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Tag: Star Sports

  • Star reignites ‘World Cupwali feeling’

    Star reignites ‘World Cupwali feeling’

    MUMBAI: Star Sports has kicked off its campaign for the ICC Champions Trophy’ 17 with a TVC featuring India’s World Cup’11 winning moment. The tournament, which will see the top eight ICC ranked ODI teams battle it out to become the ultimate champion, promises to be an action-packed affair.

    The film opens with the photo of former Indian captain, MS Dhoni, posing with the ICC World Cup trophy in front of the Gateway of India. The film moves in reverse, starting from the celebrations being done by the fans and the players just after India won the ICC World Cup in 2011, to the most iconic shot of ICC World Cup 2011 – MSD’s winning six in the Final at Wankhede stadium. The film ends with a voiceover along with the shot of current Indian captain, Virat Kohli. The voiceover states that fans will get to experience the same ‘World Cup wali feeling’ as ‘World Cup of Champions’ is about to come.

    The TVC triggers the same feeling of euphoria that the fans experienced when India won the ICC World Cup after a 28-year long wait. The ICC Champions Trophy will be another opportunity for fans to rally behind and cheer for the Indian team which is scaling new heights with every series.

    The creative is based on the idea that for an Indian cricket fan, the feeling of winning the World Cup is unparalleled. The fans last experienced this in the ICC World Cup 2011. ICC Champions Trophy’17, World Cup of Champions, promises to bring back the same feeling in 2017.

    The TVC went on-air on 26 January , 2017 during the TV premiere of MS Dhoni: The Untold Story on Star Plus and during the Ind v Eng T20I on Star Spots. The TVC is digitally available on Star Sports’ social media pages.

    ICC Champions Trophy’17, which will be Virat Kohli’s first major ICC tournament as the captain of Indian team, is scheduled to be held in England and Wales between 1 and 18 June. India, who won the last edition played in 2013, will start their title defense against Pakistan. The much anticipated India vs Pakistan clash is scheduled to be played on 4 June, 2017

  • Star reignites ‘World Cupwali feeling’

    Star reignites ‘World Cupwali feeling’

    MUMBAI: Star Sports has kicked off its campaign for the ICC Champions Trophy’ 17 with a TVC featuring India’s World Cup’11 winning moment. The tournament, which will see the top eight ICC ranked ODI teams battle it out to become the ultimate champion, promises to be an action-packed affair.

    The film opens with the photo of former Indian captain, MS Dhoni, posing with the ICC World Cup trophy in front of the Gateway of India. The film moves in reverse, starting from the celebrations being done by the fans and the players just after India won the ICC World Cup in 2011, to the most iconic shot of ICC World Cup 2011 – MSD’s winning six in the Final at Wankhede stadium. The film ends with a voiceover along with the shot of current Indian captain, Virat Kohli. The voiceover states that fans will get to experience the same ‘World Cup wali feeling’ as ‘World Cup of Champions’ is about to come.

    The TVC triggers the same feeling of euphoria that the fans experienced when India won the ICC World Cup after a 28-year long wait. The ICC Champions Trophy will be another opportunity for fans to rally behind and cheer for the Indian team which is scaling new heights with every series.

    The creative is based on the idea that for an Indian cricket fan, the feeling of winning the World Cup is unparalleled. The fans last experienced this in the ICC World Cup 2011. ICC Champions Trophy’17, World Cup of Champions, promises to bring back the same feeling in 2017.

    The TVC went on-air on 26 January , 2017 during the TV premiere of MS Dhoni: The Untold Story on Star Plus and during the Ind v Eng T20I on Star Spots. The TVC is digitally available on Star Sports’ social media pages.

    ICC Champions Trophy’17, which will be Virat Kohli’s first major ICC tournament as the captain of Indian team, is scheduled to be held in England and Wales between 1 and 18 June. India, who won the last edition played in 2013, will start their title defense against Pakistan. The much anticipated India vs Pakistan clash is scheduled to be played on 4 June, 2017

  • Star’s five marketing strategies that helped sports grow in 2016

    Star’s five marketing strategies that helped sports grow in 2016

    “Business has only two functions: marketing and innovation,” is a lesser known observation of Milan Kundera, the Czech-born French writer who’s more famous for Unbearable Lightness of Being and more such thought-provoking novels.

    Why are we cross referencing Kundera in a write-up for sports marketing campaigns? Simply because Star India and its bouquet of sports channels, marketed under brand Star Sports, are following Kundera’s words to a T— and successfully too.

    In a dynamic world of sports broadcasting where events are now held and telecast almost round the year — at times various big ticket events held and aired live the same day in different part of the globe in different time zones — it is difficult to ensure the success of every league or tournament in terms of advertising revenue. Behind the numbers’ game, lot of research is done to finalise marketing strategies, which are aimed to ensure that audiences are given exactly what they want, where they want and how they want.

    With some smart packaging, marketing and advertising, Star India has managed not only to acquire broadcast rights for the region for some of the big sporting events, but also get the eyeballs — and advertising revenue — to justify the millions of dollars it is sinking into Indian sports. A business newspaper reported last year that Star India has bet Rs. 200 billion (Rs. 20,000 crore) on sports. This money has been ploughed into not only getting the rights for Indian cricket, Summer Olympics and sundry other games, but also into building lesser sports like kabaddi and cash in on football’s popularity by creating an Indian football league with participation of retired international stars.

    We look at five marketing strategies of Star India, helmed by Chairman and CEO Uday Shankar and his deputy Sanjay Gupta, which helped the respective sports aired on Star Sports grow in terms of viewership in India.

    1. India vs. England Test Series

    In an age where T20 and slam-bang form of cricket is being aggressively promoted and vastly followed, it has been a refreshing change to see Test cricket getting good viewership. India had been itching to take revenge over England, a side which had defeated the Indian cricket gladiators in three consecutive Test series prior to this.

