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Tag: Discovery Lifestyle Networks

  • ‘We see DT&L exploding over the next few years as an advertising category and a wish category’ : Aditya Tripathi- Discovery lifestyle networks VP

    ‘We see DT&L exploding over the next few years as an advertising category and a wish category’ : Aditya Tripathi- Discovery lifestyle networks VP

    Discovery Travel and Living VP -lifestyle networks Aditya Tripathi was in Bangalore to showcase the channel’s new local show ‘A Matter of Taste’ hosted by television anchor Vir Sanghvi. The show follows Sanghvi as he embarks on on a culinary journey to explore Indian tastes, debunk myths and discover the finest in Indian food and drink.

    Indiantelevision.com’s Tarachand Wanvari caught up with Tripathi to get a lowdown on the localisation plans, the challenges of shooting in India and client customisation.

    Excerpts:

    How would you describe the progress that Discovery has made this year?
    Discovery is growing really well. In the first 13 weeks of this calendar year, we’ve beaten everybody. That’s all English news, all English movies, all English music channels – MTV et al.

    Would this apply to Discovery alone or other channels – Animal Planet and Discovery Travel & Living (DTL)?
    This is Discovery alone. There is not even a comparison with the other channel in our genre (NGC).

    What’s new in the programming line-up on DTL, especially from India?
    The big one is of course A Matter of Taste with Vir Sanghvi. We are working on a couple of other programmes also. There’s one on Indian fashion and style which will come out towards the end of the year.

    Then there’s one based on a hotel (Taj Mahal Hotel in Mumbai) which will go on air by July or so, this year. We have actually gone into a hotel and spent three months there. It covers the hotel, about how a hotel functions. When you go to the reception of a hotel, some pretty girl smiles at you, they give you a room key, you go up, actually there are lots of people working behind the scenes that you don’t see. So how does the hotel function?

    The channel is an international channel and the intention has always been that it will be an international channel with some 15-20 per cent Indian content. The majority of the programming will always come from outside. You are looking at the Indian who wants to see the world, not an insular person who wants to see only content about India.

    And what about the fashion and style show that you mentioned?
    We have already started working on that. We have taken a well known fashion designer and we are working with him on this show. I’ll share the name with you when the show is closer to being completed.

    In this series we are traveling around India and outside the country also. We look at rural fashion, we look at pop art, we look at cheap fashion, it’s not only the high haute couture and the expensive fashion. We are at looking at the Indian style sensibilities across the board. And not only in clothes, in interiors, in hotels, in all kinds of things. It’s a very interesting show, but we have shot only two episodes right now, so we are still working on it.

    Some of the episodes will be location specific, so we’ll look at a part of the country. Other episodes will be following a story in preparing for a fashion show.

    How many episodes have you planned for? What about the sponsors for the series?
    It will be a 13-episode series. We’ve not yet lined up sponsors for the moment. We’ll wait till we have a little more polished stuff to show them. We’ve just shot two episodes. The concept has been talked about to a number of people who are interested.

    So is it mainly the garment industry that is interested?
    No, because it’s not only clothes and that kind of fashion. We’ve got interest from car brands, we’ve got interests from mobile phone companies, paints, even those categories. Then jewelry and accessories will also come in.

    Your first local show was ‘The Great Indian Wedding’ where one episode was aired. What is the status on that?
    Depending upon the press you read, we were covering so many things. According to The Times of India, we were covering the Bachchan-Ash wedding also, but that’s not true.

    We have created a brand, but we want to find very special weddings. For a lot of weddings that are special, either the people are not very comfortable to be in the public domain or there are a number of weddings where the people are scared of the tax authorities. And then there are some people who are very conscious of publicity and keen to get it, but it may not be a very classy wedding.

    We are going to keep this as an irregular one-off show. Every time there’s a wedding, we approach the family and if we can shoot, we’ll take it forward from there. But the original plan was to do a series of many weddings, we’ve decided not to do that.

