ITV

Tag: advertisers

  • Times Network’s promo of ‘How I Met Your Mother’ unravelled

    Times Network’s promo of ‘How I Met Your Mother’ unravelled

    MUMBAI: The widely loved American sitcom How I Met Your Mother (HIMYM) is back for its fans on Romedy Now and will be aired on 14 December 2015. The show has got the cutest makeover with this new season. As reported earlier by indiantelevision.com, the channel has brought HIMYM back with a fresh and unique promo showing toddlers narrating the story of the show.

     

    The video features little Lily Aldrin and Marshall Eriksen as an adorable couple and a miniature, suited-up Barney Stinson flirting with girls. It also shows tiny Ted Mosby sweetly falling head over heels for Robin Scherbatsky, and some of the kids taking turns with a kid-sized version of the show’s signature yellow umbrella. The video takes the funny characters to a whole new ‘miniature’ level.

    Romedy Now is targeting a pan India population, and majorly the youth and expects to reach out to more than a million viewers. The channel has already started promotions on social media two weeks back with teasers and is now building it up to the launch of the show. The next level of the promotion will be revealed as the flag off to the airing of the show approaches.

     

    The English entertainment channel has attempted to portray the love and laughter in the show through a metaphor by portraying the characters of HIMYM as toddlers. Talking about the idea behind the adorable promo Times Network vice president of programming EEC Sonal Khanduja commented, “The treatment of using kids makes the property more affable and cute and makes for great conversation especially when parents want to share their cute memories and moments with their babies. The thought was to have a setup as close as to the show- from the set design to the five kids dressed like the original characters from the show to their attitude and the scenes from the show”.

     

    The promo has been conceptualised and executed internally by the in-house team of the channel, Oapp Team. The off-air campaign has been done by the Famous Innovations creative agency.

     

    The promo has received appreciation from its fans and has generated a lot of buzz across all the social media platforms. “We are glad that our efforts have paid off so well that the makers of the show tweeted about it. And going forward, we will be coming up with many more such unique innovations”, adds Khanduja.

     

    “The promo was created for the people who are already aware of the show and follow it and to offer a new freshness to the property”, adds Khanduja.

     

    As the promo involves shooting with kids from a young age group, the channel had to invest two days to complete the shoot.

     

    Further, Romedy Now is also actively promoting HIMYM through on-ground activities across the key pubs in the urban cities through an engaging game that can be played with friends.

     

    Since it is an iconic show for viewers, it enjoys a positive response from advertisers. “The shows on Romedy Now are leading in the category and we are confident that HIMYM will be at the top of the pack in the span of a few weeks”, concludes Khanduja.

  • Fork Media picks equity in Wi-Fi ad network Spid

    Fork Media picks equity in Wi-Fi ad network Spid

    NEW DELHI: Ad tech company Fork Media has invested in Wi-Fi ad network Spid Info Media Pvt. Ltd to leverage Spid’s technology for advertisers and publishers by offering them one of the largest audience platforms, targeting on-the-go consumers.
     

    The partnership is in line with Fork’s vision of broadening its core offerings.
     

    Spid currently has a bouquet of over 1,200 locations including all major airports, QSRs like McDonalds, KFC, Starbucks, and Costa Coffee, malls and other retail locations. 

     

    According to the company, his number is rapidly growing as it partners with ISPs and telecom providers to help monetise inventory. Fork Media aims to use Spid’s platform to leverage the locational behavior of consumers and target them for relevant advertising. 

     

    Fork Media CEO Samar Verma said, “Having Spid as a part of the Fork Media group is a strategic move for us. We see Wi-Fi as an alternative eco-system – a parallel economy, that’s growing rapidly. With the onset of 4G, a lot of telecom players are investing in Wi-Fi infrastructure to offset the costs involved in setting up 4G. Additionally, the Wi-Fi ecosystem takes location targeting to the next level by not only delivering relevant content to the consumer in and around a certain location, but also offering destination targeting. We are steering Fork Media to be less device-centric and more consumer-centric in our ad solutions. Therefore, this is an extremely important link in the chain for us in the consumer’s journey.”

     

    The acquisition of equity in Spid is a part of Fork Media’s larger expansion plans. It had recently made its foray into international markets with the launch of its operations in Dubai – targeting the GCC region. Through its tie-up with Spid, the company is now better equipped to provide well-timed offers that consumers are seeking. Fork Media is now poised to tap the immense opportunity that exists in the digital marketing space in India.

     

    Spid CEO Harsh Nagpal said, “Our partnership with Fork Media is a marriage of strengths. Fork’s reach and expertise in business development will enable us to leverage this unique proposition, further enabling brands to reach out to relevant audiences. With Samar and the entire Fork team’s collective experience and expertise, we foresee Spid deriving maximum value and growing manifold.”

