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Tag: IPL 2021

  • There was a 22% increase over 2020 and 18% over 2019 as per the BARC Think Report

    TV Ad volumes post double digit growth in 2021: BARC

     

     

    By our Staff

     

    The year 2020 was a subdued one for television advertising, leading to a decline in total Ad Volumes across the year despite the record stay-at-home rise in viewership. 2021 has bounced back with a substantial double-digit spike, delivering an all-time high of 1824 million seconds of Ad Volumes during the year. This translated into a 22% and 18% growth over 2020 and 2019, respectively. The Top 10 advertisers accounted for 780 million seconds of Ad Volumes, and the Next 40 accounted for 340 million seconds.

     

    FMCG brands continued to lead in share across categories and Hindi channels continued to dominate across languages.

     

    New advertisers and brands consistently jumped in throughout the year, thus playing an important role in the advertising volume growth witnessed throughout 2021.

     

    Commenting on BARC India’s latest Think Report, 2021 – A Voluminous Year (Yearly Ad Volume Report 2021) that analyses television advertising volumes for the past year, Aaditya Pathak, Head – Client Partnership & Revenue Function, BARC India said: “2021 certainly brought in much needed cheer to the broadcast industry. The year started off on a positive note and also ended on a high with the festive quarter. Year on year, despite pandemic impediments, television has repeatedly proved effective for every penny spent for advertisers and brands. 2021 saw over 9000 advertisers turn to television with a significant number of new entrants. Overall, 2021 was a positive year for the industry as a whole that witnessed growing value for both advertisers and broadcasters.”

     

    Here are highlights of the report:

     

    Advertisers & Brands Count

    TV had a total of 9239 advertisers and 14616 brands advertised on the medium in 2021, of which, 49% i.e., 4483 were either new advertisers or returning ones. Similarly, for brands, 51% i.e., 7470 were new or returning brands.

     

    Categories

    The FMCG category continued to lead with an enormous share of 1117 million seconds of Ad Volumes in 2021, followed by Ecommerce with 185 million seconds and Building, Industrial, & Land Materials/Equipments with 60 million seconds. Television also understandably continued to be an important medium for the Corporate Brand Image category which registered 2x growth over 2019 with 24 million seconds.

     

    The Ecommerce category had a total of 587 advertisers in 2021 of which, 65% were new entrants or earlier advertisers returning to TV in 2021, registering a growth of 51% over 2020 and 26% over 2019. Media/Entertainment/Social Media, Education, Online Shopping, Matrimonials and Financial Services were the top 5 sub-categories within Ecommerce. Ad Volumes for Education grew by 461% and Financial Services by 153% over 2020.

     

    Languages

    While Hindi continues to play a dominant part of the language mix, regional language channels recorded strong growth as well across 2021. Ad Volumes for Bhojpuri language channels doubled over 2019 and Punjabi, Marathi, Gujarati and Assamese language channels posted over 40% growth over 2019. South language channels i.e., Tamil, Telugu, Malayalam and Kannada, grew by 26% over 2020.

     

    2021 – Quarterly Analysis

    Q1 2021 kickstarted on a positive note having registered 24% growth over 2020 and 21% growth over 2019. Despite the sporadic and partial lockdowns on account of the second wave of COVID-19, Ad Volumes for Q2’ 21 were relatively higher at 417 million seconds as compared to Q2’19 which recorded 399 million seconds. Q4’21 brought in cheer for broadcasters with a bumper festive season that recorded 489 million seconds of Ad Volumes, the highest quarter ever. New advertisers continued to flock to television for effective communication with Q4’21 welcoming 2156 new advertiser or earlier ones returning to the medium, the highest for the year.

     

    After a marginal decline in Q2 2021 on account of the lockdowns, regional language channels experienced steady growth in Q3 and Q4.

     

    SD & HD Channels

    Ad Volumes for HD channels in 2021 grew by 11% over the previous year and SD channels grew by 22% in 2021 over 2020 and by 20% over 2019.

