    Most of the TV executives are making a beeline for the digital world. Examples: Sanjay Gupta towards Google, Sunil Nair towards Firework, Nikhil Gandhi as Byte Dance boss.

    While 2019 left a lot to be desired for those in the business, executives are hoping that 2020 will prove to be closer to being a twenty-twenty year.

  • IBC19, Amsterdam: ‘Red Bee Media builds hybrid media cloud environment with Cisco and 7fivefive’

    IBC19, Amsterdam: ‘Red Bee Media builds hybrid media cloud environment with Cisco and 7fivefive’

    MUMBAI: Red Bee Media has been working with Cisco and 7fivefive to create a sophisticated media centric hybrid cloud environment, designed to streamline media production, playout, media processing and distribution services for global broadcast customers.

    As one of the world’s leading managed services provider, Red Bee is creating a next generation media environment with cutting edge-technology including the Cisco Unified Computing System (UCS) and cloud software.

    “The Media landscape has changed forever and this cloud platform, with best of breed software coupled with our own micro services will allow us to significantly change the way managed services are offered in the market.”, says David Travis, Chief Product & Technology Officer, Red Bee Media. “It allows for commercial and technical flexibility while addressing the cost challenges all our customers are facing. Our work together with 7fivefive and Cisco is a showcase of innovation with the creation of a hybrid cloud architecture that is truly unique in the media industry.”

    Cisco UCS  provides a unique network architecture with cloud-like behaviour on-premise with an end-to-end hardware stack with superior performance and security to manage today’s network demands, and into the future. 7fivefive is the consulting and integration partner leading project implementation. With this new hybrid cloud media solution Red Bee can offer enhanced speed and performance across its portfolio of solutions including:

    ·         Access services

    ·         Channel origination

    ·         Content origination, production and post production

    ·         Content enrichment and distribution

    ·         Media management

    ·         OTT Streaming

    Dave Ward, senior vice president, CTO of Engineering and chief architect, Cisco, says: “Red Bee is marking a milestone in the industry’s quest to transition to IP and virtualized media data centres for simpler, faster networking. Our work together with 7fivefive created a cloud-powered network with the flexibility and security Red Bee needs to scale quickly and adapt to the demands of the media and entertainment landscape.”

    Red Bee Media will be showcasing its new cloud-ready platform at IBC in Amsterdam with its ‘Leaders in Live’ demonstration featuring Live football utilizing pure software defined services all in IP. You can see the demo at 11.00 Friday, 16.00 Saturday and 13.00 Sunday on the Red Bee Media Booth (14.D26).

  • BJP’s magic-bullet approach to social media for Election 2019

    BJP’s magic-bullet approach to social media for Election 2019

    MUMBAI: With less than 10 days left for the most awaited General Election of India, where the country selects its next prime minister, global social media giant Facebook, which also owns Instagram and WhatsApp, took down around 700 pages for showing “coordinated inauthentic behaviour”, associated with various political parties, from its site.

    The list of the pages taken down by the global giant from Facebook and Instagram under its refined social media policy for political campaigns included 687 associated with an IT Cell of the Indian National Congress (INC) and 15 belonging to Indian IT firm Silver Touch, which usually handles the duties for the ruling National Democratic Alliance (NDA) government.

    These pages were spending a hefty amount of money on promotions and advertisement. While the 687 accounts linked with Congress had spent $39,000 between August 2014 and March 2019, the 15 pages being associated with BJP had nearly double spends with $70,000 flowing from June 2014 to February 2019.

    And it can very well be just the tip of the iceberg. It is no revelation that social media has been playing a prominent role in the political battles not just in India but globally for the past few years. In fact, the landslide victory that BJP recorded in the 2014 polls, probably the biggest ever in its decades-old history, has been significantly attributed to the smart use of social media as a tool to allure young voters.

    And this year is no different. While all political parties are spending a considerable amount of money and manpower in refining their social media strategies, BJP is way ahead of the curve. Compare the amount spent by a collective of 687 pages with just the 15 that have been taken down by Facebook, and one can see the stark difference in the expenditures being incurred by the parties.

    `While none of the pages revealed the identity of the source running these accounts and from where the money was pouring in to spend on these promotional activities, it is evident that the IT machinery of BJP is quite strong and refined. Given that its magic-bullet approach resulted in a success in 2014, it is obvious that the party will once again take the same route.

    As per Facebook’s Ad Library, which includes data related to ads of political nature and relevant to national importance on Facebook and Instagram, political advertisers cumulatively have spent more than Rs 8 crore in less than two months and again leading the charts is BJP with top three accounts promoting it. One of the topmost pages called “My First Vote For Modi” has spent close to Rs 61 lakh in the past two months. In fact, the same page is offering gifts and free BJP merchandise to people who pledge to vote for the ruling party in the upcoming elections, which means extra expenditure on those goodies.

