Tag: covid

The Rise of Online Astrology Consultations And How They’re Changing Lives

Astrology has always been part of daily life in many cultures, and today, its online presence continues the traditional values with emerging technology. This shift helps to bring more clarity on relationships, career and personal growth. Astrology is a guide to know our destiny and the possible outcome of our actions. In this context, here is a simple guide to understand why this traditional culture is taking a modern shift.

Why are Online Astrology Services Increasing?

Digital astrology gained popularity during the COVID-19 pandemic, when all business meetings and education were shifting to the online mode. Meanwhile, the most influential factors for the rise of online astrology have become its convenience, privacy and accessibility. After you register on such platforms, you can talk to an astrologer for free, anytime and anywhere, for the first time.

What are the Main Services Available on Online Astrology Platforms?

Online astrology platforms are expanding to offer more services apart from the simple daily horoscope creation, comparison, and checks. Each service has its own significance, and it ensures that every person gets targeted insights as per their life circumstances. Here are some of them:

1. Convenient Online Consultations

Online astrology services allow you to instantly connect with an astrologer via chat and calls. This communication strategy increases accessibility to professional advice at your convenience.

2. Personalised Horoscope Reading

You can access customised horoscope predictions just by providing your birth details like time, date and place to the astrologers. These readings allow you to get insights about your strengths, challenges you may face and life opportunities.

3. Comprehensive Kundali Matching

This calculator allows you to compare the Gunas of the bride and groom to highlight potential strengths and challenges in their relationship. The higher scores on the Kundali represent the strengths and weaknesses of their bond. However, those getting lower scores need not worry, as these astrologers also offer suggested remedies and solutions.

4. Daily Panchang Information

Panchang has Tithi, Yang, Nagstar, and Karan information. They also give insights about he time of sunset, sunrise, moonset, and moonrise. These aspects are used in determining auspicious moments for carrying out different events and rituals.

5. Detailed Kundali Reading

Kundali is used as the cosmic blueprint to indicate different aspects of life, including health, career, love, etc. All you have to do is provide information such as your name, date of birth, gender, place and time of birth to receive your kundali through online astrology services.

6. 24/7 Expert Availability

Online astrology services are always available to answer your queries. Many of them offer free talk to astrologers for kundali or horoscope reading. You can get in touch with these experts anytime, depending on your convenience. Since the conversation is discreet, you can discuss anything without worrying about the information getting leaked.

How Technology is Shaping Astrology?

Technology is enhancing online consultations with expert astrologers. You can connect with experts through the following methods:

●   Chat: You can instantly chat with astrologers to bring clarity about kundali reading, panchang information and many more.

●   Call: Calling allows you to express your needs clearly and describe in detail what you are looking for.

Why You Should Prefer Online Consultation?

Online astrology consultation brings privacy and convenience in one place. With platforms like Astrochat.com, you will get free talk to astrologers to discuss issues related to your relationships, marriage compatibility, career growth, health and many more. So, register and get comprehensive guidance about life!

August 26, 2025
Our product is DIY, plug-n-play, and is a must-have tool for all content creators, reveals Instoried’s Sharmin Ali

Mumbai: Instoried helps enterprises and individuals create emotionally engaging content thereby improving ROI. Instoried is a deep-tech platform that analyses and optimizes the emotional quotient, tonality and relevance of written content across formats like blogs, articles, social media posts.

Instoried uses a data-driven approach using their proprietary AI driven technology to make real time analysis and suggestions to enhance content to increase engagement and interest for the reader. This leads to more clicks and as a result higher ROI for brands, creating a direct impact on sales and revenues for companies. Instoried uses the principles of neuromarketing to offer smart recommendations to increase or decrease a particular emotion in the content.

The platform helps content writers in e-commerce, news, FMCG, and other verticals to optimise emotions in their marketing content.

The company says that clients can capture the emotions of readers on point, enhance their content and save hours of extra work with the easy-to-adapt platform! Instoried has built deep learning-based natural language processing systems to help optimise content. The aim is to build a highly inclusive workplace for people of all backgrounds and genders who can help it grow.

Indiantelevision.com caught up with Instoried founder & CEO Sharmin Ali to find out more on the company. In her role, she is responsible for driving strategy, leadership and sales. Prior to deep-diving into a technology start-up with Instoried, Ali had founded a media start-up to build India’s own Netflix. Prior to that she was with Mu Sigma, working in sales with Fortune 500 companies in the US.