  • Reliance Entertainment Digital partners with Personagraph to drive value for game developers, advertisers

    Reliance Entertainment Digital partners with Personagraph to drive value for game developers, advertisers

    MUMBAI: Reliance Entertainment Digital, comprising World Wide Open, Zapak, BigFlix and Reliance Games, has partnered with Personagraph to drive more value for advertisers by utilising mobile specific segments, both from the brand and brand performance perspective. The company’s three large publishers i.e. Reliance Games, Zapak, and BigFlix, will be utilising Personagraph’s Privacy Compliant SDK toolkit for monetisation, using its predictive audience segments product line.

     

    With Personagraph, which is transparent and privacy complaint, publishers can own their data. The partnership would mean greater opportunity in an ecosystem that is capable of leveraging user insights to drive higher relevance, context and personalisation in mobile, both at the publisher and advertiser end, while using a single data source.

     

    WWO and Personagraph are partnering to bring a Data/Audience driven Private Marketplace (PMP) specifically targeting Mobile Developers in India.  A private marketplace is an exchange derivative that is selective about how and what inventory is brought in to the platform, and similarly which marketers are being provided access to brands transparently with audience attached to every impression. The Private Marketplace will be open for Mobile Developers with clear instructions on ad viewability, sizing, brand transparency, etc. while marketers will be allowed buy in to the inventory via guaranteed and non-guaranteed means.

     

    This PMP will

     

      *   Allow to leapfrog the age old ad network model in India and bring transparency today by create a scaled marketplace model

     

      *   Bring audience at scale with the right reach and data embedded on every impression

     

      *   Bring clear value for Ad impressions to bear between marketers and game developers

     

      *   Allow game developers to have full transparency over how marketers value their impressions unlike ad network models

     

    By using the Personagraph technology and with WWO demand already built in to the marketplace, the Mobile Development community can access growing and consistent revenue for advertising monetization now and going forward as we bring more publisher side partners and marketers to the platform.

  • BARC India to rollout data by end-April; to out ratings on Wednesday

    BARC India to rollout data by end-April; to out ratings on Wednesday

    MUMBAI: Speculation and anxiety over the new television rating system will come to rest by the end of April. Yes! That’s when the Broadcast Audience Research Council (BARC) India will start rolling out its data.

     

    The industry, will not only have to get used to a new measurement body, but also do away with waiting for the ratings every Thursday. BARC India, a joint industry body, will be outing data every Wednesday. 

     

    The measurement body, during a conference held on 6 April attended by broadcasters, media agencies and advertisers, presented the actual data that it would give starting April end. “We showed them the actual data as has been collated by us so far,” said BARC India CEO Partho Dasgupta.

     

    As was reported earlier, most of the leading broadcasters and media agencies had not renewed their subscription with TAM, after their subscription ended on 31 March, 2015. Not only this, many media agencies had also, through an email, informed their clients about the current situation.

     

    The email stated, “The industry bodies have agreed to cease using TAM ratings from 4 April. Rating blackout period will kick in from 5 April, until such time that BARC is available. Data for blackout period will not be available in the future too.”

     

    While TAM had said that it will continue generating ratings and give it out to broadcasters whose subscription hasn’t expired, a veteran media expert had told Indiantelevision.com, “TAM can continue coming out with its data, but it will no longer be a viewership currency. It will just work as information.”

     

    With BARC rolling out data starting April end, the industry will have to deal with a ratings dark period only for a couple of weeks.

  • Facebook launches app for advertisers, to be available worldwide soon

    Facebook launches app for advertisers, to be available worldwide soon

    NEW DELHI: Facebook has now reached more than two million active advertisers, up from 1.5 million roughly half a year ago and 1 million a year-and-a-half ago.

     

    In addition, the company has announced the ads manager app to help businesses manage their ad campaigns on-the-go, through their mobile device.

     

    The app is presently available in the United States but will soon be available throughout the world.

     

    Around 35 per cent of US small businesses do not have a web presence at all, but more than 30 million businesses around the world actively use Facebook pages because they are free, easy to use, and they work well on mobile.

     

    Facebook is helping businesses to grow, as it is easy – Facebook’s tools are easier than ever to use. It is Mobile – the consumer shift to mobile is making more business owners want to use Facebook’s mobile tools to reach customers and manage their businesses. Facebook ads are effective, claims the social media site.

