MxMIndia

Tag: Shailesh Kapoor

  • The conflicts in many of the current crop of GEC shows are based on premises that are essentially against the core of the much-revered Indian culture, notes Shailesh Kapoor

    Shailesh Kapoor: GECs’ Latest Challenge: The Urban Itch

    By Shailesh Kapoor

     

    As the year draws to an end, it’s increasingly clear that 2014 shall definitely not be remembered for being the year of content innovation on Indian television. In fact, as it turns out, it would perhaps be remembered as a year when status quo was given only a feeble challenge by new ideas, with little success. At the end of the year, most top shows on television are launches from 2010-13, barring an odd Udaan or Kumkum Bhagya, 2014 launches that walked the road traveled before.

     

    In the second half of the year, a certain pattern emerges if you study the new Hindi GEC launches. There seems a conscious attempt to go urban (read cosmopolitan), and connect with a more evolved and exposed mindset. This is evident across several shows launched over the last four months. (I’m choosing to not take show names as examples, as the point being made is a collective one.)

     

    Most recent launches have a liberal sprinkling of the English language, a dominant presence of women professionals and out-of-home situations, and an overall cosmopolitan ambience, in terms of styling, production and treatment. More importantly, the issues being tackled are urban in their relevance, with a resonance only in the upper echelons of our vast country.

     

    I have been watching these shows unfold on air over the last quarter. Most of them have performed average to below average on ratings. Covering topics like estranged familial relationships, divorces, extra-marital affairs and the likes, the conflicts in these shows are based on premises that are essentially against the core of the much-revered Indian culture (read “sanskaar”).

     

    Much as one would hope that such shows work, so that variety of themes can prosper, it’s a well-established marketing rule that relevance should be non-negotiable for a product to succeed. I know that most channels and even producers are well aware of this. After all, ratings have made everyone “research savvy” in one way or the other.

     

    Yet, we see concepts being written and treated in ways that lack resonance. Many young television writers believe that it’s their duty (and opportunity) to change Indian television. So far, so good. But their idea of what constitutes a positive, relevant “change” seems misplaced in a half-baked understanding of the target audience.

     

    That the channels actually end up endorsing such writing and production is our television industry’s version of marketing myopia, where consumer needs take a backseat to a mindset of product innovation and growth.

     

    There is an inherent manufacturer’s bias also at play here. We are humans after all, and if we like watching content of a certain type, we would want to make more of it. And because we essentially interact with more people like ourselves in our day-to-day lives, they also like similar content and the bias keeps getting reinforced by the day.

     

    In its truest sense, innovation is always customer-centric, where the idea keeps the user of the product (the viewer in our case) at its heart. Many may argue that the last year or so has been the year of innovation and failures, and that’s not always a bad thing. But I’d rather call it a year when the urban itch came to the fore. Real innovation is still being awaited, barring Satyamev Jayate.

     

  • Helmet-makers will find some answers. ICC will find a few other. But a promising International cricketer has died at the age of 25. For me, cricket may never be the same again, writes Shailesh Kapoor

    Shailesh Kapoor: The Phil Hughes Tragedy: A Deathblow To Cricket

    By Shailesh Kapoor

     

    Twenty-five-year-old Aussie batsman Phil Hughes passed away last morning, after battling for life for two days, since being hit by a bouncer in a first class game at Sydney. There was high chance that Hughes, who would have celebrated his 26th birthday this Sunday, would play in the first Test against India next week. Now, the Test itself is under question, as players come to terms with the loss.

     

    Even as family, friends and the cricketing community grieves, fans have also been left shaken. I’ve invested more than 30 years in this sport, though the interest has admittedly reduced over the last few years. I have seen Mike Gatting being hit on the nose by a Malcolm Marshall snorter, Sanjay Manjrekar have a bloody debut, Sachin Tendulkar fighting it out at Sialkot after a nose blow, Kris Srikanth’s forehead blow against Wasim Akram, and many others.

     

    In recent times, ace South African wicketkeeper Mark Boucher had a nasty eye injury on the field, forcing him to retire from cricket, and start a recovery process that’s still on after more than two years.