Ali has been profiled in the Fortune 40 Under 40 list (2022) and also won the best product and best innovation under the startup category by The Economic Times Innotribe Awards in Mumbai in September 2018. She has received an honour from the HRD Ministry of India and COWE Womennovator under Innovation and Entrepreneurship category.

Ali holds a Bachelor’s degree in electronics and communications. Instoried is at the cusp of her love for storytelling and a background in technology.

She is an author of two books, the first one ‘Y.O.U’ that was announced a best-seller by The New Indian Express and the Oxford bookstores. Her second book was titled ‘How I was forced to become a staunch racist’. She has also spoken at various TEDx events and international platforms.

She loves exploring new places, writing, is an avid reader and a foodie at heart.

Excerpts:

On the market gap seen in 2019 when Instoried launched

My experience with various Fortune 500 companies in India and the US made me observe closely and conclude that even large companies and brands are ineffective in communication. These companies make marketing decisions based on how they feel about the content instead of using data to get better results. Here is where I stepped in with Instoried. We started with just an idea to improve written content that would impact the ROI of a brand positively. We started with a web- app that helps optimise the tonality and emotion of the content for writers. Over the last few years, the tool has been imbibed with many new features that have helped improve the quality of life of writers and enabled them to create content that’s original, impactful, and empathetic.

On the game plan that has resulted in over 5 million users and 500+ businesses using Instoried

The game plan was simple: how to improve the content game for our customers? We were looking for a full-stack offering and not just a good-to-have feature. This made our customers engage with us like water. Water is a must-have, whereas juice is a good-to-have. We sell water and so our customers love us. We have interviewed a 1000+ content marketers in the US to understand their challenges and each one talked about productivity and about creating content at scale and at speed. So we built a tool with an end-to-end solution.

On how COVID impacted the business

We were able to identify a huge opportunity in this adversity. When stores were shutting down due to very few footfalls, the only option left for them was to sell online. In order to sell online, one needs to create engaging content, and that’s exactly what we do.

On the company’s USP

We are the world’s fastest-growing content-tech and media-tech startup. Our greatest USP is that our product is DIY, plug-n-play, and is a must-have tool for all content creators. On top of that, we have a tailored, curated content offering called Content360 which is like WPP on steroids! We add the human element on top of a tech product to help our clients create a broad spectrum of content across sectors.

On the business model

We are both B2B and B2C with a monthly and annual subscription model.

On the strategy of selling products to the consumer’s brain

Humans are emotional. Our emotional brain decides and logic never prevails, exactly the reason why we love iPhones over anything else. Similarly, our content needs to exude the right set of emotions that we humans can connect with easily. Our product has both generation and analysis to help writers gauge the effectiveness of their content.

On how deep tech can help brands create emotionally engaging content

Instoried is a deep-tech platform that analyses and optimizes the emotional quotient, tonality, and relevance of written content across multiple formats of blogs, articles, and social media posts. Instoried uses a data-driven approach using their proprietary AI-driven technology to make real-time analysis and suggestions to enhance written content to increase engagement and interest for the reader. Our platform helps content writers, in the SME category, e-commerce, FMCG, MNCs, and others to optimize emotions in their marketing content.

As one creates content, the tool dynamically analyses it using AI and displays the tone and emotion of the text used. When you click on a particular tone or emotion, the tool highlights all the words in your content exuding that particular tone or emotion. Upon hovering the cursor over a particular word, it gives you multiple recommendations that are both semantically and contextually relevant, thereby enhancing the empathy of your content.

We use natural language processing (NLP) to analyse the semantics of content and identify the tone, emotion and impact of the written content. With the help of Instoried, our clients have increased engagement of their blogs and marketing communication by optimising their content’s emotion, tonality and use of impactful text. We help content creators be consistently engaging with the audience.

On recent work done by the company that stands out

We are on our way to profitability in the next six months. I think that’s the most outstanding work we are doing.