     

    TV Commercials

    TV commercials with an Average Commercial Duration of under 30 seconds, were most favoured by advertisers while spots more than 60 seconds were least preferred.  The Average Commercial Duration has been reducing Y-O-Y. The Prime-Time band, i.e., 20:00 hours to 24:00 hours enjoyed the maximum share of Ad Volumes at 27%. The share of Ad Volumes for the four time bands, viz 08:00 – 12:00 hrs, 12:00-16:00 hrs, 16:00-20:00 hrs and 20:00-24:00 hrs, continued to stay the same since 2019. TV Commercials in local languages on regional channels are consistently increasing since 2019.

     

    IPL 2021

    IPL 2021 registered a total of 1680 thousand seconds of Ad Volumes with 119 advertisers and 228 brands in all. There were 59 new advertisers and 158 new brands for the season. The Top 10 advertisers for the season contributed 35% of the Ad Volumes.

     

    Tokyo Olympics

    With 466 thousand seconds, Ad Volumes for the Tokyo Olympics were almost at par with Rio Olympics that was held in 2016. There were 34 advertisers and 61 brands that advertised during Tokyo Olympics. Significantly, 31% of the Ad Volumes during Tokyo Olympics featured Olympians.

     

  • It is very difficult to take any guess at this stage about the condition of the pandemic in our country in September when a window is available for rescheduling the IPL, Indrani Sen

    Indrani Sen: Effects of Suspension of IPL 2021

    Indrani SenBy Indrani Sen

     

    The last one week advertising and marketing industry has been buzzing with speculations on the consequences of suspension of IPL 2021. Star Disney has been very prompt in offering possible solutions to sponsors and advertisers. As per the contracts, all IPL ad deals are non-cancellable, but as a special case if the sponsors and advertisers do not want to continue with the existing deals, the broadcaster has offered to cancel the deals from their end and allow their clients to negotiate fresh deals for the remaining IPL tournament as and when it gets rescheduled. Alternatively, the clients can keep the existing deals in abeyance and utilise the balance as and when BCCI finds a new window for scheduling the rest of the matches and a new venue for holding the same. The sponsors and advertisers will pay on pro rata basis for 29 matches which have taken place of the scheduled 60 matches.

     

    It is too early to get a feedback on the decisions of the sponsors and the advertisers. My guess is that most sponsors will stay with the existing deals as investment in IPL 2021 is a part of their long-term marketing and advertising strategy. Some of the advertisers who have peak seasons during summer months or have some immediate growth targets, may consider the other option. However, one thing is certain that cancelling the existing deals and renegotiating later will cost the advertisers more for purchase of similar time over the TV and OTT platforms. Strategically by offering an option of cancellation, Star Disney has probably ensured that most of the existing IPL deals continue with them.

     

    It is being estimated that BCCI and the franchise teams will collectively suffer a loss of INR 2500 to 3000 crore if IPL is cancelled totally. If it is rescheduled later, the loss will be considerably less, but the additional cost of the logistics of arranging the matches outside India will reduce the profit margin and will shrink BCCI’s central revenue pull available for sharing with the eight teams.

     

    The biggest losers would be the ancillary industries who were directly or indirectly associated with the IPL tournament, e.g., ground management, hotels providing bio-bubbles, travel, production, agencies providing on ground display, etc. Even if the tournament is rescheduled abroad, there would not be any scope of recovering their financial loss, which admittedly is on a much lesser scale than the tournament revenue, but is a very high percentage of their annual income.

     

    The situation is also complicated with the advertising and media agencies. Most of them will suffer a loss of projected revenue during the first half of 2021 due to suspension of the tournament. Their clients will insist on renegotiating the deals with them and will try to reduce the commission or fees. It will be difficult to find suitable programme/ content for rescheduling the advertising campaigns and to achieve the target reach required for achieving the sales objectives during the first half of 2021. However, all the leaders of the industry have agreed unanimously that postponing the tournament was the right decision under the current COVID situation in the country.

     

    What about the consumers, the viewers who make IPL the big blockbuster event? The day after BCCI announced their decision of postponing the 14th edition of IPL and rescheduling it at a later time outside India, The Indian Institute of Human Brands (IIHB) and the Rediffusion Consumer Lab (or Red Lab) announced findings of a survey indicating that the cancellation of the tournament may be a blessing in disguise for the advertisers during the rapidly spreading second wave of the pandemic in India.