  • DTH, an innovative platform for advertisers: Matrix Publicities & Media

    DTH, an innovative platform for advertisers: Matrix Publicities & Media

    MUMBAI: It has been a stupendous growth story. Contrary to popular trade perception the DTH advertising growth story has only ended up surprising all.

     

    With approximately 65 to 68 million households across India and about 55 per cent of the C&S base in the country, this is one of the primary reason why a lot of advertisers are looking to engage customers on the medium. 

     

    What began with a low scale, low noise start with barely two to three advertisers three years ago, has grown more than 10 times in a very short span, says Matrix Publicities & Media India, a WPP company, which has been at the forefront of this revolutionary advertising blitzkrieg. 

     

    There are in all six DTH operators, who operate out of the paid DTH subscriber sphere, whilst planning, the agencies need to keep in mind the fact that DTH as a medium is a frequency builder and should necessarily be used to ensure incremental reach.  Like television, DTH reaches out to all SEC and demographic profiles, unlike otherwise perceived.  There are various options within the medium, however, to delivery impact too and on a case to case basis the medium allows innovations, albeit at a very competitive outlay.

     

    As a media sales aggregator for all the DTH operators to GroupM & non-GroupM clients and agencies, Matrix has been able to bridge the gap between the science, art and commerce for sales on this new age media platform. 

     

    The agency feels that the platform acts as a gatekeeper to the TV viewing audience and they are exposed to the DTH visuals prior to the TV channels.  Additionally, TV also faces a lot of clutter with regard to the various genres available for viewing.  With the 10+2 ad cap in place, in principle, with most channels, getting inventories across is also an issue.  All the factors put together have ensured that this medium has turned into a ‘pull’ medium from the erstwhile ‘push’ medium. 

     

    Hence, the company has not stopped at just mere vanilla sales as this is a philosophy that does not appeal to its business head Sparsh Ganguli, who has been at the forefront of this business since its inception three years ago.

     

    With this idea in mind, the advertisers have been divided into broad categories and an in-depth analysis has revealed a lot about the spending patterns of all advertisers on this medium.  Needless to say the research not only takes into consideration the brand spent from the GroupM set of clients but even some part of the non-Group M clients to help present a more clear and fair picture.  The efficacy of the study can be gauged from the fact that the entire categories can be bifurcated month wise and the spend patterns can be highlighted for future strategic pitches.

     

    The broad categories that have been the top spenders across this medium are: automobiles (two and four wheelers), FMCG, F&B, BFSI, e-commerce, watches and jewellery.

     

    A FMCG media planner says, “The DTH platform has been influential in targeting the housewives through sustained awareness campaigns during afternoon hours and worked phenomenally well for our client’s brands.  That’s the very reason why they look to optimise spends on these platforms.” 

     

    The ad rates are in sync with the growth of the medium.  The rates range from Rs 40,000 to Rs 1,00,000 depending on the options that are availed, highlights the agency.

     

    Ganguli, however, feels that there is still a lot of ground to be covered from the advertiser’s front.  He feels that technologically the platform is evolving in a positive manner that is both beneficial to the viewer as well as for the advertiser.  According to him, “The next revolutionary way of reaching out to the viewing household is on the spliced beam format which allows the advertiser to geo-target their consumers.  This has in turn made it possible for the brands to reach out and give a customised pre-buying experience, thus resulting into more reach and effective frequency for the brand campaign.” 

     

    He adds, “DTH has shown tremendous growth but I still feel clients can do a lot more, as of now we have been able to break new grounds by providing upgraded technology and this helps the clients and new clients to optimise the medium for every campaign as innovation is the way ahead.” 

     

     

  • Star India gets AdSharp; targets regional advertisers

    Star India gets AdSharp; targets regional advertisers

    MUMBAI: The Modi sarkar promised acche din aane wale hai. If one saw the full page advertisement by India’s leading TV network Star India in The Economic Times on 3 July then it looks like good days could be coming the way of regional, small and medium advertisers which have been looking at advertising on the mainline GEC but have found the sticker price too high.

     

    The who’s who of the advertising industry took notice of the path-breaking step initiated by Star network CEO Uday Shankar.

     

    The network’s advertisement says, “Grow your business with the power of Star!” and invites marketers, planners and advertisers to attend  free  45-minute seminars through which they can get familiarised with the art of targeting their customers in a cost-effective manner to stay ahead of the competition.

     

    The target advertiser is  those businesses which are still not advertising on television. Media observers believe that India is a land of opportunity and various small and medium sized businesses have an opportunity to grow by advertising their products on TV, but have been loath to do so because they don’t have agencies, TVCs and also find the cost exorbitant. They cite the example of CavinKare’s Chik shampoo which began as a small regional player, but went on to challenge even the MNCs successfully. 