    What are the challenges that you face while making something out of India?
    One challenge that we have is to convince our colleagues in other parts of the world that it will be a good story. Because we see now on Discovery channel, on our own channel DT&L there are now many programmes that are being made out of India. There’s a series like the one by Anthony Bourdain, or any of these international shows, they come and make one or two episodes out of India, but they come with their foreign crew, foreign anchor and cameramen and they come and shoot here and they go back and shoot the rest of the series everywhere.

    We are in the process of convincing them that an Indian production unit can make a show just as well, plus, we make them at a lower cost. The point is that the storytelling will be as good, the production quality will be as good. That’s one of the main challenges that we face.

    Could you shed light on the logistical challenges?
    Shooting a series which is not based in a studio is always a challenge. For instance, each half hour episode of A Matter of Taste has involved seven to eight days of travelling and shooting around different cities, plus the dubbing and editing and other work. For each episode we’ll go to three or four cities. The logistics for that are challenging, but it’s not that they would be any different anywhere else.
    What about your programmes that are focused on communities such as the drinking community – The Thirsty Traveller?
    That is one guy, an anchor called Kevin Brauch who travels around the world, like you have food programs and travel programs, his program is to explore the drinking culture and the different local beverages. That’s a show that has been very popular.

    Is anything coming out of India on those lines?
    There was talk that they would come to India. I was in touch with the production company and there was a little problem with getting permission. So we are now working with them to try and get an episode out of India.

    Won’t there be conflict with the authorities on that? After all alcoholic drinks are products that you can’t even advertise about in India?
    Well, all that we have heard so far is that they had permission problems. We are not sure what they are. We are working with them to find out.

    What is the situation as far as advertising is concerned?
    Of the English entertainment channels including movies, we have sold more inventory, more secondage than any of the others in the last year. That is movies, Star World, Zee Café…

    But those are a different genres altogether?
    We are the only lifestyle channel. When we launched two and a half years ago, Zoom, Star One VH1 – we were launching at the same time and all four were saying that we are lifestyle. Now I think that all the others have changed their formula.

    Certainly among the advertising community, we are recognised as the only lifestyle channel. But being a single channel in a genre that is not defined by anyone, it’s very difficult to define, so we compare ourselves with English entertainment. Because generally the values of the programming are the same, it’s kind of an unwinding programme that you watch to entertain.
    ‘Depending upon the press you read, we were covering so many things. According to The Times of India, we were covering the Bachchan-Ash wedding also, but that’s not true.‘

    So have your advertiser numbers improved from the 236 brands that you had said sometime ago?
    Yes. The number of brands keep going up. The very interesting thing about the channel is that from the day we launched, actually even before we launched, we said that we’d be an upscale channel and we are trying to fill a niche for the advertiser of upscale products.

    Today, traditionally a lot of advertisers for upscale products are on print. They are not on TV, because most channels are not focused. So we said that we will come in and reach those kinds of advertisers. So Pepsi will not advertise on my channel, but Diet Pepsi will advertise or Crush will advertise. Now Airtel no longer advertises on our channel for their standard connections because they are much more of a mass product, but Blackberry Pearl will come on our channel, Samsung LCD screens will come on our channel. The battle for us is not to get as many advertisers as we can, the battle is to keep that focus.
    To return to the localisation issue how many of the Indian programmes are being broadcast abroad? Where do you get the best response from?
    In Discovery the way this works is that all the shows that we make here are offered to our colleagues and then it’s up to them to buy them. So our last production Indian Rendezvous is there outside the country, in UK, this was a six-episode series and all the six episodes will be there. In the case of A Matter of Taste which is now complete, we’ll be sending it to them. I am confident that this will also air around the world.

    Singapore, which is the whole of Asia region and the UK, these are the places where there is maximum affinity. But I am hoping that going forward the US will also start buying into the programming. Right now it is UK more than the rest of Europe. But now that India is on the top of mind for everyone around the world, I am expecting that our spread will be greater than it is now.
    As far as your international content is concerned and programme blocks, is there anything special happening?
    One show that we are looking forward to is Queer Eye For The Straight Guy which we will introduce later this year. This is a makeover show for men.