     

    IIHB and Red Lab conducted a small survey among 482 consumers (271 males & 211 females) over three weeks (April 17 & 18, April 24 & 25 and May 1 & 2) to judge change in their attitude, if any, towards IPL as the second wave of the pandemic continued to increase across the country. The questions mainly concentrated on three broad areas (1) the appropriateness of holding IPL in India this year (Should the IPL have been played at all this year? Given the pandemic, should the IPL have been played overseas again?); (2) the respondents intensity of watching IPL (Are you watching more/less/same of the IPL as last year? Do you think watching IPL every evening provides an escape from all the pain, grief and death all around? IPL were to be cancelled; would you miss the game?) and (3) the respondents recall of ads and celebrities and effects on brands (Do you remember ads and celebrities from the IPL telecast? Given the current mood, do the ads on IPL attract you? Would you buy the brands being sold?).

     

    Over the three weeks, the number of respondents not available or not contactable decreased steadily. The positive sentiment towards conducting IPL in 2021 also decreased from 81% to 58% over three weeks and the number of people agreeing that IPL should have been played outside India went up. There was a 33% drop over the three weeks in the positive answer to the question “Do you think watching IPL every evening provides an escape from all the pain, grief and death all around?” Percentage of people watching less of IPL 14 compared to IPL 13 also went up over the three weeks. The recall of advertisements as well as celebrities were very good across the three weeks, but the intention of buying the brands dropped from 84% to 52% over the three weeks.

     

    IIHB and Red Lab concluded that the sensibilities of the consumer were getting hurt with the cricket extravaganza continuing during the pandemic and there was a growing discontent with IPL 2021.  It appears that continuing with the tournament in India might have got the sponsors and advertisers the desired exposures but would not have translated the same to desired consumer spends on the brands. The partial or total lockdown imposed by many state authorities will also contribute to the dip in sales.

     

    It is very difficult to take any guess at this stage about the condition of the pandemic in our country in September when a window is available for rescheduling the IPL. We do not know when the current second wave will end and what will be the final death tolls, if there will be a third wave of the pandemic in September as predicted by many medical practitioners and health experts. Only one thing is certain, we will overcome this coronavirus one day.

     

  • Sports marketing specialist Mahesh Ranka assesses the scenario post the suspension of the biggest marketing event of the year

    So what does the IPL postponement mean for the Indian sports & marketing ecosystem

    Screengrab from IPLT20.com

     

    By Mahesh Ranka

     

    Mahesh Ranka

    The Indian Premier League is the biggest marketing and entertainment extravaganza that has had everyone hooked on to it for almost a decade-and-a-half.

     

    That the 2021 edition will happen or no was a question raised by many, who were only shooting their thoughts, while BCCI and all the franchise owners were very sure and positive for the show to go on. With so much at stake and all the possible arrangements, it was only safe to assume that IPL would set an example in keeping live events alive in these unforeseen and testing times.

     

    Come May 4, 2021, IPL was suspended and then postponed, to a date that’s not been decided yet.

     

    There were many quarters constantly voicing concerns about three key things happening – the Assembly Elections, the Kumbh Mela and the IPL in these pandemic times. To me, IPL was the safest bet and the BCCI took the right step in putting a pause to the event.

     

    In the past, IPL has shown it’s as much a festival as Diwali, as many category purchases have significant spike during these two festivals in India. Marketers will now be scratching their brains already to think of a Plan B.

     

    Will the impact of this be felt? It’s a no-brainer, the question should be where all, will the impact be felt?

     

     

    For IPL/ BCCI

    IPL is not going to see a significant loss of revenue from the central sponsors or the broadcasters for sure as the agreements ensure that.  IPL valuation may also undergo a correction, which may reflect on the teams too.

     

    A key aspect that will be at the centre of sports discussions will be from the global market perspective. Will this lead to concerns around many other cricket events, and other sports to be held in India?

     

    ICC T20 World Cup isn’t too far and there are already talks of “if it moves to Dubai, BCCI will still hold the rights”. While this is great for cricket, for sponsors of the ICC event, they would be merely exposed as brands on broadcast and would run a campaign that will not have the same flavour as the event being hosted in India.