    Building up the tension with #scoretosettle, Star Sports network used the Virat Kohli factor very effectively and the response was satisfying. The five-match Test series had a reach of 159 million viewers. BARC recorded a total of 728 million impressions in the India urban market and a total of 1,217 impressions in the all-India market. The fourth Test had the highest rating with 4.9, proving the series was the biggest of the year.

    Virat Kohli scored a brilliant 235 in the fourth Test and the rise of Karun Nair and Jayant Yadav had Indian viewers glued to their TV screens. There would have been additional viewers reached via Star’s digital platform Hotstar that too streamed the matches. The series was won 4-0. It was not only Team Virat that put on a sterling performance in recent times, but also Star Sports in terms of viewership.

    2. ICC Cricket T20 World Cup

    In a heavily marketed campaign of the year, the T20 World Cup was being played on the Indian soil for the first time in its history. Quirky, gripping and nationally-emotional TVCs were made and beamed on national television starting early 2016. With #T20WC as easy and relatable as ever, the match between India vs. Pakistan trended with #maukamauka, setting the tone for brilliant support for the Men in Blue. India defeated Pakistan comfortably, riding on Virat Kohli’s brilliant half century after the team, at one time, was tottering at 23/3 due to a fearful Mohammed Amir spell. India reached the semi-finals, only to be defeated by eventual winners West Indies.

    The tournament reached 393 million people in India, one of the highest viewed tournaments in 2016. The India vs. Pakistan game got a rating of 17.3 across the Star Sports network, becoming the most watched T20 game ever since the 2007 WC final played between the arch-rivals.

    While the cricket on display was high quality, credit must be given to the marketers who too did their job magnificently. Video snippets and memes capturing Mauka-man’s reactions were also pushed in real-time during the match and after it, which contributed to #IndvsPak overtaking the tournament’s official hash tag during the game.

    The Mauka Mauka campaign, originally devised in 2015 by Ranchi-born Suresh Triveni for Star Sports, not only connected with cricket fans instantly, but also got featured in a Forbes’ list of five best sports marketing campaigns that went viral in 2015. Even as the campaign’s character still connects with viewers when used by Star Sports, writing about it in 2015 Forbes said, “Occasionally, a campaign hits a nerve and it catches the attention of a whole country. For India, this is that campaign.”

    3. Rio Summer Olympics 

    It doesn’t get bigger than the Olympics, does it? In one of the most apt hash tags in Indian markets last year, Star Sports used #issebadakuchnahi in the build up to the Rio Olympics 2016. Rest as they say, is history. Female badminton player PV Sindhu reached the finals and was part of an extensive marketing programme by the Star network.

     The tall and powerful Indian, who catapulted overnight as a superwoman in an overtly patriarchal country, lost to Spain’s Caroline Marin in a well-fought three-set final 21-19, 21-12 and 21-15. The match recorded 17.2 million impressions, the most viewed programme on that day across all genres in India. In total, 202 million viewers tuned in to watch the Rio Games on television and 10 million (Star’s internal figures) watched the live streaming on Star’s digital sibling, Hotstar.

    The whole scenario of Indian alternative sports or non-cricket games has changed after the Rio Olympics. Fans found new heroes in gymnast Dipa Karmakar, Sindhu, wrestler and bronze medallist Sakshi Malik, Aditi Ashok and various other sports personalities. As part of the story-telling, Star Sports brought their stories to fans via videos, images and content and ensured continuous engagement with fans throughout the tournament with conversations peaking when India clinched two medals (badminton and wrestling). So thought out was the marketing engagement unleashed by Star Sports that it even dug out the noodle-haired Indo-Canadian Kamal Sidhu, one of India’s fav music veejays and TV anchors during the mid 1990s and early 2000s, as the host for pre-live Olympics programmes.

    #BillionCheers, a 360-degree campaign that happened before, during and after the Olympics helped #Rio2016 become one of the top trending hash tags in India in 2016.

     4. India Super League

    The Indian football extravaganza was one of the hottest tournaments in 2016 in terms of viewership. The league saw the arrival of 2010 World Cup Golden Ball winner Diego Forlan join hands with Mumbai City FC, taking the side to the semi-finals for the first time in three editions. The league was won by Atletico de Kolkata, which defeated fellow first season finalists Kerala Blasters at a wildly-cheering houseful Kochi Stadium in Kerala.

    Using the Diwali fervour as a peg to enhance viewership, Star Sports network used a tagline of ‘Ye Diwali Football wali’ to connect the game to the audiences and the soccer culture of the nation. While 41 million fans tuned in to television to watch the final, it was a rise of 41 per cent viewership compared to the final of ISL 2015. In Kerala, the ISL matches were viewed more than the 2016 T20 cricket WC semi-final between India and West Indies and the Euro 2016 final.

    In West Bengal, the match had a higher viewership than the IPL 9 final. The league saw a total viewership of 216 million and a steep growth in rural viewership, cumulatively reaching 101 million viewers in a new high for the sport. This edition of the league also registered double view-time as compared to 2015 on the digital platform Hotstar.

    5. Kabaddi World Cup

    Arguably the alternative sport of 2016, kabaddi grew manifold with two editions of Pro Kabaddi League (PKL) and the men’s World Cup in the same year. The viewership of every event grew as time progressed and the game can now boast of having a dedicated audience, both on ground and on TV and digital platforms. The fourth edition of the PKL posted 10 million average BARC impressions and is the only league in the country to have registered a growth trend in four editions. The league has shown a growth of 51 per cent in the last four seasons and has been one of the key reasons for India’s good performance in the World Cup.

    As India snapped up the World Cup, the men’s edition clocked a whopping 114 million impressions spread across 33 matches over 16 days. Star helped building its audience with #readytoraid and a TVC that captured well rural India, the topography the game is primarily associated with.

    The women’s kabbadi challenge was even better. In the marketing strategy, Star Sports highlighted that women regularly challenge gender stereotypes in the society and can cross the line in kabaddi as well – the hash tag being an apt #crosstheline. After women’s kabaddi in PKL IV, the first two matches got a viewership of 38 million, the highest any women’s sport has got in India ever. The tournament had a total viewership of 90.4 million, with an average of 6.7 million impressions as per BARC data. This number is 2.3 times higher than the second semi-final between New Zealand and West Indies, the highest rated women’s game till date. Thus, women’s kabaddi Challenge features amongst the top 10 sporting events watched on Indian television over the last one year.