    Each episode features a new candidate usually a straight/heterosexual man ready to be culturally transformed. Each candidate prepares for a special event and receives generous guidance from each Fab Five member in their respective categories of expertise. Candidates are prepared for such events as a marriage proposal, a first dinner with a girlfriend’s parents, and a backyard barbecue.

    We have a women’s hour. However our viewership is homogeneous. So we have not focussed on building programme blocks.
    Have you done any further client customisation like you did for HSBC some time ago and what has been the response to such efforts? How effective has customization been for your clients?
    We do a lot of client customisation where we package programs. We had a Monday to Friday programme Off to the Caribbean with Pepsi Gold around the World Cup time. What we do is to pick up a selection of programmes.

    A few weeks ago we did something for HT Mint, a very upscale targeting was required, so we did a series that we already had for Europe. We packaged that as Mint Money Mantras. With the travel site yatra.scom we did Amazing Yatras.

    That kind of customisation happens all the time. In terms of product integration, we haven’t done that yet, but are looking at doing that as well. In terms of effectiveness the client keeps on coming back for more so obviously it is quite effective for them.
    Who are your repeat clients?
    Pepsi is a repeat client. They have come back on various occasions and we keep getting new clients also. So it’s obviously effective.

    What marketing activities does the channel do to create awareness?
    We don’t do a lot of marketing. Word of mouth has helped us a lot. The fact is that our target audience is tough to reach through the traditional mass media. Having said that, we did put in some ads in newspapers to create awareness about A Matter Of Taste.

    Discovery Lifestyle launched a couple of channels in Malaysia recently. Any plans to bring them into India?
    Not at the moment. While DTH and digital cable are growing this is not immediately on our radar.

    Who are the big advertisers from Bangalore ?
    Yeah, I do, to meet the advertisers. There’s Britannia, then you’ve got ITC here, they are the big ones. Titan, Tanishq, IBM-Lenovo, etc. ING is a big client, Kingfisher Airlines, lot of these are our clients. In the case of the IT software companies, it’s more of a B2B arrangement, so we don’t have these as our clients.

    Could you offer your views on the television scene in India?
    These are exciting times. Well, every time you open a website or a newspaper you see channels being launched left, right and center. Every one is launching channels. You’ve reported that Sun has started a Kids channel.

    So how long do you think these can be sustained?
    I’ve been working with media for a long time now. Even in the mid nineties, people were saying that so many channels are being launched and they won’t be able to sustain, but no high profile channel has really gone down. They are still able to financially keep going. Obviously there is a lot of money following the channels. You know especially when distribution money is not very substantial. Around the world, channels run on distribution money, the subscription route. If that is not substantial, then it’s very difficult.

    Finally where do you see DT&L over the next three years?
    We launched about two and a half years ago to fit into the upscale Indian. We were hoping to create a new category of advertisers. We’ve had success so far in shifting and attracting the TV advertisers. One thing that hasn’t happened yet is that a lot of print only advertisers haven’t yet moved onto TV. That’s one thing that we expect to do a lot on.

    As the economy booms, as more tourists start travelling, we are very well paced and we really see this channel as an advertising category and a wish category exploding over the next few years. I am very proud of what we have done so far. We are ahead of our advertising and revenue targets, but we expect that the next two or three years will really be boom time for us. The operations here are profitable, but we never disclose country specific breakup details.
  • ‘We believe that it is not in numbers but in the quality and nature of programming that is getting us noticed’ : Aditya Tripathi – Discovery Lifestyle Networks vice president

    ‘We believe that it is not in numbers but in the quality and nature of programming that is getting us noticed’ : Aditya Tripathi – Discovery Lifestyle Networks vice president

    Discovery Lifestyle Networks VP Aditya Tripathi began his professional career with Living Media India Ltd., and has worked in senior positions with some of the biggest media houses in the country. He made the move to Discovery in 2000 and his expertise in creating brand empathy, marketing and promotion has gone a long way to reinvigorate the various Discovery brands in India, especially Travel & Living.