     

    If it happens, the movement of the T20 World Cup will put tremendous pressure on holding a bi-lateral series and other sporting action in India, leading to opportunity and revenue loss to the board, fans as well as marketers.

     

    Commercial stakeholders:

    All the commercial stakeholders across would have to plan for a situation probably as unique as someone hitting a six off every ball in every over for 10 overs!

     

    Disney – Star India:

    As probably the single largest commercial stakeholder of IPL, Star India, has an uphill task on multiple fronts to realign its business and financial plans for the year. With a major part of the plan being IPL for Star Network as well as for Disney Hotstar, it’s going to be impossible in the near-term for Star to:

    :: Find quality and engaging content to fill the programming  gap on television as well as HotStar.

     

    With OTT growing significantly in  India, Disney-Star will have to scramble to get some very attractive programming to be on the growth path.

    :: Build advertising revenue and plan for longer deals.

    :: Push for subscription on OTT as well as television platforms. IPL being a key property to push subscriptions, a new plan will be in play to achieve objectives or even probably revise targets.

    :: Revenue loss for now from all the syndication of rights globally, will also be a revenue gap that will not be filled by any other means.

     

    All the above may leave an option open for competition to plan and execution some bold and radical moves to woo the audience.

     

    A Brand’s Biggest Vehicle – The IPL

    Brands and businesses plan their launches and campaigns specifically with IPL in mind. For them, the current situation will be a massive letdown, while some sponsors/ advertisers will be fine with the shift if IPL (whenever it happens), many will have to take a deep hard look at their half yearly plans if not annual.

    Very clearly, new age brands like Cred and Dream11 had massive plans, so did the beverage companies – especially soft drinks in their prime season. For these three  categories, the opportunity to exploit is suddenly missing, and they’ll have to think hard and formulate new plans, with revised targets, in shortest possible time!

    In fact their existing efforts (ad film, media plan, activation, etc)  and investments would have to be redeployed, scrapped or modified, as necessary.

    Let’s think about Kotak – that was targeting topical credit card sales, with  seven team associations Or Upstox, who apart from growth, would have also had valuation gains in their radar by the end of IPL 2021!

     

    Areas of concern for marketers that would crop up :

    Timing & Seasonality: Season time  for some and in the first part of the business year for others, all calculations would go haywire and would need some extraordinary thinking, planning and execution to see through the year as planned.

    Growth plans : The planned growth on the back of IPL campaign, will get a deep hard look-in for the scenario would change significantly. The impact of IPL is visible on any of the plans.

    Reeling with uncertainty : Even if the brands are happy waiting for IPL, in the current scenario Uncertainty is the only Certainty. A third and probably a fourth wave might hit us, and no exact idea when. In such situation, everything is going to be fluid! And it will constantly keep the marketers  on their toes for the  plans they want to  prepare and execute.

     

    IPL Teams:

    All the franchisees have secured reasonably good revenues from sponsorships. And with no more franchise fee, they are sitting pretty on top dollar earnings from the central pool, in addition to their own sponsorships.

    Almost all teams had made significant plans to leverage and build digital platforms and engagement, with the current development event those plans would  find it a challenge to meet the set objectives. A good chance of engaging with their fans will diminish fast, now that the IPL has been postponed.  Moreover, with the uncertainties, teams and their plans for to rest of the year will be fluid.

    BCCI had announced and wanted to auction two more teams to be brought into the fold of IPL making it a 10-team affair from 2022. With the current scenario – pandemic and economic, and uncertainty for now, BCCI may find it challenging to unlock the value as per earlier estimates. It could lead to rescheduling the auction and inclusion of two more teams in IPL by a year or so.

     

    Non Sponsor Brands – competing brands

    With the leading or newer brands  going big on IPL, one thing is for sure, each of them hoped to gain handsome returns.

    These brands end up simplifying  as well as amplifying the category (Upstox, Dream11, Unacademy) and also expand the market.

    The other brands in these categories would have plans basis the market familiarity and growth because of the larger spending brands; trying to take a small part of the pie.

    With the expansion of the market limited, each competitor would have to create new plans to further their growth.