    The BJP social media teams and leadership have been intelligent with their hashtag campaigns too. Just recently the #MainBhiChowkidaar campaign was trending on Twitter. Not just that, the on-ground rallies with people showing support to this slogan surely grabbed a lot many eyeballs. Other hashtags like #ModiOnceMore are being used widely by the party supporters.
    While social media is a war zone that BJP is banking on very strongly, another interesting attribute of its campaigns is the Modi merchandise. From caps to sarees to masks to kids’ snack packets, Modi’s face can be found anywhere and everywhere. The TV, print, and radio campaigns have seen an equally big investment in promotions.

    Though such wide promotions might give an edge in terms of recognisability to the party, it might not be a stepping stone to success, says TRA Research CEO N Chandramouli on being asked to compare the expenditures made by the parties across media.

    He shared, “When speaking to a local political party's communication advisor recently, we got discussing on the ad budgets of the current ruling party and the others. The ad budget differences between the BJP and Congress are estimated to be at least 3 to 4-fold. With such high budgets, BJP has started advertising with high intensity early on using all media at its means. On the other hand, Congress, which is estimated to have an ad-spend of just 25-30 per cent of the ruling cash-bags laden party, is surely waiting for the appropriate time to spend most productively.”

    Elaborating more on the same, Chandramouli continued, “Not many notice this but the seven phases can be construed as a wily orchestration of distributing the lesser budget of the opposition over two extra phases to try and reduce their advertising fire-power. That said, such battles are not just won depending on the amount of ammunition that the side has, but on the ability of the party's message to mobilise people through positive messaging. Parochial politics, dividing, blaming, and finger-pointing and jingoism do not have a high impact on the highly aware electorate, who decides with the ballot keeping their personal concerns and needs in mind.”

    The party having the highest ad-decibels and ad-spends faces one more critical challenge, that of their messages going into the blind-spot of the voter due to the repeated 'noise'.

    India will go into polls over 7 phases starting 11 April to 19 May. The results will be announced on 23 May.

  • First Song of Maati Music on election

    First Song of Maati Music on election

    MUMBAI: R K Arora, ex-CEO of Zee Media and Founder and CEO of Divija Media launched “Maati Music” – a music production division of Divija Media Services Pvt Ltd. The music division aims to provide a platform to young and emerging artists, talented singers, lyricists, music composers, directors, actors and dancers to create content in different genres and languages.

    The first song on forthcoming elections“AAO MILKER MATDAAN KAREN” is all set to urge and motivate the youth and first-time voters to participate in governance by casting their vote.In the 2019 polls, 133 million young adults will get to cast their vote – 70 million young men and 63 million young women.

    In a Democracy, elections are the biggest opportunity to bring about the changes. And VOTE is the biggest weapon for this change. Commenting on this occasion, R K Arora said, ‘Voting’ is not only our ‘Right’. In fact, it is our responsibility as a citizen and we all must fulfil this responsibility with seriousness. We all MUST cast our vote and must also inspire others to cast their votes.”

    Hailing from Delhi, the singer S K Gautam is a young boy who is student of 12th standard. Music is composed by AnkitTyagi, Music Director who has an experience of 7 years in this domain. The lyricist – Akhil Singh has written more than 150 songs in the span of three years for various music companies like T-series, Zee Music, Sonotec music, Chanda music and Wave Music.

    Two songs have already been recorded will be released soon during this month.SwenToday, News Portal and You Tube channel is also part of Divija Media Services Pvt. Ltd.
     

  • India Today Television’s Roving Studio – Election Express makes a supercharged comeback

    India Today Television’s Roving Studio – Election Express makes a supercharged comeback

    MUMBAI: As we enter the final phase of election campaigning, India Today TV has once again upped the ante on innovative news delivery, with Election Express 2.0. Election Express will cover more than 10,000 kms in 50 days, travelling across the country, covering every phase of the General Elections 2019. Kicking off its journey from the Southern state of Telangana in the historical & cultural city of Hyderabad, the roving studio will next move to Andhra Pradesh, Tamil Nadu, Karnataka, Maharashtra, Madhya Pradesh, Uttar Pradesh, West Bengal, Jharkhand and Bihar before culminating the journey at the holy city & political warzone of Varanasi. It will bring to the fore local issues of national significance, gauging the pulse of the common man and the expectations they have from their chosen political parties. Experiencing elections on the move, the news narrative will be taken away from the studios and into the heartland of the country, where the fate of the nation is decided.

    What sets this mobile studio apart is the state-of-the-art hydraulic system which expands the bus horizontally turning the sitting area into a newsroom on wheels. Not only this, in this avatar the bus also has a terrace – yes you read that right. Using a custom built staircase, the anchor can climb up to the roof of the bus which gives you a bird’s eye view of the city and is the perfect location to conduct interviews and live broadcasts.

    On the voyage of Election express tracking the pulse of the nation, Kalli Purie, Vice Chairperson, India Today Group said, “We are proud of our innovative election programming, and Election Express is a testament to the constant innovation we pride ourselves on. Elections are not fought in studios but in the heat and dust of ground zero, and this gives viewers a front row seat.”

    In addition to key Interviews with Leaders and Ministers across cities, the Election Express will give a glimpse of the mood of the nation and the pulse of the voter to try and understand what makes this great democracy tick.