    India is attaining prominence because of the socio-economic developments taking place in the country. Ahead of Discovery Travel & Living’s (DT&L) first local production The Great Indian Wedding to be aired on 20 August, Tripathi spoke to Indiantelevision.com’s Usha Thomas about how the lifestyle channel was gaining eyeballs with incessant demand from both Indian and foreign viewers for India-centric content.

    Excerpts:

    How did the concept of a lifestyle channel come about?
    With its growing and dynamic TV market and emerging middle-class, India was the right place to begin Discovery Networks’ new lifestyle endeavour. Some years ago, we took stock of the international TV landscape and we identified the presence of established global leaders in different genres: news, sports, movies, factual. And, among all this we identified a niche in the lifestyle space. There was no global brand and given that we had some experience in lifestyle and travel genres, we felt that this was an area we could occupy and dominate in the years to come.

    The senior management from the parent group came to India and wanted to be convinced that India was the right place to launch a lifestyle channel. After a day of the usual presentations, we took them to Gurgaon and showed them the homes, buildings under construction, call centres and malls. They looked around and said if this is the future of India, then lifestyle is the future of India and right there in the middle of a shopping mall, we were given the go ahead to launch DT&L. And, hence India was the first country to launch lifestyle networks.

    What is the positioning of the channel?
    Since its launch in November 2004, DT&L has striven to make its positioning distinct from that of factual channels. From day one, the strategy of our channel was to offer varied, non-fictional content as it is our strength. But, we don’t need to stick to factual alone. We can be factual as well as be in the lifestyle group and our positioning in the lifestyle group is aspirational, yet attainable. It’s just not about enjoying life, it is about celebrating life. It is good looking entertainment. So our channel is aspirational yet attainable, hedonistic, pacy, edgy …always stylish and trendy. We believe in good looking, entertaining television.

    Who is your target audience?
    Our primary target audience is upscale SEC AB audience – males, females and couples, between the age group 18 – 45 years. But, for us SEC, age, gender are limiting definitions. Our focus markets are Top 10 cities in India. Apart from these, the aspirational character of the channel will attract a secondary audience as well. It’s a state of mind that we are looking to capture so we are targeting a person with an international outlook, a person who has travelled abroad, may have even lived abroad, whose kids may be studying abroad and one who has seen international television and international lifestyle. This is common in Travel & Living in the UK, US, Singapore, all over the world. Nationality is not important for people with this mindset.

    Outline your performance in viewership, reach and among advertisers?
    Today, we reach 3 out of 4 cable homes in the country and in the top six metros, we reach 4 out of 5 homes. As far as viewership and relative channel share compared to other English entertainment channels Star World and Zee Café is concerned, we are growing considerably with time. We don’t share content with these channels but almost eight months after our launch, we had overtaken Star World in terms of numbers.

    Word of mouth and strong advertiser response is an indicator of our success. We are looking at the mindset which goes beyond demographics.

    Though TAM is a very democratic form of measurement designed to measure television groups across the country, groups, cities & towns, it is not designed to measure our target audience. For us, it is the people in malls, in fine dining restaurants, our ad agencies who are watching the channel. We believe that it is not in numbers but in the quality of programming and nature of programming that is getting us noticed.

    DT&L is about innovative, up market and interesting programming and we seek to experiment with properties that transverse different genres. We also pride ourselves on understanding our audience. Audience feedback has greatly attributed to our success and word of mouth is what makes us tick.

    In the first year, we had 236 brands on the channel and each time we go to an ad agency, the decision makers and their families are watching the channel so we have got very positive response from the advertisers to this channel. Also, despite the rapid growth of the television industry in India, advertising spends on lifestyle brands have traditionally been restricted to the print medium. The lifestyle channel provides advertisers with a dynamic media vehicle to reach a well targeted and defined viewership profile. It attracts 120 advertisers from across product categories, further cementing the channel’s unique value proposition.