On how Content360 will help content writers create better content

Content360 is a full-fledged services/ consulting arm offering end-to-end content services to companies. It will help create content at scale using empathy and focusing on the desired long-term outcome and not just the short-term output. Content360 addresses the limitation of traditional content agencies, digital-first brands, and freelancers who churn out multiple content forms per month, focusing on just the output. Users include startups, SMEs, MNCs, e-commerce sites, D2C websites, content creators, mid-size digital marketing agencies, content agencies, freelance marketers, bloggers, and more.

The process starts with understanding the business goals and objectives of the company, current content strategy, current output, and outcome, and then improving on the goals. As a use-case, the business goal of an e-commerce firm is to generate more revenue from their website channel, after understanding various parameters like – current click through/ conversion rates, best-converting landing pages, tone, emotion, and impact of content. Instoried will advise on the best way to create website content with the best emotion, tone, and words that would result in higher conversions.

On the importance of empathy in content creation

My experience gave me the insight that corporations of all sizes were poor at communicating effectively! They have a tough time building human connections and communicating with empathy to their target audience. They make marketing decisions based on how they feel they should communicate instead of using data to their advantage. Here is where I thought Instoried would be a good product-market fit in the writing arena. Instoried helps large companies make their marketing and communications content more human with a data-driven, scalable, and repeatable approach using AI.

Our tool is an all-inclusive one where we now have a spell check, Grammar check, headline generation, plagiarism checker, panel testing, and tonal & emotional analysis checker. You can check it out at app.instoried.com. We aim to make the concept of ‘adding empathy into content’ a part of daily communication by focusing on mobile devices, both android, and iOS. Since content is a global and day-to-day phenomenon, it’s only commonplace to ensure that we communicate with empathy on every social media platform. The importance of adding empathy cannot be underestimated or overlooked.

On the investments being made by Instoried and fundraising

We have closed a few rounds in the last three years, right now the focus is to get to profitability by March next year and then raise a larger round of funding.

On what brands need to keep in mind when marketing to consumers at a time of layoffs and a possible hard-landing recession next year

Profitability is key. Do whatever it takes to be profitable as companies that are profitable are here to stay.

On using text versus video in brand storytelling

Every video has a text caption to go along with it. Text tags along with every content format. Text is like water which is a must-have with everything one consumes.

On the potential of Linkedin in B2B marketing

I love Linkedin sales navigator for its targeted approach to reaching out to plausible prospects.

On what you expect to see from Twitter under a new owner when it comes to advertising on that platform

I love the idea of charging eight dollars per month for a blue tick. The man is a sheer genius. However, it’s too early to comment on how advertising will be affected under his leadership. I hope to see a startup slab for advertising so that it gets affordable as opposed to standard pricing across all brands.

November 23, 2022
9 in 10 business leaders believe economic uncertainty threatens to wind back pandemic progress in the workplace: LinkedIn research

Mumabi: Online professional network LinkedIn has launched a new global C-level research study to show how flexibility and employee benefits introduced during the pandemic are now at risk due to the ongoing economic uncertainty. According to the research, nine out of every 10 business leaders in India say the current economic climate could threaten flexible working (91 per cent), while other areas of work life such as learning and development (90 per cent) and employee wellbeing (89 per cent) are most likely to be affected too.

In fact, more than two-fifths of India’s business leaders are looking to reduce employer learning and development budgets and opportunities (43 per cent), and nearly half (49 per cent) are looking to reduce flexible and hybrid working roles. Additionally, 71 per cent also prefer to work more frequently from the office as opposed to working from home. Despite this, 82 per cent of business leaders believe that hybrid working is here to stay for the long term.

This comes at a time when new analysis of remote job postings on LinkedIn shows that remote roles are in decline, although the applications to those roles exceed supply by nearly 2x in India. In September, 11.3 per cent of paid job postings in India offered a remote working option. However, remote working roles received 20.3 per cent of all job applications.

Employer-employee disconnect could demotivate professionals: The research highlights a growing disconnect between what professionals want and what employers are now offering, with the balance of power shifting back to employers as hiring slows.

LinkedIn’s Global Talent Trends report reveals that across India, the top priorities that job seekers value beyond compensation are advancement, upskilling, and work-life balance. In terms of advancement, the report finds that employees want growth and transformation in their careers. In India, an employee who has made an internal move is about 10 per cent more likely to stay at their company when compared to those who stay in the same role for two or three years.

