MUMBAI: A few years ago Star India decided to hive off some bits of its repertoire and focus exclusively on its main GEC Star Plus and the emerging sports scenario. Surprisingly, the channel is now taking a new turn by targeting the youngest viewers. As per industry sources, the Uday Shankar-led network is all set to launch both SD and HD versions of Star Movies Kids.
Going by the name, the channel is likely to showcase animated movies at first, which are currently broadcast on the main Star Movies channel. It will also help star in targeting kids advertisers to maximise its investment in the cost of acquisition of the movies.
The broadcaster already had a channel Baby TV, catering to toddlers, that was owned by parent company Fox Networks. Given the digital environment, Star not only has challengers in the broadcast space such as Nick, CN, Pogo, Hungama, Disney, Discovery Kids, etc, who have fortified their bastions over the years but also OTT players that have become the second screen for a considerable amount of kids.
Broadcast Audience Research Council (BARC) data suggests that 29 per cent of kids like watching Hindi GECs, followed by 18 per cent for Hindi movies and only 11 per cent kids consume kids channels. The high viewership for GEC indicates parallel viewing that kids do along with parents.
When it comes to the film based animated content, it gives better ROI with higher per minute impressions. According to the BARC data week 1 to week 32 of 2018, film-based animated content garnered 472 impressions, followed by cartoons/animation with 158 impressions and game/talk/quiz with 46 impressions.
Kids form a big section of TV audience. Kids’ viewership is also expected to spike as broadcasters are looking to invest more in home-grown content.
Talking about the year 2019, as per the BARC data week 2, Disney Channel, Nickelodeon, Hungama, Pogo TV and Cartoon Network stood at first, second, third, fourth and fifth positions respectively with 141953 impressions '000s, 140548 impressions '000s, 106963 impressions '000s, 73646 impressions '000s and 64072 impressions '000s.