     

    There are many other instances, including former Indian opener Raman Lamba losing his life after being hit by a shot fielding at forward short leg in a game at Dhaka. Lamba was not wearing a helmet. But with Hughes’ incident, even that little learning can’t be taken.

     

    There are two ways for a fan to handle such an incident. You can either pass it off as a one-in-a-billion case, convincing yourself that you are unlikely to see any other tragedy of this scale in your lifetime again. Or you can watch each delivery in each future game with a sense of trepidation, hoping all goes well. The reality, at least for me, will lie somewhere between these two ends.

     

    There’s so much media talk around cricket of late. Sachin Tendulkar released his wonderfully sterile autobiography recently, and the Supreme Court is going all guns blazing to clean up the IPL. But the Hughes incident dwarfs everything else, in terms of its potential long-term impact on the game. I shudder to think what could happen if this freak, one-in-a-billion incident repeated itself within the next few months with another International cricketer.

     

    The media coverage around the incident has been reasonably mature, though I haven’t seen much in the Indian media that’s insightful analysis with an eye on the future. On social media, some new agencies and publications were under attack for posting pictures of the on-field incident. The pictures are not “gory”, and one could question if there was indeed a need to exercise censorship here, or is it by now a stereotypical response to pan the media for being “insensitive”, when a tragic incident happens. But that’s another debate, for another day.

     

    Helmet-makers will find some answers. ICC will find a few other. But a promising International cricketer has died at the age of 25. For me, cricket may never be the same again.

     

  • While there are studies to suggest consoumption of non-veg food has increased, the sight of meat generates disgust in around 30-40 percent audiences in India, notes Shailesh Kapoor

    Shailesh Kapoor: In Support of an All-Vegetarian MasterChef India

    By Shailesh Kapoor

     

    The contempt our social media elite have towards mass Indian television is well-known. Barring an odd Bade Achhe LagteHain, all fiction content on Hindi GECs (and most non-fiction too) is frowned upon by the upper echelons of Twitter. Even then, I was surprised by the attention MasterChef India going vegetarian in their latest season received over the last week.

     

    MasterChef India has never got media attention in the past. But earlier this week, a story in The Economic Times suggested that the show going vegetarian this season could have much to do with one of its two principal sponsors – Amul and Fortune (The Adani Group).

     

    Anyone who knows how Indian television works would laugh that conspiracy theory off. MasterChef India is not an ‘advertiser-funded programme’, where the creative control is shared between the channel and the advertiser.

     

    Twitter picked up the news, and soon, it was the hot topic of discussion, with a largely negative sentiment surrounding it. Not that Star Plus would be bothered. They would know that those commenting are not the target audience, and more importantly, they have little understanding of the real target audience.

     

    When we see the decision of turning the show vegetarian from the viewership lens, it makes perfect sense. I must clarify that I’m as non-vegetarian as one can get, and would have personally liked to see a non-vegetarian-only MasterChef. But TV shows are not made for individuals, are they?

     

    If you’ve been brought up in a progressive, cosmopolitan environment, it would be impossible for you to understand the issue at hand. That would have been the case with me as well. But over the last five years, we have conducted extensive research on food and lifestyle television. The disgust that the sight of meat can generate in certain audiences (and by “certain”, I mean 30-40%) has to be seen to be believed. We have had live examples of upper middle class housewives instinctively turning their faces away from the screen when something as basic as a bowl of chicken pieces is shown. We’ve seen this happen across India, city after city.

     

    I know there are studies that suggest that the consumption of non-vegetarian food is increasing in India. But there are many caveats on how to read that data. A lot of this consumption is infrequent, once in a fortnight, for example. Also, a lot of it is ‘out of home’. When we talk Hindi GEC, we are talking of ‘family viewing at home during dinner time’. All three parts of that phrase (family, at home, dinner time) support a vegetarian idea.

     

    In MasterChef Australia, meat is called ‘protein’ and if you fillet a fish well, you are ‘respecting’ it. In an episode a couple of seasons ago, a trout was called ‘lucky’ because it was going to be cooked on the show. In the latest season, when there was a vegetarian challenge, where all ‘protein’ was removed from the pantry, half the contestants cooked Indian!