But with companies reducing flexibility and growth opportunities, the C-level research shows that a majority (86 per cent) of business leaders in India are concerned that these cost-cutting measures will have a negative impact on employee motivation levels, which may also be why 84 per cent agree they aren’t able to find the right talent today.

LinkedIn India country manager Ashutosh Gupta said, “The sheer scale of the ongoing uncertainty is forcing many leaders to rethink what—and how much — they can offer to their employees today. While flexibility and learning are usually the first to go when times are tough, pulling back on these in the present situation could demotivate employees, widen the skills gap, and inflate retention rates. At a time when professionals are just as threatened by the age of uncertainty as businesses are, leaders must adopt a forward-thinking approach and continue to invest in their people. Empowering employees to upgrade their skills and allowing them to choose how they want to work can drive greater levels of employee satisfaction in these testing times. Ultimately, having a workforce that feels supported and fulfilled will be key to building resilient businesses that drive growth and outperform competitors despite macroeconomic challenges.”

Leading through uncertainty

As companies navigate uncertainty, one area of agreement is clear: creative thinking and problem-solving are critical. These are the top soft skills Indian leaders identified as necessary to get through this time, followed by communication, adaptability, and transparency. In fact, soft skills such as problem-solving, communication, and strategy were featured in 78 per cent of jobs posted globally on LinkedIn over the last three months. Rather than leaving their teams in the dark about the tough decisions ahead, leaders need to build bridges with their employees and bring them on the journey with them.

LinkedIn’s advice for leaders to navigate uncertainty

Take an adaptive leadership approach: leaders must be transparent about the current state of affairs and adapt to what lies ahead, while also providing employees with clarity on short-term business priorities. They should see this period as an opportunity to iterate and adjust, which will stand them in good stead when the cycle ends.

Maintain workforce connection and trust

Today, half of Indian employers (51 per cent) encourage employee collaboration and knowledge sharing. By helping employees build connections with their colleagues, employers can energise their teams and strengthen their company culture. Furthermore, returning to command and control styles of leadership and dictating that employees must be in the office will quickly erode trust.

Focus on skills

The skill sets needed for jobs have changed by around 29 per cent since 2015, and this number is expected to grow to 50 per cent by 2025. By understanding the skills your employees have today and the skills your company needs in the future, companies can hire or redeploy talent into growth areas.

LinkedIn has made a number of LinkedIn Learning courses available for free until December 31 to help leaders navigate uncertainty, including courses on “How to Future-Proof Your Organization and Become a Multiplier of Wellbeing in Your Organization.” LinkedIn has also published its Global Talent Trends report, which provides leaders with insight into how labour market trends are affecting employees and workplaces.

November 15, 2022
Paytm Insider to become the most attractive platform to discover and consume the best live entertainment, shares Varun Khare

Mumbai: Paytm Insider is a platform that lets you discover and buy the best in events, travel, and food in your city. The company strives to curate experiences that are worth users’ time and money, possibly something that they have never tried before.

The company said that it is an experience finder and enabler of fun, with tickets to everything from the latest in live sports events to music festivals and concerts, standup comedy and open mic shows, food and shopping festivals, theatre, workshops, and then some.

It says that it is a big believer in the transformational power of shared experiences and the ability of creative arts and technology to drive change in ourselves and our communities. Outside of figuring out when your friend is free, the aim is to make sure that it gets users the experiences they love, or will fall in love with, and gets you there fast.

Indiantelevision.com caught up with Paytm Insider business head Varun Khare to find out more on the company and the expansion plans moving forward. He describes himself as a highly professional and self-motivated business head with proven ability in the planning and delivery of digital and physical intellectual property that creates powerful stories for brands and creators across multiple platforms.

He has extensive expertise in working with artists/creators, promoters, producers, and brands across account management, new business development, media strategy and buying, agency management, and budget control within fast moving corporate environments.

Khare has excellent interpersonal skills and the proven ability to deliver results across multiple channels. A strong track record in sales and customer relationship building in high-pressure environments through the creation of innovative marketing strategies whilst maintaining a high level of customer satisfaction and return on investment targets.

Excerpts:

On the aim behind starting Paytm Insider and the market gap that was seen

Paytm Insider was founded back in 2014 as a tailor-made solution for event organisers to easily manage and plan their events, from discovery to purchase, on-ground management to communication, including accessing sales trends and customer data with ease. The idea was to provide a better experience for both organisers to plan events and consumers to discover and buy tickets to exciting events in their city.