  • Digital industry leaders believe BJP’s ‘Chowkidar’ campaign is impactful: report

    Digital industry leaders believe BJP’s ‘Chowkidar’ campaign is impactful: report

    MUMBAI: Buzzoka, India’s most disruptive influencer marketing company has launched the Digital India Report Card, a survey that attempts to understand the performance of the current government in the digital media space.

    The survey quizzed digital media leaders through 3rd party media publishers. The custodians included agency and brand leaders across the Indian Digital Ecosystem. From top brands, top agencies and startups, Buzzoka managed to provide a more holistic understanding on the performance of the various digital initiatives.

    Overall, the survey highlights that the stakeholders of Indian Digital industry are happy with current Government’s efforts in the digital space. The experts believe that the policies implemented by the Government between 2014-2019 have given a boost to the digital ecosystem in India.

    A whopping 91% respondents believe that digital media has the influencing power to change the perception of voters in 2019 elections which is good news for the Government. The digital industry believes that current Government’s digital initiatives have helped them to reach the rural audience. It’s a massive positive step towards getting far more campaign eyeballs for brands targeting rural Indians. Also, it’s a big boost for the digital economy as brands have increased their spending on digital media.

    The Government has done a good job overall & the digital industry seems to be quite satisfied with their initiatives to boost the digital media sector in India.

    A majority of 69% respondents were satisfied with the Govt’s policies implemented to boost the digital ecosystem of the country. Over 77% agreed that they witnessed a rise in digital media budgets during 2014-2019 signaling a massive rise in Digital India infrastructure.

    Considering the current ongoing campaigns by two leading parties, 54% of respondents believed that BJP’s Main Bhi Chowkidar campaign was impactful, whereas 65% respondents believed that Congress’ Chowkidar Chor Hai campaign was a miss.

    91% agreed that digital media has the power to influence voter perception in India, while PM Narendra Modi and his party BJP were considered to be the most active leader and party on social media.

    Speaking about the survey, Ashutosh Harbola, Co-Founder, CEO, Buzzoka, said, “The survey was an important one for us as we wanted to understand the pulse of the digital media industry. Since, Buzzoka focuses on B2C influencer marketing and our overall business model is directly a beneficiary to the rising digital ecosystem, the survey becomes an important landmark in eyeing the future.”

  • BTVI adds new shows to programming as Elections 2019 captures audience

    BTVI adds new shows to programming as Elections 2019 captures audience

    MUMBAI: India’s fastest growing business news platform BTVI – Business Television India believes in bringing relevant content to its viewers. In tandem with the current political environment, the channel has expanded its content to ensure that its audience connects with all the latest political developments in the country.

    With an aim to bring in-depth information on politics, the channel has introduced interesting shows in different formats such as interviews, panel discussions, debates, on-ground coverage and analysis with renowned experts.

    “As part of our “business +” programming push, we have launched new shows including ‘Power Talks’ that features political heavyweights in conversation with BTVI,  ‘Rajniti On The Ground’ in travelogue, panel discussion format, ‘The Big Debate’ that showcases key debates of relevant topics, the ‘Campaign Trail’ where team BTVI is traveling across India, interacting with leaders and people, ‘Your Leader’ that features candidates from various political constituencies to help voters know their candidates better and  ‘Millennials Vote’ that puts out the views of first time voters to understand what they want from country’s politicians,” said Siddharth Zarabi, Executive Editor BTVI.

    “The new shows have been launched to help BTVI’s audience build a 360-degree perspective on India’s politics and political economy,” Zarabi added.

    BTVI is the only channel in the English Business News genre to have witnessed strong increase in viewer sampling levels. The share of viewing from BTVI has doubled, which brings BTVI to a co-terminus leadership of the genre.

  • BJP tops political advertisers chart on Google; Congress ranked 6th

    BJP tops political advertisers chart on Google; Congress ranked 6th

    MUMBAI: Ahead of the general elections 2019, BJP has topped the list of political advertisers on Google. It has recorded an advertisement spent share of around 32 per cent. Rival Congress stands further in the queue at the sixth spot with a meagre 0.14 per cent share. This has been revealed by the internet giant's Indian Transparency Report released today.

    The report also mentions that political parties and their affiliates have spent Rs 3.76 crore on advertisements since 19 February 2019.

    The Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) emerged as the top advertiser with a total advertisement expense of Rs 1.21 crore, accounting for around 32 per cent of the total advertisement expenses on Google, it said. Congress was ranked sixth with total expenditure on advertisement of Rs 54,100 on Google.

    BJP was followed by Andhra Pradesh's Jagan Reddy-led YSR Congress Party, which spent a total of Rs 1.04 crore on advertisements, according to the report.

    Pammi Sai Charan Reddy, another advertiser, spent Rs 26,400 to promote YSR Congress Party candidates.

    Pramanya Strategy Consulting, which was promoting the Telugu Desham Party (TDP) and its chief Chandra Babu Naidu, was ranked third with an advertisement expenditure of Rs 85.25 lakh, the report said.

    Digital Consulting Pvt Ltd, another entity that also promoted Naidu and his party, was ranked fourth with total spending of Rs 63.43 lakh.

    Google also said that it blocked advertisements of four of 11 political advertisers due to a violation of its ad policy.