     

    It’s easy to argue that Indian television channels should be ‘progressive’ and help India’s outlook evolve towards a more global one. I would totally support that point when it comes to issues related to woman empowerment, education, health, gender equality, sexuality, racism and the likes. But maybe we can leave food out of this? It has no social impact whatsoever. And there is a deep, religious aspect to this all, which should not be questioned in all fairness.

     

    Like always, the choice of viewing or not viewing is with the one who controls the remote. I think we may do well to respect the viewer before respecting the ingredients.

     

  • Despite 50 top brands in the country that target children actively, the day increasingly finds little resonance, writes Shailesh Kapoor

    Shailesh Kapoor: Is Children’s Day losing media significance

     

    By Shailesh Kapoor

     

    Today is Children’s Day. Unlike many other branded days – such as Mother’s Day, Daughter’s Day, Father’s Day and, of course, Valentine’s Day – Children’s Day is an indigenous event, observed on the birth anniversary of Jawaharlal Nehru.

     

    But like most festivals and special days, the genesis becomes less important over time, than the actual celebration. Children’s Day, however, suffers from both genesis and celebration issues.

     

    Have you seen any significant TV commercial or print ad around Children’s Day? Or any special episodes of TV shows themed around this day? Some kids channels have planned specials of their existing shows, but those are destinations where every day is Children’s Day anyway.

     

    We have all seen the media exploitation of Valentine’s Day, Mother’s Day and the likes over the last two decades. Brands have used these specials to peddle offers or simply communicate their brand message in a more contextual environment.

     

    But with Children’s Day, very few such efforts are visible. There are at least 50 top brands in the country that target children actively. And the parent-child bond (especially the mother-child) is a part of many brand messages. Yet, Children’s Day finds no resonance.

     

    Is it because over time, the awareness of this occasion has reduced amongst the children themselves? That, indeed, is one of the reasons. But it also begs the question, because if media can create awareness of non-existent properties (where was Father’s Day a decade ago?), it can surely revive a traditionally strong one.

     

    I suspect this has something to do with the indigenous vs. foreign difference. In MNCs, brand plans are often made globally and then adapted for local execution. Children’s Day would never feature in such a plan. And if some key brands choose to ignore it, the momentum will never build enough to create the threshold the day needs to become ‘marketable’.

     

    But there’s another aspect that could also be leading to this, and that’s the one that bothers me more. Indian entertainment businesses (both television and films) have always treated the children segment with a sense of tentativeness. It’s been the orphaned target group, left to find its entertainment in cartoons, while all the content innovation happens for the adults.

     

    In India, a kid can watch animation content till the age of 12, and then graduate straight to a Saathiya or a Roadies. There is no in-between, barring an odd show like CID or Taarak Mehta. The only channels we research kids for are the kids channels. Everyone else is happy catering to 15+.

     

    Much as this may seem ‘correct’, it creates an impact that is extremely worrying. Kids channels are heavily under-indexed on advertising revenues and hence cannot afford original live-action productions with any sense of scale. As a result, over the last two decades, Indian kids have little content variety on offer. Even as a housewife tries and balances as many as 10-12 shows in a day, her child has adjusted himself to just one or two shows, which he will now watch for the next three years, if not more. You don’t need to be a child psychologist to know that the long-term damage here can be fairly substantive in nature.

     

    It’s time for the top GECs and film studios to challenges themselves. There is immense commercial opportunity too. But is there enough will to dip into it?

     

  • BARC can do well to discourage this artificial segmentation by not providing any of these handles (GEC, Youth GEC, etc.) in their planning tools, and even prohibit their data bureaus, as and when they come up, from doing the same, writes Shailesh Kapoor

    Shailesh Kapoor: Time to Redefine ‘General Entertainment Channel’?

    By Shailesh Kapoor

     

    Though largely an uneventful year for Indian television content, 2014 has seen some channel launches, after almost four years of status quo. Zee launched Zindagi mid-year, followed by Sony’s launch of its third GEC Sony Pal, and later this month, Epic goes on-air. We all know that Zee has its second (or third, if you count Zindagi) GEC in the incubator.

     

    Classically, back in the 90s, a channel was called a GEC (General Entertainment Channel) if it had something for everyone in the family. It was “general” enough to have a mix of content that should cater to a fairly generalized collective need. The term GEC is India-specific and was perhaps coined by the advertiser community to give a handle to the set of mass channels that existed at that time.