We started off with tickets to the Bacardi NH7 Weekender and Russell Peter’s early India tours, and over the years we’ve emerged as a leading entertainment ticketing platform. We have gone on to host some of the biggest concerts, artist tours, sporting events, and lifestyle festivals across the country.

On how the platform met the challenge of covid by taking events online

A little before the pandemic, we had a small team that was working on an experimental project to host live online quiz formats and shows. With the onset of the covid pandemic, we fast-tracked this journey and pivoted to ‘digital events’ hosting comedy shows, workshops, and concerts. This presented us with a continuous learning curve and the ability to innovate and adapt with feedback, and we soon combined live streaming technology with powerful interactive elements that allow participants online to engage with each other, including the host.

We’ve worked on creating unique and interesting digital formats with comedians, creators, artists, and event organisers across comedy shows, sports screenings, workshops, quiz formats, music festivals, and masterclasses covering a range of genres.

On its USP compared to competition

It is our teams’ ability to stay agile and proactive across technology, marketing, products, and project management. We’ve built out a DIY solution for event organisers equipped with automated onboarding, event management, and billing solutions, making it easy for them to access data and sales trends and plan their events. Our focus is always to work with organisers and collaborate to create IPs rather than try to manage it all in-house. By sharing data and access, organisers are also able to build their own communities, and we play a proactive role in helping them build these out.

On goals for the year

Our goal is to be the most attractive platform for consumers to discover and consume the best live entertainment across the top cities in the country after the pandemic. This is, of course, an ambitious target to undertake post covid when the industry is starting up again and still recovering.

On the genres that Paytm Insider focuses on for events

On the platform, you’ll find a handpicked selection of events across comedy, music, sports, lifestyle, and food festivals; theater; workshops; travel; and more. We’ve always focused our efforts on ensuring we have a good mix of events across these genres. Now that the event season is here and the weather is conducive to hosting more events outdoors, audiences will see a lot of lifestyle festivals, artist tours, concerts, and travel experiences.

On events that Paytm Insider itself curates

We believe in collaborating with event organisers, venues, artists, and brands to curate, promote, ticket, and produce IPs, festivals, and experiences. The best way to do that is to define a combined set of parameters that define the success of an event and then work together to achieve it. Thus, bringing in more value for all stakeholders and making it a more sustainable model.

We’ve partnered with brands, venues, artists, and event organisers to host a series of lifestyle festivals over the next couple of months: Zomaland, Gin Explorers Club, Lil Flea, Toast Wine and Beer, Horn OK Please, and many more. Across the music category, you’ll find an India tour by Arijit Singh, festivals like DGTL and SMF, and an India debut performance by Solomun. Across comedy as well, we have an upcoming multi-city tour by Karunesh Talwar, and we’ve also worked on partnering with venues across the country – Social and antiSocial, Fandom, Prism, Ext bringing you a curated set of gigs weekly. Across theatre as well, we’ve collaborated with Bhasha Center to present a series of engaging plays by ‘Aagaz Theatre Trust’ and ‘Third Space Collective.’

On the traction that digital events get vis-a-vis on-ground events

We’ve seen some great traction and consumption patterns across digital event formats since the pandemic hit. Brands, artists, and event organisers have shown interest in using the platform and product to build out their own digital communities and fan clubs. We’ve partnered across over 26K digital events and sold over 500K tickets to digital experiences.

On the pricing strategy in a price sensitive market like India

We believe in the value and the offering that event organisers are giving consumers, so we don’t look at discounting prices but rather sustaining this. We’ve also seen an increase in the average ticket price post covid compared to pre-covid levels. To sustain this, we believe it’s important to incentivize early purchasers and also look at avenues to bring in more value, for example, introducing tickets with merchandise, F&B options, and meet and greets, giving consumers the opportunity to commit to an increased value upfront and bringing in a level of security and stability for the organiser.

On PayTM Insider’s revenue model

Event organisers, artists, and brands can engage with us in various ways, depending on the services required for a particular event or project. We work across various capacities – ticketing model, co-promoter deal, marketplace for brands to reach out to consumers, brand partnered IPs, and platform-centric brand associations.