  • Star’s five marketing strategies that helped sports grow in 2016

    Star’s five marketing strategies that helped sports grow in 2016

    “Business has only two functions: marketing and innovation,” is a lesser known observation of Milan Kundera, the Czech-born French writer who’s more famous for Unbearable Lightness of Being and more such thought-provoking novels.

    Why are we cross referencing Kundera in a write-up for sports marketing campaigns? Simply because Star India and its bouquet of sports channels, marketed under brand Star Sports, are following Kundera’s words to a T— and successfully too.

    In a dynamic world of sports broadcasting where events are now held and telecast almost round the year — at times various big ticket events held and aired live the same day in different part of the globe in different time zones — it is difficult to ensure the success of every league or tournament in terms of advertising revenue. Behind the numbers’ game, lot of research is done to finalise marketing strategies, which are aimed to ensure that audiences are given exactly what they want, where they want and how they want.

    With some smart packaging, marketing and advertising, Star India has managed not only to acquire broadcast rights for the region for some of the big sporting events, but also get the eyeballs — and advertising revenue — to justify the millions of dollars it is sinking into Indian sports. A business newspaper reported last year that Star India has bet Rs. 200 billion (Rs. 20,000 crore) on sports. This money has been ploughed into not only getting the rights for Indian cricket, Summer Olympics and sundry other games, but also into building lesser sports like kabaddi and cash in on football’s popularity by creating an Indian football league with participation of retired international stars.

    We look at five marketing strategies of Star India, helmed by Chairman and CEO Uday Shankar and his deputy Sanjay Gupta, which helped the respective sports aired on Star Sports grow in terms of viewership in India.

    1. India vs. England Test Series

    In an age where T20 and slam-bang form of cricket is being aggressively promoted and vastly followed, it has been a refreshing change to see Test cricket getting good viewership. India had been itching to take revenge over England, a side which had defeated the Indian cricket gladiators in three consecutive Test series prior to this.

    Building up the tension with #scoretosettle, Star Sports network used the Virat Kohli factor very effectively and the response was satisfying. The five-match Test series had a reach of 159 million viewers. BARC recorded a total of 728 million impressions in the India urban market and a total of 1,217 impressions in the all-India market. The fourth Test had the highest rating with 4.9, proving the series was the biggest of the year.

    Virat Kohli scored a brilliant 235 in the fourth Test and the rise of Karun Nair and Jayant Yadav had Indian viewers glued to their TV screens. There would have been additional viewers reached via Star’s digital platform Hotstar that too streamed the matches. The series was won 4-0. It was not only Team Virat that put on a sterling performance in recent times, but also Star Sports in terms of viewership.

    2. ICC Cricket T20 World Cup

    In a heavily marketed campaign of the year, the T20 World Cup was being played on the Indian soil for the first time in its history. Quirky, gripping and nationally-emotional TVCs were made and beamed on national television starting early 2016. With #T20WC as easy and relatable as ever, the match between India vs. Pakistan trended with #maukamauka, setting the tone for brilliant support for the Men in Blue. India defeated Pakistan comfortably, riding on Virat Kohli’s brilliant half century after the team, at one time, was tottering at 23/3 due to a fearful Mohammed Amir spell. India reached the semi-finals, only to be defeated by eventual winners West Indies.

    The tournament reached 393 million people in India, one of the highest viewed tournaments in 2016. The India vs. Pakistan game got a rating of 17.3 across the Star Sports network, becoming the most watched T20 game ever since the 2007 WC final played between the arch-rivals.

    While the cricket on display was high quality, credit must be given to the marketers who too did their job magnificently. Video snippets and memes capturing Mauka-man’s reactions were also pushed in real-time during the match and after it, which contributed to #IndvsPak overtaking the tournament’s official hash tag during the game.

    The Mauka Mauka campaign, originally devised in 2015 by Ranchi-born Suresh Triveni for Star Sports, not only connected with cricket fans instantly, but also got featured in a Forbes’ list of five best sports marketing campaigns that went viral in 2015. Even as the campaign’s character still connects with viewers when used by Star Sports, writing about it in 2015 Forbes said, “Occasionally, a campaign hits a nerve and it catches the attention of a whole country. For India, this is that campaign.”

    3. Rio Summer Olympics 

    It doesn’t get bigger than the Olympics, does it? In one of the most apt hash tags in Indian markets last year, Star Sports used #issebadakuchnahi in the build up to the Rio Olympics 2016. Rest as they say, is history. Female badminton player PV Sindhu reached the finals and was part of an extensive marketing programme by the Star network.

     The tall and powerful Indian, who catapulted overnight as a superwoman in an overtly patriarchal country, lost to Spain’s Caroline Marin in a well-fought three-set final 21-19, 21-12 and 21-15. The match recorded 17.2 million impressions, the most viewed programme on that day across all genres in India. In total, 202 million viewers tuned in to watch the Rio Games on television and 10 million (Star’s internal figures) watched the live streaming on Star’s digital sibling, Hotstar.

    The whole scenario of Indian alternative sports or non-cricket games has changed after the Rio Olympics. Fans found new heroes in gymnast Dipa Karmakar, Sindhu, wrestler and bronze medallist Sakshi Malik, Aditi Ashok and various other sports personalities. As part of the story-telling, Star Sports brought their stories to fans via videos, images and content and ensured continuous engagement with fans throughout the tournament with conversations peaking when India clinched two medals (badminton and wrestling). So thought out was the marketing engagement unleashed by Star Sports that it even dug out the noodle-haired Indo-Canadian Kamal Sidhu, one of India’s fav music veejays and TV anchors during the mid 1990s and early 2000s, as the host for pre-live Olympics programmes.

    #BillionCheers, a 360-degree campaign that happened before, during and after the Olympics helped #Rio2016 become one of the top trending hash tags in India in 2016.