     

    The Star India seminars are likely to give more details for its, soon-to-be launched offering, AdSharp, which marks the network’s plunge into geo-targeted advertising in an organised manner. Through it, advertisers can target customers region specifically, as the ads will be local.

     

    The network which has advertising revenues of around Rs 5,000 crore annually is hoping to increase those top line numbers by luring the small and medium advertiser.

     

    The first of such seminars will start from Mumbai (15-19 July), followed by Pune (24-26 July), Delhi (5-9 August) and the last will be in Ahmedabad (21-23 August). Registration began almost a month back.

     

    The invitees can choose from the seven sessions offered in each day-long seminar. The day will not be just about selling and buying of geo-targeted air time by its ad sales team; attending advertisers will also get a chance to get a TV commercial produced free for them by Star India on taking up a package.

     

    HDFC Life senior executive vice president – head marketing, product, digital & e-commerce Sanjay Tripathy believes that Star India’s first of its kind initiative is laudatory and “will help the network increase its client base.”

     

    Rivals also expressed appreciation.  Zee’s chief sales officer Ashish Sehgal believes that Star’s seminar campaign  will educate advertisers who have been sitting on the periphery on how to market locally and eventually help expand the overall TV ad market.

     

     “We have been offering geo-targeted advertising for more than a year now with Amagi. We are part of almost every geo-targeted advertising plan that Amagi does for smaller regional advertisers, and this has worked well for us,” says Sehgal while highlighting that technology plays an important role here. “Broadcasters can choose to outsource geo-targeting to a third party or do it in-house; we have chosen the former so far.”

     

    Similarly, Amagi’s co-founder KA Srinivasan says that if the largest Indian broadcast network starts pushing geo-targeted advertising then it validates what he and some others have been doing for years now. “It is a good move for the industry and geo-targeting will only pick up in the coming years.”

     

    Star’s Adsharp which was scheduled to launch by June end, will now be launched by next week or so. It has opted for Cisco as its technical partner for the geo-targeting service.

  • Doordarshan gets a technology boost

    Doordarshan gets a technology boost

    MUMBAI: The otherwise quiet Doordarshan is now making headlines, and all for good reasons. The pubcaster that has brought in a slew of new shows to strengthen its programming is now also looking at upgrading its backend services.

     

    In the latest, Doordarshan has decided to move on from its semi-integrated software that handles different departments manually, to Broadcast Air Time Scheduling System (BATS) software, which integrates all the departments online. The software will be provided by Media Nucleus.

     

    The decision was taken after Doordarshan realised that there were too many manual interventions in every department. Unlike private broadcasters like Star and Zee, where every department is interconnected through Broadcast Traffic Signaling System, the pubcaster until now had been working manually in most of the departments.  

     

    BATS is a software that integrates different departments of the broadcaster; right from the administration to the programming, ad sales, marketing and billing among others. The software is useful, since it allows departments to work in their own capacity and yet compile everything to be put on air, without any revenue leakage.

     

    The software ensures accurate billing by effectively managing account hierarchy, different packages and products, pricing plans, library with barcode tracking, content rights management, automated ad booking along with discounts offered on bulk deals, charges, billing cycle, invoicing, payment processing and collections.

     

    “There are chances of huge revenue leakage when billing is done manually,” informs Media Nucleus director Santosh Nair. Doordarshan (finally) realised that with so many Kendras, decentralised operation and regional channels, the outstanding revenue was difficult to monitor since all was done manually. Hence, the Information and Broadcasting Ministry (MIB) decided to remove the existing manual system and put in place a new technology which is used by broadcasters worldwide. 

     

    “With BATS, all the management and ministry level officials and director generals working in DD will get up-to-date information of how much revenue is being booked. With this software they do not have to call people from Delhi to Mumbai or send fax sheets of the revenue collected. It is all available on a webpage, which the management can check to get an understanding of what is happening across the 21 channels of DD, how much revenue is coming from each Kendra and which advertiser has got them the maximum revenue,” adds Nair.

     

    Media Nucleus won the bid after a thorough study conducted by Doordarshan. “We undertook a study of the BATS software of Media Nucleus and GEN 21 of Indonesia. While both the softwares were at par, we chose Media Nucleus, because one it is indigenous and two because it has provided us more customisation, which is what we needed,” informs Doordarshan deputy director general CK Jain.

     

    Jain also points out that they chose Media Nucleus despite getting offers from other companies, who were willing to create special softwares for the pubcaster. “But we wanted something that was already tested. Also, a lot of Indian broadcasters were switching from their existing BATS software to the one by Media Nucleus,” adds Jain.