     

    Ancillary Businesses

    All the constituents – ground management, display boards, bio-bubble, travel and  stay, production and other equipment , manpower etc. that are working with IPL directly or indirectly, will now have to look for opportunities, especially freelancers, temporary hires or contracted resources. IPL runs its own ecosystem and this time the ecosystem has been halted. There is a definite challenge in the market with respect to deployment of the resources.

     

    Opportunity for BCCI / IPL

    With the current situation and mood in the country, IPL could generate decent amount goodwill, by creating a movement towards support and help for the victims or sufferers of Covid19. Each IPL team and state board can take up a support role, helping patients with Oxygen, to  organise medical supplies.

    While the easiest way  to help is to donate  money towards the treatment of Covid-19 patients, they would serve themselves and the community well by creating a path breaking idea, involving all cricket fans similar of the one that Sport Club do Recife did in 2014 in Brazil.

     

    Mahesh Ranka is among the early specialists in the business of sports in India and is Founder and CEO, GamerChangerZ and Founder, Indus Sports. His views here are personal.

     

     

  • A proprietary study to understand the impact of IPL on brand health metrics

    Havas Media Group launches Hi-Cricket

    By Our Staff

    Havas Sports & Entertainment has partnered with YouGov, a research and data analytics group, to launch Hi-Cricket, a proprietary study to understand the impact of the Indian Premier League (IPL) 2021 in influencing brand health metrics across categories.

    The study, led by the Havas Insight team, has respondents from key cities to get a deeper understanding of how a larger than life platform such as IPL helps influence mind measures. Hi-Cricket will also answer the role of premium media buys in impacting brand health, one of the most critical questions raised by advertisers today.

    Mohit Joshi
    Mohit Joshi

    Said Mohit Joshi, CEO, Havas Media Group India: “Hi-Cricket 2021 is a culmination of Havas’ Meaningful Brands philosophy and data from YouGov’s Cube. While there is a lot of discussion on IPL performance and viewership, this unique study helps to not only understand consumers’ level of engagement with the game but also allows advertisers to track the impact of IPL 2021 on brand health metrics like Awareness, Consideration, Familiarity and Recommendation. The research uses customised quantitative structured questionnaire and encompasses Tier 1 & 2 cities. Designed to constantly monitor brand trends on key brand health indicators, along with Meaningful attributes, this study will help advertisers understand the overall impact of their association with IPL. Hi-Cricket is the first initiative by Havas Insights and Havas Sports and Entertainment; we also intend to take the partnership into other sporting domains such as the Olympics, Hockey, Football and Kabaddi.”

    Deepa Bhatia
    Deepa Bhatia

    Added Deepa Bhatia, General Manager, India, YouGov: “According to YouGov India profiles’ data, IPL is one of the biggest sports assets along with ICC Cricket T20 World Cup. Sports assets have impacted the recall of brands globally. YouGov panel constitutes data of 2 lakh active panel respondents who have participated in various surveys. During the IPL season, YouGov will consistently reach out to people who watch IPL to set up the study. Using Havas’ Meaningful attributes, the customised Hi-Cricket study will help us understand what drives meaningfulness for brands and to what extent are campaigns able to drive perceptions for brands based on functional, personal and collective benefits.”

     

     

  • Since there are enough and more new ads around IPL 2021, Vikas Mehta comes up with a bonus add-on to his weekly column

    AdsOnIPL21: Akal Badi ki Ads?

     

    Since there are enough and more new ads around IPL 2021, Vikas Mehta comes up with a bonus add-on to his weekly column

     

    By Vikas Mehta

    Vikas MehtaTrust my Gen Z single sample to ask me a pointed question during the IPL. How do the Indian  cricketers get to shoot ads? Aren’t they in some bubble and get transferred from one bubble to another? We hear them moaning about the mental agony of the bubble, but every few months, they do manage to somehow augment their incomes with new ad campaigns. Bubbles notwithstanding.

    This re-view is dedicated to the new ads during the IPL featuring our cricketers. Past and present.  Last weekend the match between Delhi Capitals and Chennai Super Kings was touted as the match between guru and shishya. Dhoni vs Pant. I carried this imaginary rivalry into the ad world while watching the ad for Indigo Paint with Dhoni and then the one with JSW Steel bars (boring, uninvolved, irrelevant category) with neither me nor my Gen Z sample being the intended target. Frankly, the brand decision in both categories, paints and steel bars, is heavily dependent on the middle men and of course our budget, but paints has come a long way and why can’t steel bars hope to go the paint way. Specially when JSW is one of the main sponsors of DC.