On the whitespace areas going forward

Tier II and III markets are where we see decent ticket pricing, people opening up to live entertainment, and an increased interest in F&B and lifestyle experiences.

On how Paytm Insider leverages technological innovations

We always emphasise looking for technology solutions to help put on the best experiences for attendees. We have adopted tech solutions that enable turnstile tables at entry, RFID (radio frequency identification) cards for seamless purchases at events, accreditation solutions for managing access and manpower at events, and digital entry setups that reduce scanning of tickets and make entry smooth at events.

We also have a completely automated onboarding platform for event organisers to list and manage all aspects of their events, including an automated billing system.

On the number of events done each month and revenue run rate

We have about 700–800 events monthly across categories.

November 9, 2022
Natpe announces its plan to file for bankruptcy under chapter 11

Mumbai: The National Association of Television Program Executives (Natpe) has announced its plan to restructure its business affairs with the Bankruptcy Court under Chapter 11 of the bankruptcy code. It said, “Like many other professional organisations, Natpe has been adversely impacted by the Covid pandemic, which prevented us from holding events, which typically generate significant revenue. Natpe was forced to operate on its financial reserves, which now required it to reorganise its business structure.”

“Natpe is looking at all possible options to restructure, including raising funds through strategic alliances and continuing to operate Natpe as a more streamlined and reorganised operation. For almost 60 years, Natpe has been the leading global professional association for content producers, distributors, developers, streamers, and buyers across all distribution platforms. Natpe is optimistic that it will emerge from the reorganisation process in the same position,” it said.

The emergence of new Covid-19 strains at a time when infections were at their maximum led to Natpe being compelled to postpone its main conference and market activities in 2021 and 2022.

In response to one of the largest rises in Covid infections, Natpe decided to cancel the in-person conference scheduled for January 2022 in Miami, Florida. Next year it will host an event in the Bahamas from 18-20 January instead of in Miami. It aims to return to Budapest in the summer.

October 6, 2022
Striking the right note: Clef Music Awards’22 unveils the winners in a glitzy ceremony

Mumbai: It was a scintillating Saturday night at Mumbai’s Sahara Star hotel as the stars aligned to stage the second edition of Indiantelevision.com’s Clef Music Awards 2022.

In India, one tends to associate music with films or Bollywood music, but there’s so much more out there waiting to be discovered. Raising a toast to all such independent musicians & original music creators, the CMA awards honoured musical accomplishments for the period August 2021 – August 2022 in a one-of-a-kind celebration held on 24 September. The first edition of the event took place virtually last year due to the restrictions imposed by the Covid-19 pandemic.

This year’s event commenced with a poignant moment as the ITV founder and editor-in-chief Anil Wanvari posthumously recalled the contributions of the industry’s legends and music veterans, namely Bappi Lahiri, KK Menon, Bhupinder Singh, and the nightingale of India, Lata Mangeshkar, all of whom we lost in the past year.

The Radio & Music Clef Music Awards (CMA) integrates musicians, lyricists, composers, bands, record labels, from the Hindi & English language music fraternity pan-India as it celebrates talent across the musical spectrum, classified into over 40 categories, ranging from Hindustani and devotional music to rap, folk, ghazal, sufi, pop, electronic, and rock music.

The jury members included eminent names from the industry, such as Abhijeet Sawant, Amit Sana, Ankush Bhardwaj, Atul Churamani, Bhaskar Pal, Divya Kumar, Heena Kriplani, Mayur Puri, Prashant Ingole, Sanjeev Kohli, Santosh Nair, Shikhar Yuvraj Manchanda, and Sunnyy Vyas.

Notable names from the world of music, such as Leslie Lewis, Amit Sana, Kavita Seth, and Sonu Kakkar, to name a few, also marked their attendance at the event.

Here is the full list of the winners who took home the CMA trophies:

September 25, 2022
Ficci Frames makes a comeback with Ficci Frames Fast Track

Mumbai: Ficci Frames Fast Track 2022, a pre-cursor to the Ficci Frames which makes a comeback after the pandemic, is slated to be held on 27 & 28 September in Mumbai.

Ficci Frames, organised by the Federation of Indian Chambers of Commerce & Industry (Ficci), is the country’s biggest international seminar for the media and entertainment industries, which spans across film, television, digital entertainment, animation, gaming and visual effects.