     

    Doordarshan has 400 stations which will be integrated through BATS. “We evaluated the company and its software for six months and then signed the agreement, two months back,” informs Jain. The contract is on a long term basis with no closure date.

     

    The installation of BATS will be done in three stages. In the first stage BATS will integrate the nine marketing division, DD commercial centre and the 17 Kendras. “This should be completed in the next two and a half months. The whole process should be up and running by early 2015,” says Jain.

     

    The hardware installation has already started. “This has been done after completion of the system requirement study. It was through this study that we understood the kind of customisation that was needed for us,” says Jain.

     

    How will this system help DD? Answers Nair, “We have been chosen on the basis of our experience, expertise and deployments. With our software, DD will be at par with any international broadcaster whereby they will be able to provide end to end seamless integration of all departments with live broadcast. This will also augment enhanced revenues with tight check on billing and outstanding increasing the pubcaster’s profitability.” 

     

    The pubcaster through this is looking to be at par with the other broadcasters. “This is a response to the needs of the advertiser. We will surely be at par with other private channels,” concludes Jain. 

  • Bollywood on Sandalwood’s private FM Radio land rocks

    Bollywood on Sandalwood’s private FM Radio land rocks

    BENGALURU:  The FICCI-KPMG Media and Entertainment Report 2014 (M&E-2014 Report) says that the radio industry outperformed all other traditional media segments by clocking a growth of about 15 per cent in 2013. The report further goes on to say that clients are being forced to re-evaluate their media mix as their advertising budgets are constantly under pressure. There has been a tendency to shift focus from nationwide pure brand building to more tactical, local, focused promotional targeting. This has played in radio’s favour as it enables local reach to advertisers, who are looking to target specific audiences at affordable pricing.

     

    Be it a product launch, realty, education institutes, restaurants, jewellery brands, theatres, movie and movie audio launches, the elections, events or artist performance, radio is now an important part of a plan for any media planner.

     

    Click here for full report

  • India TV eyes 35 per cent revenue increase in this election year

    India TV eyes 35 per cent revenue increase in this election year

    MUMBAI: With the Election Commission having announced the election schedule, the unfolding political drama has certainly picked up momentum. News channels were already in the fray but will now devote even more air time to election programming in the coming weeks.

      

    On its part, India TV – which recently underwent a makeover to be hailed as a more serious news channel – will start its election programming today, using this as an opportunity to showcase its change in focus. “The commitment was to set new benchmarks in the news presentation. We have already taken leaps in that direction and elections are a direct opportunity for us to showcase the differentiation,” says India TV MD and CEO Ritu Dhawan.

     

    The channel will kick-off its full-fledged version of electioneering next week under the title, ‘Faisla Kursi Ka’. A special election series called Aap Ki Adalat mein Faisla Kursi Ka will feature as part of India TV’s most popular show Aap Ki Adalat with India TV chairman and Editor-in-Chief Rajat Sharma. The regular series will continue alongside.

     

    The channel’s flagship show Aaj Ki Baat Rajat Sharma Ke Saath has already tilted towards elections while newer shows like Yeh Public Sab Janti Hai, Delhi-Darbar, Sitare Zameen Par and Vansh are in the pipeline. “With a firm belief that content which is unlike our competition, not only have we made substantial investment for the same but we have also ensured that our content does not suffer from predictability,” says Dhawan.

     

    Actor Om Puri will host Vansh while the other shows will be anchored by celebrities including Dalip Tahil, Piyush Mishra and Meghna Malik.

     

    According to Dhawan, the aam aadmi’s desire for a change in governance has resulted in a nearly 17 per cent increase in viewership in the news genre, with India TV experiencing an almost 20 per cent increase.

     

    With Hero Motorcorp as presenting sponsor, Shakti Pumps as powered-by sponsor, and many more advertisers and sponsors the likes of Tata Motors, Birla Cement, Ranbaxy, Rupa Hosiery and Emami already on board the channel during election time, India TV is expecting 20 to 35 per cent of additional revenues in this election year, as compared to the earlier non-election one.

     

    “In total, we expect 20 to 35 per cent of additional revenues on a fairly high year-on-year base of a non-election year. That also qualifies as we have made reasonable investments in the content part,” says Dhawan. Sources estimate that the channel is looking at making nearly Rs 180 crore this year.

     

    Coming to the what and how, India TV’s news gathering team will pan across the country’s key constituencies on polling days, complemented by a team of experts in the studio.

     

    “It would not be an exaggeration to say that we will most definitely be omnipresent through our wide network of reporters, stringers and other strategic partners. We have made large investments to further strengthen our news gathering,” signs off Dhawan.