     

    Over time, as the number of ‘GECs’ increased, advertisers and planners started using GEC 1 and GEC 2 as reference terms for the top ranked and second tier GECs.

     

    However, look at things closely the way they exist today, and you would know that it’s time to question all the parlance surrounding the term ‘GEC’. Here are some thoughts, for example:

     

    1. Zindagi’s offering is anything but ‘general’. In fact, it’s a very differentiated, specialized-content based channel. Even if it did 100 GRPs, could it ever be called a ‘General’ Entertainment Channel with such content?

     

    2. The same argument applies with even more force to Epic, where the offering is catering to a content need that’s incredibly sharp and therefore, irrespective of its audience size, niche.

     

    3. Sab TV’s content filter (light-hearted family entertainment) is very specific as well.

     

    4. More than 95% original programming time on Star Plus today goes to fiction content targeting women audiences. Is that ‘general entertainment’?

     

    5. Movie premieres, that were a core part of the GEC offering in the 90s, are now increasingly being seen on movie channels instead. Does that make the GECs less ‘general’?

     

    It may seem a matter of semantics, but the implications of these semantics can be substantive. By clubbing all channels airing fiction and non-fiction content as ‘General Entertainment Channels’, we have created artificial segmentation of the content market. Channel V today is far more general in its offering than Sab TV is. But because it was historically a music platform, it has clubbed into another artificial category: Youth GECs!

     

    Now all this would not matter if the cost of getting 1% audience to watch your ad on all channels were the same. But it is not. CPRP (Cost Per Rating Point) wildly fluctuates across these artificial categories. GECs have a distinctive advantage over most other Indian language channels in this regard. And this advantage borders on being unfair.

     

    BARC can do well to discourage this artificial segmentation by not providing any of these handles (GEC, Youth GEC, etc.) in their planning tools, and even prohibit their data bureaus, as and when they come up, from doing the same.

     

    And while I wait for that to happen, I leave you with a question: Think hard and name the one Indian channel that you think has the most ‘general’ entertainment to offer to the country at large. Ask the question around too. Some of the answers may surprise you.

     

  • It's well-known that no direct correlation exists between box-office and television performance, notes Shailesh Kapoor

    Shailesh Kapoor: The Art Of Mass Entertainment: Oh My Dog!

    By Shailesh Kapoor

     

    Performance of Bollywood films on television is a fascinating topic. It’s well-known that no direct correlation exists between box-office and television performance. Yet, a lot of movie-buying happens based on box-office collections. If one dig deeper, there are box-office measures that can be used to predict the ratings of a film’s premiere telecast. The single screen to multiplex box-office collections ratio is one such measure. Films that tend to get a higher percentage of their collections from single screens tend to work better on television, despite their overall collections being much lower than certain other multiplex-centric film.

     

    It is not very difficult to see why this should happen. Television audiences, especially the film-viewing ones, are skewed towards lower SECs and the smaller towns. They represent a mindset that’s closely mirrored by the single screen theatre audience. Their entertainment choices are more escapist in nature, with comedy and action being the driving genre, though a dose of traditional family values is always desirable.

     

    Last week, Akshay Kumar’s recent release Entertainment premiered on Zee Cinema and scored a whopping 5.5 TVR. To put it in perspective, this number is higher than the ratings of Kick and Singham Returns, the two biggest box-office grossers of this year, both in the mass action genre. It is 60% higher than the ratings of Dhoom 3, the biggest Bollywood grosser at the box-office till date. Ratings of hits like Queen and 2 States dwarf in front of Entertainment’s 5.5.

     

    Entertainment performed miserably at the box-office. It opened below par for an Akshay Kumar film and had no takers at the end of its first week, going on to be a certified flop. If you have seen the film, you would understand why. It’s a long 140-min slapstick comedy about the relationship between a man and a dog (playing the titular role). It could have been fun, but the jokes are all heard-before, and the film takes itself too seriously and tries to tell a story around an incredulous, spoofy premise.

     

    In one of the many nonsensical scenes, when the dog’s pulse drops to zero on the operation theatre table, Akshay Kumar magically revives him by a giving him a hard thump on the chest. It’s almost as if someone else made a good film about a man-dog relationship and this film decided to spoof it out.