     4. India Super League

    The Indian football extravaganza was one of the hottest tournaments in 2016 in terms of viewership. The league saw the arrival of 2010 World Cup Golden Ball winner Diego Forlan join hands with Mumbai City FC, taking the side to the semi-finals for the first time in three editions. The league was won by Atletico de Kolkata, which defeated fellow first season finalists Kerala Blasters at a wildly-cheering houseful Kochi Stadium in Kerala.

    Using the Diwali fervour as a peg to enhance viewership, Star Sports network used a tagline of ‘Ye Diwali Football wali’ to connect the game to the audiences and the soccer culture of the nation. While 41 million fans tuned in to television to watch the final, it was a rise of 41 per cent viewership compared to the final of ISL 2015. In Kerala, the ISL matches were viewed more than the 2016 T20 cricket WC semi-final between India and West Indies and the Euro 2016 final.

    In West Bengal, the match had a higher viewership than the IPL 9 final. The league saw a total viewership of 216 million and a steep growth in rural viewership, cumulatively reaching 101 million viewers in a new high for the sport. This edition of the league also registered double view-time as compared to 2015 on the digital platform Hotstar.

    5. Kabaddi World Cup

    Arguably the alternative sport of 2016, kabaddi grew manifold with two editions of Pro Kabaddi League (PKL) and the men’s World Cup in the same year. The viewership of every event grew as time progressed and the game can now boast of having a dedicated audience, both on ground and on TV and digital platforms. The fourth edition of the PKL posted 10 million average BARC impressions and is the only league in the country to have registered a growth trend in four editions. The league has shown a growth of 51 per cent in the last four seasons and has been one of the key reasons for India’s good performance in the World Cup.

    As India snapped up the World Cup, the men’s edition clocked a whopping 114 million impressions spread across 33 matches over 16 days. Star helped building its audience with #readytoraid and a TVC that captured well rural India, the topography the game is primarily associated with.

    The women’s kabbadi challenge was even better. In the marketing strategy, Star Sports highlighted that women regularly challenge gender stereotypes in the society and can cross the line in kabaddi as well – the hash tag being an apt #crosstheline. After women’s kabaddi in PKL IV, the first two matches got a viewership of 38 million, the highest any women’s sport has got in India ever. The tournament had a total viewership of 90.4 million, with an average of 6.7 million impressions as per BARC data. This number is 2.3 times higher than the second semi-final between New Zealand and West Indies, the highest rated women’s game till date. Thus, women’s kabaddi Challenge features amongst the top 10 sporting events watched on Indian television over the last one year.

  • WWE dominates programme ratings; Ten 1 returns to lead ratings

    WWE dominates programme ratings; Ten 1 returns to lead ratings

    MUMBAI: After staying away from the top of the table, Ten 1 returns as the most viewed channel in BARC ratings for Week 52 (24 December to 30 December). With no major sporting league currently on, sport viewers returned to their perennial favourite WWE, pushing Star Sports 2 on to the second spot. The top-ranked channel got a total of 66865 impressions in the All India, CS 4+ data.

    After leading for two consecutive weeks for India’s heroics against England in the test series, Star Sports 2 dropped to the second spot, to be followed by Star Sports 1 with 45358 and 21781 impressions respectively. Ten 2 took the fourth spot with 15512 impressions and the list was concluded with Star Sports 3 moving to the fifth spot, garnering 14051 impressions.

    After cricket’s unbridled domination for two consecutive weeks, WWE came back and how! The wrestling show once again proved its credentials, sweeping off the top programs’ list. Ten 1 appears on the list four times, with various programmes of WWE featuring on the top three with 1152, 1044 and 1019 impressions respectively. The fourth spot is held by Ten 2, flanked by WWE Raw as the program with 917 impressions. The list is completed with Ten 1 featuring with Incredible Innings coming on the fifth slot, with 781 impressions.

    The next week might see an interesting battle of numbers, with both Premier Badminton League and Pro-Wrestling League beginning on the 01 and 02 January, respectively. With the badminton league being beamed on the Star Network and PWL being broadcast on the SPNI network, it can be seen as a two-horsed war from the onset of 2017.

  • WWE dominates programme ratings; Ten 1 returns to lead ratings

    WWE dominates programme ratings; Ten 1 returns to lead ratings

    MUMBAI: After staying away from the top of the table, Ten 1 returns as the most viewed channel in BARC ratings for Week 52 (24 December to 30 December). With no major sporting league currently on, sport viewers returned to their perennial favourite WWE, pushing Star Sports 2 on to the second spot. The top-ranked channel got a total of 66865 impressions in the All India, CS 4+ data.

    After leading for two consecutive weeks for India’s heroics against England in the test series, Star Sports 2 dropped to the second spot, to be followed by Star Sports 1 with 45358 and 21781 impressions respectively. Ten 2 took the fourth spot with 15512 impressions and the list was concluded with Star Sports 3 moving to the fifth spot, garnering 14051 impressions.

    After cricket’s unbridled domination for two consecutive weeks, WWE came back and how! The wrestling show once again proved its credentials, sweeping off the top programs’ list. Ten 1 appears on the list four times, with various programmes of WWE featuring on the top three with 1152, 1044 and 1019 impressions respectively. The fourth spot is held by Ten 2, flanked by WWE Raw as the program with 917 impressions. The list is completed with Ten 1 featuring with Incredible Innings coming on the fifth slot, with 781 impressions.

    The next week might see an interesting battle of numbers, with both Premier Badminton League and Pro-Wrestling League beginning on the 01 and 02 January, respectively. With the badminton league being beamed on the Star Network and PWL being broadcast on the SPNI network, it can be seen as a two-horsed war from the onset of 2017.

  • ISL 2016 shows growth; final gets 41 million TV views

    ISL 2016 shows growth; final gets 41 million TV views

    MUMBAI: The third season of the Hero Indian Super League was one of the most watched and followed footballing properties in India in 2016. With eight teams vying hard and looking equal on the paper, it was set to be a thrilling contest on cards. Atletico de Kolkata won the equally fought final in a penalty shootout, defeating fellow finalists of 2014, Kerala Blasters at a packed Kochi Stadium.