    DT&L is providing a variety of shows, apart from just travel based shows. The programming strategy on DT&L since 2004?
    DT&L is essentially a lifestyle channel and along with travel, the programming will give viewers the inside track on all the latest trends in luxury and includes travel, health, relationships, wine, cuisine, home, car, bikes, the good life with a little bit of celeb and glam life.

    We have evolved keeping our original concept in mind and have grown far more than expected since our launch two years ago. Content is the key driver. We have made it our policy to incorporate as many different genres as possible and to acquire international programs or create localised programming in order to form a strong bond with our viewers.

    The Theme Week and Sunday Brunch strategy introduced in end December 2005 targeted at both viewers and advertisers. These programming blocks were created to appeal to the various target groups at times that they prefer while at the same time giving advertisers a focussed platform to reach key audiences.

    We have introduced a number of genre-defining programmes that have never been seen before in India, for example,American Chopper, Faking It, Million Dollar Agents, Miami Ink. We have all along explored different different genres of programming and experimented with reality factual programming with a difference.

    We don’t do celeb focusssed programming and are not overawed by celebs. Shows that we have incorporated have ranked extremely high in terms of quality and appeal and capitalize on wit and local humor, apart from being real.

    What are your views on DTH in India?
    The encouraging DTH scenario was also one of the reasons why the Indian management had been advocating the case for a lifestyle network in India. The channel has been established as a lifestyle channel, roping in the upwardly mobile. Currently available in 22 million homes across the country, DTL is also now available on the DTH platform.

    Today, we have the choice to choose the bouquet you want and the channel you want, so we welcome it. Internationally, the Discovery family of channels has thrived in all DTH markets. All three of our channels – Discovery, Animal Planet and Travel & Living are available on Dish TV and Tata Sky. We get to see the channel we want rather than with cable ops where they run all the channels and one can’t choose. For DTH, exclusivity is important and that suits us.
    ‘10-15 per cent of the programming will be Indian. At any given point, we will have one local show on air and every quarter, we will premiere a new series‘

    Can you tell us about Discovery producing programs in India?
    India’s relevance on the world map is increasing. There are more people around the world interested in India, coming to India to work and travel so therefore DT&L is producing programming on Indian audiences but this will go to our channels across the world. The programming will show India in a positive light and in turn we get eyeballs from other regions who see these programs and maybe plan to visit India on seeing it.

    The way the Discovery format is used, we make a program on one part of the world and we show it in other parts of the world. That is the nature of our programming and all the shows on the three channels Discovery, DT&L and Animal Planet are of global interest. Similarly, we know our channel here is an international channel that provides high quality entertainment for a global audience.

    Give us the complete lowdown on the first local production The Great Indian Wedding?
    With our decision to commission local productions in India, we had been identifying various ideas that fit our programming strategy. Amongst many other concepts, we zeroed down to The Great Indian Wedding show. Also, in our discussions with many production houses, Delhi based Blue Mango came up with the very same idea. They were given the go ahead to make a pilot, mainly to serve two purposes: Get the formula right and then make the rest of the series.

    At the time that we decided on the wedding series, the media was all agog about the Chatwal wedding. Many other channels were trying to get the coverage and when we spoke to the Chatwals, they readily agreed to give us exclusive access to all the happenings on the wedding which was to be held in three cities in India – Mumbai, Udaipur and Delhi.

    The Great Indian Wedding is a one of a kind series, allowing the viewer to experience the wedding as an insider. The focus is on weddings with a difference and have a twist to them: opulence, glam quotient, location and theme. The pilot episode premieres on 20 August at 8 pm.