     

    Yet, on television, all this and more is, indeed, Entertainment. Akshay Kumar is a very popular star with the masses, but his better work in recent times (e.g. Special 26) does not rate too well. But a film like Entertainment doesn’t even need a star. It has this element of sheer idiocy that is not worth the price of a movie ticket, but a good freebie for a mind that perpetually feels the need to de-stress.

     

    There has been a lot of talk in recent years, about how some films are designed for you to ‘leave your brains at home’ when you come to watch them in the theatre. I wonder where you are supposed to leave your brains when you are watching such films at home itself!

     

    In a parallel universe, in the same industry, the infotainment genre, which was largely driven by one type of programming for a long time (survival genre shows led by Man Vs. Wild) is now espousing more intelligent (though entertaining in no less measure) content. National Geographic has been actively pursuing its ‘Entertain Your Brain’ proposition with good success, with shows like Brain Games and Science Of Stupid.

     

    But even as television gets smarter on that side, mass numbers continue to baffle you at times. The irony is not lost on me. Neither is the dichotomy of it all.

     

  • The truth is that the entire approach to festive programming has shifted hands from programming to ad sales, writes Shailesh Kapoor

    Shailesh Kapoor: The Death of Festive Programming?

    By Shailesh Kapoor

     

    We are a week away from Diwali, the biggest festival in the North of India. Dassera just went by and the New Year is not too far away. The classical ‘festive season’ has started. In the ’80s and the ’90s, these festivities were accompanied by a bonus – special made-for-festival television programming.

     

    There would be a Hasya Kavi Sammelan on Holi every year. New Year’s Eve was famous for Doordarshan’s special three-hour show. Independence Day and Republic Day had special programmes and movies to celebrate the occasion. Channels would dress up for the festivals, through specially-designed packaging variants. Celebrities would wish you through 10-second spots peppered across television. Channels would also acquire rights to Bollywood concerts to air on such occasions. And of course, the festivals will be integrated into the running shows, via special episodes or story integration.

     

    Over the last decade, many of these thematics have disappeared. There’s a token film telecast to sync with an occasion like Independence Day, but that is a library repeat anyway. I suspect someone would have kept count of how many times Gadar has been shown on TV to celebrate India’s freedom, from the time of the film’s release in 2001. Some channels have attempted special events around Holi and Eid, but most such attempts come across as hurriedly-created sales properties.

     

    But there is an overkill of integration of festivals in running programmes, especially the daily soaps. In 2012, a show took to celebrating KarvaChauth so seriously that it was being celebrated on the show even after we had celebrated Diwali in the real world.

     

    If a ‘General Entertainment Channel’ was to take its ‘generality’ seriously, it should be tapping in on each big festive occasion to provide content that’s specially designed and produced for it.

     

    My interest doesn’t lie in watching festive programming, but more in understanding why it’s largely disappeared. Someone could come up with the ratings argument, that many such attempts have not rated well in the past. But if a lazily or half-heartedly created show doesn’t rate in regular primetime, does the channel stop making primetime shows?

     

    The truth is that the entire approach to festive programming has shifted hands in most broadcasters (and I include the radio industry here) – from programming to ad sales. We are in the busiest advertising season too, and content is put together with a clear eye on the money available in the marketplace. The premiere of a Bollywood Blockbuster or a brand integration on a running show is what the ad sales guys would do well to take as ammunition into the market, to get a big slice of the spending pie available.

     

    Creating a new property makes the selling job so much more complex. You have to sell a new idea, and there is always a chance that it won’t sell well enough for make the money it needs to make. The quick fix of patching up existing programming as a ‘special’ keeps all the involved parties secure – the programmer, the sales guy and the advertiser.

     

    But it’s laziness at the end of the day, isn’t it? If a Diwali special event was created by a leading GEC with all its heart and soul, it could rate higher than most running shows and films. And it’s a property for the channel to cherish and telecast periodically during the year, before bringing it back the following year again as a second edition.

     

    But that would be heterogeneity on display. And I believe that, however unknowingly, our mainstream television fraternity may have got addicted to homogeneity far too much to like a change.