    The final was seen by 54,000 fans in the stadium, while 41 million fans tuned in on television to follow the nail biting drama (BARC, CS4+, U+R, all Channels). The total viewership was a rise of 41 per cent as compared to the final of 2015, shattering all records on the TV viewership of the league in history.

    Numbers suggest that finalists’ were being ably supported by their respective states. In Kerala, the ISL final became the most viewed sporting event in 2016, eclipsing the 2016 T20 World Cup semi-final (India vs West Indies) and the Euro 2016 final. In West Bengal, the ISL final had a higher viewership that that of IPL 9 finals (BARC, CS 4+, U+R Average Impressions).

    With a total viewership of 216 million as compared to 207 million last year, it is easy to understand that the football league is growing steadily (BARC, CS4+, U+R). One of the One of the highlights of the season was the sharp increase in rural India viewership registering a cumulative figure of 101 million, indicating the widespread appeal of the sport. Furthermore, key metro markets like Mumbai and Chennai emerged as one of the top performers this season recording a surge of more than 50% over last year along with a cumulative 20 per cent spike in viewership in Tamil Nadu.

    Football Sports Development Ltd founder & chairperson Nita Ambani, optimistic about the rising popularity of the game in India, said, “The overwhelming response from fans is testament to the vision we have for the league, and it reaffirms our faith that the ‘Indian football is moving in right direction. The response from newer markets like Tamil Nadu and Mumbai, and further growth in established markets like West Bengal, Kerala etc shows the appetite for the sport. Stadium attendance, viewership numbers and growth on digital platform this season further encourages us to reset our benchmark for the season ahead.”

    The third season of ISL has recorded a surge of over 25 per cent in overall viewer engagement vis-à-vis ISL 2015. This showcases the enhanced quality of play complemented by new look graphics and the best of experts on the commentary panel, cutting across demographic boundaries and capturing the imagination of a diverse fan base.

    2016 edition also took the digital medium by storm, registering double view-time, which was 2.3 times over last year on both Hotstar and Jio platform combined. The phenomenon of the Hero ISLwas also visible at the stadiums throughout the season in all ISL club cities, with fan armies and football enthusiasts filling up an average of over 84 per cent seating capacity, the highest across all three seasons.

    Star India managing director Sanjay Gupta said, “The kick-off to the Hero ISL in 2014 signified the birth of a footballing nation. This is a long term journey however we are very encouraged by the incredible fan affinity and increase in following of the league and the sport in a short span of three years. We had dreamt of the day when Indian footballers would emerge as sporting heroes and this season of the Hero ISL has seen many new stars emerge. Further the quality of play and multi-lingual, high quality broadcast content has delivered record engagement levels amongst fans. The deeper penetration of the league into Urban and Rural India and the explosive growth of digital consumption augurs well for the future of football in India.”

  • ISL 2016 shows growth; final gets 41 million TV views

    ISL 2016 shows growth; final gets 41 million TV views

    MUMBAI: The third season of the Hero Indian Super League was one of the most watched and followed footballing properties in India in 2016. With eight teams vying hard and looking equal on the paper, it was set to be a thrilling contest on cards. Atletico de Kolkata won the equally fought final in a penalty shootout, defeating fellow finalists of 2014, Kerala Blasters at a packed Kochi Stadium.

    The final was seen by 54,000 fans in the stadium, while 41 million fans tuned in on television to follow the nail biting drama (BARC, CS4+, U+R, all Channels). The total viewership was a rise of 41 per cent as compared to the final of 2015, shattering all records on the TV viewership of the league in history.

    Numbers suggest that finalists’ were being ably supported by their respective states. In Kerala, the ISL final became the most viewed sporting event in 2016, eclipsing the 2016 T20 World Cup semi-final (India vs West Indies) and the Euro 2016 final. In West Bengal, the ISL final had a higher viewership that that of IPL 9 finals (BARC, CS 4+, U+R Average Impressions).

    With a total viewership of 216 million as compared to 207 million last year, it is easy to understand that the football league is growing steadily (BARC, CS4+, U+R). One of the One of the highlights of the season was the sharp increase in rural India viewership registering a cumulative figure of 101 million, indicating the widespread appeal of the sport. Furthermore, key metro markets like Mumbai and Chennai emerged as one of the top performers this season recording a surge of more than 50% over last year along with a cumulative 20 per cent spike in viewership in Tamil Nadu.

    Football Sports Development Ltd founder & chairperson Nita Ambani, optimistic about the rising popularity of the game in India, said, “The overwhelming response from fans is testament to the vision we have for the league, and it reaffirms our faith that the ‘Indian football is moving in right direction. The response from newer markets like Tamil Nadu and Mumbai, and further growth in established markets like West Bengal, Kerala etc shows the appetite for the sport. Stadium attendance, viewership numbers and growth on digital platform this season further encourages us to reset our benchmark for the season ahead.”

    The third season of ISL has recorded a surge of over 25 per cent in overall viewer engagement vis-à-vis ISL 2015. This showcases the enhanced quality of play complemented by new look graphics and the best of experts on the commentary panel, cutting across demographic boundaries and capturing the imagination of a diverse fan base.

    2016 edition also took the digital medium by storm, registering double view-time, which was 2.3 times over last year on both Hotstar and Jio platform combined. The phenomenon of the Hero ISLwas also visible at the stadiums throughout the season in all ISL club cities, with fan armies and football enthusiasts filling up an average of over 84 per cent seating capacity, the highest across all three seasons.

    Star India managing director Sanjay Gupta said, “The kick-off to the Hero ISL in 2014 signified the birth of a footballing nation. This is a long term journey however we are very encouraged by the incredible fan affinity and increase in following of the league and the sport in a short span of three years. We had dreamt of the day when Indian footballers would emerge as sporting heroes and this season of the Hero ISL has seen many new stars emerge. Further the quality of play and multi-lingual, high quality broadcast content has delivered record engagement levels amongst fans. The deeper penetration of the league into Urban and Rural India and the explosive growth of digital consumption augurs well for the future of football in India.”