The theme of Ficci Frames Fast Track is the comeback after the pandemic. The two-day long conference will commemorate the industry which underwent the heat of COVID and has only emerged stronger. It seeks to bring the industry back to its feet and is raring to go.

Ficci assistant secretary general and head media & entertainment Leena Jaisani brought forth, “The idea is to bring together the industry under one roof and just celebrate the fact that we have not only survived the pandemic that affected people and industries world over, but also came together during that period to help and support people. Many studios and associations took the responsibility of vaccinating employees and their families.”

As OTT emerged as a very robust player during the pandemic, the focus this year will also be on OTT. The convention would discuss top trends, policies and regulations in the industry with various stakeholders including filmmakers, technicians, actors, heads of the film studios and representatives from exhibition sectors.

There will be dialogues and exchanges around what kind of a change has the pandemic triggered and what the future looks like for the media and entertainment sector. Conversations will also be around film tourism, IP rights and film incentives.

Ficci Frames Fast Track will also organise masterclasses and workshops around various aspects of filmmaking. This year, students from various schools and colleges will also get an opportunity to hear and learn from the leaders in the sector.

The celebrated and much loved actor, Ranveer Singh, would be inaugurating the event and shall be present for the opening session.

September 20, 2022
GUEST ARTICLE: Experiential marketing to thrive in the post-pandemic world

Mumbai: The immersive experience was popular earlier, but the Covid-19 pandemic accelerated its application by several companies, making it take centre stage rather than being offered as an add-on. Let’s see how the dynamics changed during the pandemic and the way forward.

The world is seeing the light on the other side of the tunnel. The Covid-19 pandemic’s effect has weakened now and after two years of struggle and adversity, the world is slowly paving its way back to normalcy. As the world starts connecting in person once again, experiential marketing is seeing an uptick in demand from consumers. Before the pandemic hit, experiential marketing was well perceived by consumers, with marketers seeing the potential of immersive brand experiences and events. With a locked-down lifestyle of over two years, the demand for real-life experiences has now grown exponentially.

Live events, which were seen in their element after a hiatus of over two years, got all the more creative and we could see they are now heavy on technology to bring out the personalised impact. Intimate experiences are what consumers in the modern day are striving for, and after the upheaval of the pandemic, wherein the uncertainty surged suddenly, people now want to live it to the fullest with their dear ones.

Weddings have evolved to be upbeat and intimate. For that matter, destination weddings are slowly gaining standard status in India across all economic classes. From event companies to branded hotel chains, everyone has tailored their offerings to thrive in this space by providing exhilarating experiences at bespoke destinations with breathtaking natural views in the background. Customers are now looking beyond just what is basic. They want all that with their close ones, and ideally, only close ones will witness it all. The one big event inviting multiple people is not what patrons are looking at for multiple reasons, with the Covid-safe environment taking centre stage.

People have been striving to immerse themselves in human interactions and in-person events for the longest time. Covid-19 kept them away from each other. Yet, the world somehow found ways to connect, though virtually. Events were being hosted online. Live events and destinations have started hosting virtual tours through the internet. Be it concerts, corporate events, car and bike expos, or destination conventions and trade shows, the brand value was kept alive online, but people longed to witness them again in person. Hence, marketers redefined how customers experience these events with an added value. For example, a tour and travel firm, during the Covid times, introduced a subscription-based VR experience to showcase to customers how they can sense various destinations. If they liked the appeal of a close-to-real experience, the customer could engage in a valuable package to travel to the destination once the lockdown was lifted.

Real-life experiences create happy memories for the customers, and that has been shown to contribute a lot to increased conversions or sales. In the foodservice industry, many upbeat events saw drastic closures during the pandemic. Hotels turned into quarantine centres, and their restaurants remained confined to receiving delivery orders only. However, they conceived things differently. Instead of sending just the end products, hotels reimagined the live-kitchen experience of their award-winning restaurants at the patron’s home. Hence, the concept of DIY signature dishes was born. The hotel sent individual ingredients for the signature dishes, and patrons were guided on how to make the dish via a note or virtual live guidance from the executive chef. The results were lip-smacking. The hotels that practised this approach expressed an increase in customers visiting them currently who wanted to experience the signature dishes at the hotel in the ambience provided by the hotel.