     

    PS: I still celebrate my festivals and this column would be on a Diwali break next week, to be back on October 31.

     

  • While a section of the sports fraternity is busy developing genuine talent in boxing, badminton, shooting and the likes, a large section of viewers are happy watching sports like popcorn fare, writes Shailesh Kapoor

    Shailesh Kapoor:The State Of Our Sport: Asiad, ISL & more

    By Shailesh Kapoor

     

    In many ways, the 1982 Asian Games (also called Asiad) in New Delhi had a major role to play in India’s television history. They marked the advent of colour broadcasting in India, and also initiated a culture of viewing live sports broadcast, a pleasure unknown to most Indians till that point of time.

     

    The 17th Asiad is currently underway in Incheon, Korea. But you would be excused for not knowing much about them. The Asiad event, which India once gave great importance to, has progressively lost significance over the last two decades. There is little media coverage, and virtually no viewership.

     

    Even the Olympics, which have gained more prominence over the last few years thanks to India’s medal count moving from a zero for many years to a record five in 2012, record scant viewership.

     

    Even if we look at the comfort territory, i.e., cricket, viewership has moved away from Tests and even ODIs, to the IPL. Evidently, we are becoming a country of leagues. With a high-investment property in Indian Super League (ISL) lined up, this trend would further consolidate in the coming year.

     

    But the shift is not from nation-vs-nation sport to sporting leagues. It is fundamentally a shift from sports to sports entertainment. Consumer research in the sports category reveals the insight that watching sport, per se, is not always an entertainment experience. Purists, who follow sports to the last detail, are a handful in number, ranging from less than 15% of the total viewer base for cricket to less than 5% for most other sports.

     

    For everyone else, tuning into a sports channel is primarily an entertainment-seeking activity. You are hoping to be dazzled by some high-octane action, a twist in the tale, some humour and even some song-and-dance. And yes, while you are at it, you will also like a particular team to win.

     

    A purist (and I am one, when it comes to sports) may scoff at the state of affairs, but in what has been a one-sport nation so far, if this is what we need to build any kind of sports awareness, then so be it.

     

    Where that leaves our handful of sporting heroes, who win laurels for us at International meets, is questionable. Saina Nehwal is arguably India’s greatest sportsman in the 2010-14 period. Yet, her awareness and popularity remains abysmal in mass India. Badminton is not an entertaining sport to watch, and to make matters worse, it is considered by many viewers as a fairly easy sport to play (and hence, no big deal in winning top honors in it!).

     

    We are the crossroads of a sporting revolution of some kind. While a section of the sports fraternity is busy developing genuine talent in boxing, badminton, shooting and the likes, a large section of viewers are happy watching sports like popcorn fare.

     

    Only time will decide which of these two directions will we head in. Both of them, however, are a major improvement on being a cricket-crazy one-sport nation.

     

  • MxMIndia columnists and industry experts Shailesh Kapoor & Sanjeev Kotnala were at the BARC roadshow in Mumbai on Thursday. Presenting their views

    BARC-ing up the right tree!

     

    MxMIndia columnists and industry experts Shailesh Kapoor and Sanjeev Kotnala were at the BARC roadshow in Mumbai on Thursday (*See Disclosure). Presenting their views

     

     

    BARC-ing up the right tree!

     

    By Shailesh Kapoor

    This week, BARC (Broadcast Audience Research Council) conducted roadshows across four cities, sharing important details of the new audience measurement system, to be implemented soon. While we did not get a specific date when the first ratings will be rolled out, there was a lot of new information shared in the roadshow, especially on the universe and the sample design.

     

    The details of what was shared should shortly be available in the media, including the BARC website. Hence, I can stay away from writing about them. It is suffice to say that there are sea changes, not incremental ones, over the current measurement system, not just in terms of the panel size and the market coverage (inclusion of rural being the mega addition), but in terms of the sheer approach to how the new system has being envisaged, both in terms of technology and data credibility.

     

    But what impressed me even more was the candor and warmth with which the roadshows were conducted. In the Mumbai roadshow that I attended, BARC CEO Partho Dasgupta and Technical Committee head Shashi Sinha made the main presentation. They were later joined by technical committee member Paritosh Joshi, and together, the three answer more than 20 questions from a packed audience.