  • Sports TV 2016: Digital explosion, player consolidation & confusion

    Sports TV 2016: Digital explosion, player consolidation & confusion

    2016 was a roller-coaster for Indian sports in the truest sense. It was akin to a Bollywood pot-boiler of the country’s sportspersons bringing cheer and applause in various disciplines, including Rio Olympics, to melodrama and suspense of wrestler Narsingh Yadav’s doping issue and whether he or Sushil would represent India to superb action on and off the field (off the field ones involving mostly our politician-administrators and their disdain for rules of the games) to romance to multiple climaxes in a game-changing year that could well herald Indian sports broadcasting becoming a two-horse show with digital media piggy-back riding sports in general.

    The year began on a strong note with Sony Pictures Network India (SPNI) joining hands with majority Walt Disney-owned ESPN to launch two new English channels, Sony ESPN and Sony ESPN HD. The channels started broadcasting on 17 January 2016 with the Australian Open and going on to telecast several high profile and popular sporting events, both Indian and international, throughout the year. The co-branded Sony-ESPN channels replaced Sony KIX.

    Sony’s bouquet of sports channels (Sony Six, Sony Six HD, Sony ESPN and Sony ESPN HD) also broadcast the Euro Cup, one of the hottest sporting properties and the second most followed event in the football fraternity after the World Cup. The numbers were good with a league phase match between Italy and Spain garnering as much as 1.7 million impressions on BARC ratings. A quarter-final match between Poland and Portugal, the eventual winners, managed 290,000 impressions. The whole tournament totted up a cumulative TV audience of 62.7 million viewers . The final between Portugal and France witnessed 12.4 million Indian viewers, reaching a peak between 1:00 AM to 1:30 AM on 11 July 2016 with 7.4 million viewers. Kolkata notched up the highest percentage (19.3 per cent) of total viewership followed by Mumbai, Bangalore, Delhi and Aizwal.

    For SPNI, which promoted the event extensively and started selling ad inventory six months before the tournament began at a fairly high rate (Rs 250,000 for a 10-second spot) , it was a positive sign for the future of football broadcasts in the Indian market as such rates were unheard of three to four years ago. That Sony was building up to a climax became clear later in the year.

    Setting rest to speculations, Sony Pictures Networks announced on 31 August 2016 that it had entered into definitive agreement with Zee Entertainment Enterprises Ltd (ZEEL) to acquire the Ten Sports network in a deal worth $385 million. Owned by Taj Television, the distribution arm of ZEEL,TEN Sports operated five channels— TEN 1, TEN 2, TEN 3, TEN Golf HD and TEN 1 HD.

    As and when the acquisition is completed— it is subject to regulatory approvals — SPNI’s bouquet of sports channels will be the biggest in India, heralding not only consolidation in a fragmented sports market, but also making the Indian sports broadcast realm a two-horse race (Star India on one side and Sony-ESPN combine on the other) as Nimbus Sports with two channels and few premier events rights (French Open for one) remains a comparatively small player.

    The other big gun in the sports arena, Star India added more channels to its sports-channel stable with the mid-July launch of Star Sports Select HD 1 and Select HD 2. The channels will not only widen the Star Sports bouquet, but would also add marketing fire-power to Star India as the new channels were launched to exclusively offer Premier League, Bundesliga, Tennis Grand Slams and Formula 1. What makes the sports scene exciting is that Star India has sunk not only billions of dollars in acquiring strong sporting properties, including rights of Indian cricket, but is also building new properties like India Soccer League and Pro-Kabaddi for both men and women.

    But cricket ruled the Indian hearts of Indian fans keeping them on tenterhooks for on and off the field activities. The most successful Indian league, the Indian Premier League or IPL, despite criticism revolving around it becoming stale, continued to rule the waves with addition of two new teams and Vivo coming on board as the title sponsor in a deal estimated to be worth Rs. 2 billion or Rs. 200 crore, marking a 25 per cent increase in what PepsiCo paid earlier for a five-year deal.

    According to a few media reports, IPL earned close to Rs 2,500 crore or Rs. 250 billion in revenues, which included TV and digital rights, teams’ sponsorships, ticket sales and merchandising. On social media too, IPL made just the right amount of noise, but it lagged behind last season’s buzz, according to media firm Maxus’ MESH report on the IPL. Overall, IPL2016 generated 3.1 million mentions throughout the tournament in 2016. While IPL 2016 lagged behind in mentions throughout the tournament as against IPL2015, the final week of this season saw a jump of 74 per cent in conversations.

    On the TV platform, IPL continued setting new trends. 54 per cent of the total Indian audience remained glued to the event on pay television. Mumbai, Delhi, Bengaluru, Kolkata and Hyderabad were the best markets in terms of TV viewing, cumulatively reaching 361 million people. The final, played between Sunsrisers Hyderabad and Royal Challengers Bangalore, was the most viewed match of the season; getting about 44.68 million impressions. Summed across the five channels over five weeks, the total viewership stood at 1.02 billion BARC impressions, one of the highest-ever in Indian television history.

    Year 2016 also saw the rise of `other alternative’ sports or those disciplines that can be kept in a tray where non-cricket and non-tennis games are kept. Pro-Kabaddi League came up with two editions this year. The first edition of the league saw a rise of 36 percent in terms of TV viewership compared to last year. The event was beamed on five channels – Star Gold, Star Sports 2 and 3, Plus Suvarna and Maa Movies, apart from the digital platform of Hotstar, which also saw a 33 percent growth in terms of ‘total minutes viewed’ over the first 11 days of Season 3.

    The fourth season of the Pro-Kabaddi League or PKL also happened in 2016. The ratings showed a growth pattern, making PKL one of the prime sporting properties in the Indian market. Star Sports said that the league had seen a cumulative growth of 51 per cent, regularly posting 10 million average impressions that were about 2.3 times higher than last year, turning a rural sport into a cult hit. Time for Bharat to take a bow!