    For me, this battle was won by the shishya. The two JSW ads have managed to not only exploit Pant’s personality but have also communicated the brand benefit woven into an involved storyline. The guruji’s ad unfortunately was a damp squib which was content with the typical celebrity formula. Show Dhoni in the ad and the rest will follow. And this in an ad for floor paints. Usually all paint ads are about walls. I think so much more could have been done with Dhoni and floor paint. My Gen Z sample  made another pertinent comment. So many Dhoni ads, he is an old man now (I guess I am vintage for her) shouldn’t the brand make his ads about his experience or his knowledge. Clearly the Gen Z sample is totally influenced by the Gen Z shishya.

    I did re-view Dream 11 last time but as has been the case always, I am now swamped with more fantasy team ads. So, I turned to my Gen Z sample for help. Let it be known that she is an expert on fantasy team contests having participated and won in some EPL contests. For her Dream 11 was the Indian cricket team, My Circle 11 was Dada, MPL was Virat Kohli and Howzatt.com was Yuvraj. Phew! Some clarity.

    MPL though have not used Kohli this time. They have done a literal interpretation of the Hindi proverb “Akal badi ki bhains” (is the brain better or a buffalo! No disrespect to both, please!) and it seems that currently the bhains is winning. I liked the ad because it clearly implies that making your fantasy team is so easy that you do not need to use your brains  to make the team. And it in its own way does take a dig at those short ads for Dream 11 which have Dhoni asking people to use their brains not on buttering your boss or your father but on choosing a fantasy team on Dream 11. Nicely done. My Gen Z sample though did not agree with me. Because she had never heard of the Hindi proverb. You cannot win them all, I say.

    My Circle 11 has roped in Ranveer Kapoor. Maybe Dada did not have enough time with his health issues, so Ranveer is now the co-anchor. And I do think I saw Rahane in one ad too. And me thinks that the ads have been done in a rush. Looked tacky and depended on Ranveer to announce a new promotion. But I do think that in the next few weeks we shall have more ads from My circle 11. I do hope so. Cannot re-view the current ones. What a waste of Ranveer, is the only comment from my Gen Z sample.

    The Yuvraj led Howzatt.com ads sounded familiar. Trust Gen Z sample to come to my rescue. She gently reminded me that the promotion was similar to My Circle 11 ads of beating the teams chosen by Dada, Watson, Rashid etc to win more money. Guess somebody has got me in plumb. Howzatt?

    And before I sign off I thought I saw another fantasy team ad for a new brand which was being endorsed by K Rahul. My head is now totally spinning with so many fantasy team ads, all around cricket. All using cricketers, ex and present. But my Gen Z sample had the last word, better than watching phone ads or ecommerce ads or those perpetually smiling Dhoni ads.

  • Tanmay Bhat and team think out of the box once again

    Cred gets Jackie Shroff for next ad film

    By Our Staff

    Big bang advertiser (and also a payment convenience provider) Cred has launched a new campaign in continuation with its official sponsorship with IPL 2021. After the first ad film went viral featuring Rahul Dravid in an angry avatar, the next ad film has Jim Sarbh and Jackie Shroff in a never-seen-before personas.

    The ad films have been produced and directed by Early Man Film. The campaign was written and conceptualised by Tanmay Bhat, Devaiah Bopanna, Puneet Chadha, Nupur Pai and Vishal Dayama and executed by DDB Mudra and 22Feet Tribal Worldwide. Karan Malhotra has composed the music for the films.

    Said Kunal Shah, Founder and CEO, Cred: “We are happy to continue our association with the IPL for the second year in a row. At Cred, we believe in rewarding good financial behaviour. With this campaign, we want to instil our message of the importance of financial literacy and educating viewers on the rewarding benefits of practising responsible financial behaviour. ”

    Added Ayappa, Director and Co-Founder, Early Man Film: “It’s that time of the year when we collaborate with our favourite heroes from the 90s and make them do strange, yet wonderful things for Cred. I hope everyone enjoys these films as much as they did the last set.”