    During the ad break of this pilot episode, a banner will be streamed asking viewers if they have a great Indian wedding coming up. Based on the responses and our research, the 13 part series will be made. The remaining episodes will go into production in the 2006-2007 wedding season. We are looking at ethnic, different weddings and need not be of the same scale as the Chatwal wedding. Apart from the many applications received for the upcoming wedding season, we expect many more once the pilot episode is aired.

    The programme captures the glamorous theme parties extending from exotic locations like Jag Mandir in Udaipur to premium hotels in Delhi, the striking performances by Indian and international artists and the romantic and religious wedding ceremony. The host, Natasha Mago presents an insiders view, chatting up the bride, groom, guests, the challenges and frustrations of the wedding planner and the actual wedding ceremony.

    All guests invited at the wedding who appear on the show have given their signed consent in this regard, mainly to avoid legal hassles later, what with the high celeb turnout for this wedding.

    Our aim is to showcase India and showing a wedding held at the opulent and historical venues at Udaipur & Delhi, we hope to do our bit in promoting tourism in India. Keeping in tune with the high standards that Discovery is associated with, budgets were high especially as it was all shot on digibeta cameras. It was not studio based and there will be no compromise on the quality of the film, light, sound and effects used. We are clear that each programme should include a unique and entertaining story, credible facts and high-quality production values.
    ‘We plan to get into merchandising by early next year by releasing DVD versions of our popular series and those currently on air‘

    What are the marketing initiatives being undertaken for the new local shows?
    We have already started airing promos and teaser campaigns for the pilot episode from 15 July and these have evinced a lot of interest among the viewers and the advertising fraternity. On the day (20 August) that the pilot episode will be premiered, we will be placing advertisements in all the major national dailies.

    Have you set targets regarding the amount of India centric content?
    It is essentially an international channel and India productions will be a small but significant part of the repertoire of programmes. The Indian programming will never dominate the channel as we clearly make it with the intention of airing it in other parts of the world. So, maybe 10-15 per cent of the programming will be Indian. At any given point, we will have one local show on air and every quarter, we will premiere a new series.

    What outdoor activities are being planned in India in order to extend the brand beyond television?
    We plan to get into merchandising by early next year by releasing DVD versions of our popular series and those currently on air. We have tie ups for the same with firms based out of Singapore and hope to soon associate with local firms.

    Name few acquisitions made recently?
    Among the recent acquisitions are a home interiors show called Trading Spaces and one on the training methods for airline cabin crew called Flight Attendants School. In January, we will be airing another BBC title Hairy Bikers Cookbook which captures the journey of two motorbike freaks as they travel to different places and learn about the local food.

    Are Indian viewers different from their counterpart in other countries?
    Honestly, there is no difference as our target audience matches up to any other in a similar genre in the world. They travel a lot, may have been educated abroad or visit countries on business and their lifestyles, eating habits and aspirations are similar to those abroad.

    Any plans of incorporating broadband and mobile into your business?
    We are looking at what technology may allow and what audiences are looking for and yet marrying that to the core DNA attributes of what Discovery has represented and people have loved through the years. We do not consider them a threat and with time, will integrate them in our business. Flipping channels is a reality and we are evaluating on working with mobiles, VoIP and other different platforms. We have been at the forefront of incorporating technology in the way we program and market the channel.

    For the series aired last quarter Five Takes, we had selected young people in their early to mid-twenties, and have given them $50 a day, a camera to film and software to edit so they document their daily lives. We gave the audience the opportunity to vote on the net and via SMS to decide where these young people should go and what they should do.

    In the niche channel environment where perception counts for a lot customization, do mention any customised solutions that have been done for clients?
    We recently had our first initiative in this regard with HSBC Bank for the HSBC Premiere card. They target the same high net worth individuals like us and they invited their customers and potential customers to a dinner and whisky tasting event at elite hotels in Delhi, Mumbai and Bangalore. We spoke about different whiskeys, their history and they also got to taste the best available in the world. We got tremendous feedback from those invited and HSBC and will hold many more customized events with like minded firms in the future.