    A fairly good show by the likes of pro boxing matches featuring India’s Vijender Singh, Indian Badminton League, ISL and Pro Wrestling League convinced sportspersons, event managers and advertisers that if properly packaged non-cricket sports too can attract viewership, audiences in stadia and generate revenues for all stakeholders.

    The year also witnessed the rise of the digital platform, in general, and marketing tactics by them to further increase penetration riding on the craze for popular sports in India. For example, Hotstar bought the digital rights of IPL last year to push its boundaries. While 35 million people had watched the IPL play-offs in the 2015 season, the numbers swelled remarkably in 2016 reaching 80 million. It would be quite safe to predict that there were a billion views on the digital platform this season for sporting events.

    Throughout the year, Hotstar’s premium services saw a huge drive to add new members. The registration was kept fairly simple and all major football leagues in Europe and Germany were broadcast on the digital platform. Cricket ODI matches and Tests on Star Sports were broadcast with an average delay of about five minutes, which garnered a lot of traction and spurred downloads of the app.

    With Sony LIV giving good competition with El Clasico and other events, it seems popular sports can actually drive the growth of digital platforms, especially subscription-based OTT services. The total watch time on OTT platforms in 2016 went up by 60 percent, driven also by the fact newcomer Reliance Jio started giving away the Hotstar app free to its subscribers.

    Proliferation of HD services too (mostly separately and differently priced for consumers), like OTT platforms, joined the gravy train trying to entice viewers through sporting events. For example, Indian fans of the English Premier League were in for a surprise when Star Sports announced that Indians will not be able to watch the matches beyond 31 October 2016; they would have to perforce sign up for the Star Sports HD channel package, which included Star Sports Select HD1 and HD2.

    With the arrival of Paul Pogba and Zlatan Ibrahimovic as players with huge fan-bases and forever-at-loggerheads managers Jose Mourinho and Pep Guardiola, Star knew the Indian following would not diminish — and they were not disappointed. If a consumer subscribed to all the sports channels in HD on a DTH platform, the package would cost approximately Rs. 700 per month. Many ardent non-cricket fans chose the high ticket option, while the remaining moved over to the digital platform as a significant number of live sports events were watched on Hotstar where the premium service cost Rs199 per month.

    However, one of the many climaxes, which added to the roller-coaster ride of sports broadcasting in India, involved the sports administrators. BCCI’s continuing face-off with the Supreme Court-mandated Lodha Committee recommendations on proposed clean-up of cricket — buffeted by allegations of match-fixing, conflicts of interests and brazen politicking — could pose a question mark on cricket matches organised by BCCI and their eventual telecasts.

    A shadow has even been cast over the 10th edition of IPL too. If the BCCI and Supreme Court don’t come to an amicable solution on former’s defiance and the latter’s hardening of stance, IPL future could be hazy having cascading effects on issues like broadcast rights and on some stakeholders like SPNI, Star India and team franchises who all have sunk in billions of Indian rupees in the juggernaut called IPL and India cricket.

    The year may have come to an end, but sports promises to continue providing more excitement. As they say, the match ain’t over till it is over.

  • Sports TV 2016: Digital explosion, player consolidation & confusion

    Sports TV 2016: Digital explosion, player consolidation & confusion

    2016 was a roller-coaster for Indian sports in the truest sense. It was akin to a Bollywood pot-boiler of the country’s sportspersons bringing cheer and applause in various disciplines, including Rio Olympics, to melodrama and suspense of wrestler Narsingh Yadav’s doping issue and whether he or Sushil would represent India to superb action on and off the field (off the field ones involving mostly our politician-administrators and their disdain for rules of the games) to romance to multiple climaxes in a game-changing year that could well herald Indian sports broadcasting becoming a two-horse show with digital media piggy-back riding sports in general.

    The year began on a strong note with Sony Pictures Network India (SPNI) joining hands with majority Walt Disney-owned ESPN to launch two new English channels, Sony ESPN and Sony ESPN HD. The channels started broadcasting on 17 January 2016 with the Australian Open and going on to telecast several high profile and popular sporting events, both Indian and international, throughout the year. The co-branded Sony-ESPN channels replaced Sony KIX.

    Sony’s bouquet of sports channels (Sony Six, Sony Six HD, Sony ESPN and Sony ESPN HD) also broadcast the Euro Cup, one of the hottest sporting properties and the second most followed event in the football fraternity after the World Cup. The numbers were good with a league phase match between Italy and Spain garnering as much as 1.7 million impressions on BARC ratings. A quarter-final match between Poland and Portugal, the eventual winners, managed 290,000 impressions. The whole tournament totted up a cumulative TV audience of 62.7 million viewers . The final between Portugal and France witnessed 12.4 million Indian viewers, reaching a peak between 1:00 AM to 1:30 AM on 11 July 2016 with 7.4 million viewers. Kolkata notched up the highest percentage (19.3 per cent) of total viewership followed by Mumbai, Bangalore, Delhi and Aizwal.

    For SPNI, which promoted the event extensively and started selling ad inventory six months before the tournament began at a fairly high rate (Rs 250,000 for a 10-second spot) , it was a positive sign for the future of football broadcasts in the Indian market as such rates were unheard of three to four years ago. That Sony was building up to a climax became clear later in the year.

    Setting rest to speculations, Sony Pictures Networks announced on 31 August 2016 that it had entered into definitive agreement with Zee Entertainment Enterprises Ltd (ZEEL) to acquire the Ten Sports network in a deal worth $385 million. Owned by Taj Television, the distribution arm of ZEEL,TEN Sports operated five channels— TEN 1, TEN 2, TEN 3, TEN Golf HD and TEN 1 HD.

    As and when the acquisition is completed— it is subject to regulatory approvals — SPNI’s bouquet of sports channels will be the biggest in India, heralding not only consolidation in a fragmented sports market, but also making the Indian sports broadcast realm a two-horse race (Star India on one side and Sony-ESPN combine on the other) as Nimbus Sports with two channels and few premier events rights (French Open for one) remains a comparatively small player.