Experiential marketing has come a long way, and digitization has certainly helped people remain connected all the time. People are finding newer ways to stay connected, and experiential marketers are trying their best to make a point of how the patron is as immersed in the product or service as possible. While 4D in cinema dates back several years, the application of virtual reality and augmented reality has come a long way in the events sector too. From headphones-based beach parties to VR gaming zones, experiential marketing has revolutionised how people looked at events previously.

The crux of the success of experiential marketing remains the feeling of ownership that it creates. People love taking control of things and using them for the best according to themselves, so experiential marketing creates just the environment. For example, the new-age apparel stores online are coming up with features wherein one can see how they will look in a particular outfit even before deciding to buy it. They sense how they would look in it and how it’d feel to own it. This can lead the customers to buy or choose another outfit. So, the feeling of ownership even before making the sale has led to the success of experiential marketing. In the case of events, people love to witness how their prospective event will look through a virtual environment. A virtual walkthrough of the event’s flow helps the customer visualise how their event will look before the day.

Experiential marketing has come a long way in these years where it originally came as an ancillary service but has become a crucial element of the marketing mix for many corporates. It is in line with the evolving needs of customers, who are now savvy and demand more from brands and are well over the age-old advertising tactics.

The author of the article is Hubble Entertainment co-founder and managing partner Hafiz Khan.

September 2, 2022
UFO Moviez expects the company will return to pre-pandemic level: Sanjay Gaikwad

Mumbai: As long as there are no new pandemic-induced restrictions that would affect business operations, UFO Moviez founder and managing director Sanjau Gaikwad is optimistic that the company will soon return to the pre-pandemic level.

Addressing shareholders in the annual report, he said that during the year, as a proactive measure amidst the second wave, the company raised equity funds to the tune of Rs 96.82 crore. It was primarily done to address any unforeseen events due to any further Covid-induced restrictions and to help the core business meet its immediate capital requirements as soon as the movies begin to release following the pandemic. The fundraising, he explains, has given the company a strong financial foothold. “We will prudently utilise these funds for business expansion and any short-term capital requirements until our core business regains normalcy.”

He noted that the severity of the Covid-19 pandemic and ensuing restrictions continued to affect the business in FY22 as well. This, he explains, was due to the absence of big-budget releases during the first seven months of FY22, which was led by the closure of cinemas in most of the States due to the second wave of Covid.

“The release of big-budget movies began only in November ’21 and continued thereafter. However, the widespread of the third wave of Covid-19 at the very beginning of January ’22 and subsequent restrictions led to another two months’ impact on the business operations as movies only started to be released again towards the end of February’22. As a result of the two lockdowns due to the second and third waves of Covid-19, the overall recovery in the business has remained subdued in FY22. However, as a result of a steady flow of releases in recent months and the strong support of movie-goers, theatrical revenues have rebounded swiftly while advertising revenue is gradually improving. This is expected to continue in FY23 subject to no further pandemic-induced restrictions.”

The company’s AGM will take place on 23 August 2022.

July 30, 2022
R K Swamy launches Amrit Mahotsav Campaign for finance ministry

Mumbai: The ministry of finance has released a special music video called “Thank You” as part of the “Azadi ka Amrit Mahotsav” celebrations, which mark the 75th anniversary of India’s independence.

The song was composed by the duet Salim-Sulaiman and has a star cast of singers in several languages. It was written and conceptualised by R K SWAMY. This music video stands out since it was created as originals in 11 languages and was originally rendered in each language.

The video is intended to recognise the contributions of everyone involved in the ministry as well as the workers in the banks, insurance, and other financial services sectors to nation-building and the fight against the Covid pandemic.

R K SWAMY executive creative director Sangeetha N said, “We wanted to break the clutter for these special people who never shut down their service even during Covid, so that the country could cope. We cast for talent in every language, and we have a lineup of the best of them. Remarkably, there was so much enthusiasm for this project from everyone. It shows in the genuine expression of gratitude we could capture both in the song and in the video.”

Music composer Salim Merchant commented, “This was a super special project for us. It was a privilege and an honour to be able to execute this on behalf of the ministry of finance. It was a special thought. It needed a magical expression. We were fortunate to get such good talent to participate. Hats off to Team R K SWAMY for their conception and management of this project.”

July 15, 2022