    The other big gun in the sports arena, Star India added more channels to its sports-channel stable with the mid-July launch of Star Sports Select HD 1 and Select HD 2. The channels will not only widen the Star Sports bouquet, but would also add marketing fire-power to Star India as the new channels were launched to exclusively offer Premier League, Bundesliga, Tennis Grand Slams and Formula 1. What makes the sports scene exciting is that Star India has sunk not only billions of dollars in acquiring strong sporting properties, including rights of Indian cricket, but is also building new properties like India Soccer League and Pro-Kabaddi for both men and women.

    But cricket ruled the Indian hearts of Indian fans keeping them on tenterhooks for on and off the field activities. The most successful Indian league, the Indian Premier League or IPL, despite criticism revolving around it becoming stale, continued to rule the waves with addition of two new teams and Vivo coming on board as the title sponsor in a deal estimated to be worth Rs. 2 billion or Rs. 200 crore, marking a 25 per cent increase in what PepsiCo paid earlier for a five-year deal.

    According to a few media reports, IPL earned close to Rs 2,500 crore or Rs. 250 billion in revenues, which included TV and digital rights, teams’ sponsorships, ticket sales and merchandising. On social media too, IPL made just the right amount of noise, but it lagged behind last season’s buzz, according to media firm Maxus’ MESH report on the IPL. Overall, IPL2016 generated 3.1 million mentions throughout the tournament in 2016. While IPL 2016 lagged behind in mentions throughout the tournament as against IPL2015, the final week of this season saw a jump of 74 per cent in conversations.

    On the TV platform, IPL continued setting new trends. 54 per cent of the total Indian audience remained glued to the event on pay television. Mumbai, Delhi, Bengaluru, Kolkata and Hyderabad were the best markets in terms of TV viewing, cumulatively reaching 361 million people. The final, played between Sunsrisers Hyderabad and Royal Challengers Bangalore, was the most viewed match of the season; getting about 44.68 million impressions. Summed across the five channels over five weeks, the total viewership stood at 1.02 billion BARC impressions, one of the highest-ever in Indian television history.

    Year 2016 also saw the rise of `other alternative’ sports or those disciplines that can be kept in a tray where non-cricket and non-tennis games are kept. Pro-Kabaddi League came up with two editions this year. The first edition of the league saw a rise of 36 percent in terms of TV viewership compared to last year. The event was beamed on five channels – Star Gold, Star Sports 2 and 3, Plus Suvarna and Maa Movies, apart from the digital platform of Hotstar, which also saw a 33 percent growth in terms of ‘total minutes viewed’ over the first 11 days of Season 3.

    The fourth season of the Pro-Kabaddi League or PKL also happened in 2016. The ratings showed a growth pattern, making PKL one of the prime sporting properties in the Indian market. Star Sports said that the league had seen a cumulative growth of 51 per cent, regularly posting 10 million average impressions that were about 2.3 times higher than last year, turning a rural sport into a cult hit. Time for Bharat to take a bow!

    A fairly good show by the likes of pro boxing matches featuring India’s Vijender Singh, Indian Badminton League, ISL and Pro Wrestling League convinced sportspersons, event managers and advertisers that if properly packaged non-cricket sports too can attract viewership, audiences in stadia and generate revenues for all stakeholders.

    The year also witnessed the rise of the digital platform, in general, and marketing tactics by them to further increase penetration riding on the craze for popular sports in India. For example, Hotstar bought the digital rights of IPL last year to push its boundaries. While 35 million people had watched the IPL play-offs in the 2015 season, the numbers swelled remarkably in 2016 reaching 80 million. It would be quite safe to predict that there were a billion views on the digital platform this season for sporting events.

    Throughout the year, Hotstar’s premium services saw a huge drive to add new members. The registration was kept fairly simple and all major football leagues in Europe and Germany were broadcast on the digital platform. Cricket ODI matches and Tests on Star Sports were broadcast with an average delay of about five minutes, which garnered a lot of traction and spurred downloads of the app.

    With Sony LIV giving good competition with El Clasico and other events, it seems popular sports can actually drive the growth of digital platforms, especially subscription-based OTT services. The total watch time on OTT platforms in 2016 went up by 60 percent, driven also by the fact newcomer Reliance Jio started giving away the Hotstar app free to its subscribers.

    Proliferation of HD services too (mostly separately and differently priced for consumers), like OTT platforms, joined the gravy train trying to entice viewers through sporting events. For example, Indian fans of the English Premier League were in for a surprise when Star Sports announced that Indians will not be able to watch the matches beyond 31 October 2016; they would have to perforce sign up for the Star Sports HD channel package, which included Star Sports Select HD1 and HD2.

    With the arrival of Paul Pogba and Zlatan Ibrahimovic as players with huge fan-bases and forever-at-loggerheads managers Jose Mourinho and Pep Guardiola, Star knew the Indian following would not diminish — and they were not disappointed. If a consumer subscribed to all the sports channels in HD on a DTH platform, the package would cost approximately Rs. 700 per month. Many ardent non-cricket fans chose the high ticket option, while the remaining moved over to the digital platform as a significant number of live sports events were watched on Hotstar where the premium service cost Rs199 per month.

    However, one of the many climaxes, which added to the roller-coaster ride of sports broadcasting in India, involved the sports administrators. BCCI’s continuing face-off with the Supreme Court-mandated Lodha Committee recommendations on proposed clean-up of cricket — buffeted by allegations of match-fixing, conflicts of interests and brazen politicking — could pose a question mark on cricket matches organised by BCCI and their eventual telecasts.

    A shadow has even been cast over the 10th edition of IPL too. If the BCCI and Supreme Court don’t come to an amicable solution on former’s defiance and the latter’s hardening of stance, IPL future could be hazy having cascading effects on issues like broadcast rights and on some stakeholders like SPNI, Star India and team franchises who all have sunk in billions of Indian rupees in the juggernaut called IPL and India cricket.

    The year may have come to an end, but sports promises to continue providing more excitement. As they say, the match ain’t over till it is over.