     

    Throughout the presentation and the question-answer session, there was an air of approachability on display. Even for questions for which BARC did not want to share too much information, they could say so with reasons upfront, than give an uptight, no-comments type of response.

     

    Importantly, one could sense great chemistry between the team members. With constant pressure on timelines and an all-eyes-are-on-us awareness, one won’t blame if the BARC team were to be tense and on the knife’s edge. Instead, they were unbelievably relaxed (in a very good way, lest I should be misunderstood) and there was smart sprinkling of humor through the session too.

     

    Clearly, we are looking at a more inclusive audience measurement company; one that’s open to new ideas and suggestions, from all constituents of the industry. That has been one of the known problems with the incumbent, where the approach has been more on the lines of: This is what our product is, and you have little choice but to take it. I suspect, we are going to see a huge attitudinal shift in the year to come.

     

    No specific dates were committed, as I mentioned before. There has been some media talk about the delays. To me, this is largely a non-issue. The roadshow gave a clear sense of progress. If the first ratings don’t roll out in early 2015, they surely will by mid 2015. If we have stayed with the current system for more than 15 years, in various forms, we can surely wait a few more months, can’t we?

     

     

    Shailesh Kapoor, founder and CEO of media insights firm Ormax Media. He spent nine years in the television industry before turning entrepreneur. The views expressed here are his own. He can be reached at his Twitter handle @shaileshkapoor.

     

    		  

    Pregnant BARC. Delivery date unknown

     

    By Sanjeev Kotnala

    Yesterday, the weather in Mumbai was cloudy with some areas reporting scattered rains. Inside the Nehru auditorium BARC’s promising session remained uneventful. The mystery hardly got resolved. What one heard were futuristic promises. With the IRS episode fresh in mind and BARC many months away from data release, this status update seemed more aimed at leaving no square vacant for a later date checkmate.

    The update by the BARC team was like an election manifesto; full of good intent.  Hopefully technology will ensure smooth and quality execution. The BARC team wants to start basic reporting before tackling never ending value enhancement demands from industry.

    The presenters understandably  were unwilling to share much information. Most good question returned unanswered. Presenters cited BARC Board directive as something that held them back! No harm in being cautious  and not to over-promise and under-deliver.

    BARC is  definitely on the right track, promising what industry needs; a robust data with minimal error percentage.  That this is the need is no rocket science. But the most important question – when and how – remained unanswered.

    The team at BARC must be applauded getting the best technology for Indian situation. They are sensitive to the industry need and well aware of possible mal-practices. Their roadshow itself was inspiring confidence on BARC’s future delivery.

    A lot rides on the data BARC will project and its natural for anxiety to build up as a new technology (watermark) and new NCCS reference points will be used.  So here is the gist.

    BARC TV viewership draws on Watermark technology embedding  signals during transmission at the broadcaster end. This is picked by the recorder/ meter/ devise when people watch TV. The signal through integrated SIM card in the device sends back information to Data analytics team. This is cross-matched with the logs maintained at two centres (Mumbai-Bengaluru). Net data is projected basis 20,000 HH (expected to go up to 50,000 in 3 years). Reporting uses IRS, Census data references to finally report  TV Viewership on NCCS Grid, mainly in U and U+R basis.

    BARC data will be primed to report ‘What India is watching’ and will cover almost all states. Data devices placement reflect 153 MN TV sets geographical dispersion on state level. It will give report basis ‘telecast + 7day’ accounting for repeat / delayed viewing too. But rural standalone will not be reported.

    The BARC team seems to be moving with the demand imposed by current technology.  A lot of promises are being made: Robustness of reported data. Reduced margin of error. Holding back non-stabilized data. Adhering to government guidelines. Transparency and external audit. Reporting on multi screen basis. Attempt to map viewership on digital devices, TV Viewership on same day basis. 25% annual churn in panel. Internally and across business associates information shared on need-to-know basis. Strong filters to prevent infiltration. Etc. etc.

    The openness of the BARC team for suggestions sends out positive signals. Add to it BARC’s confidence in creating rules to prevent stakeholders disputing unfavorable results. Just a reminder on this one: the IRS had such conditions as part of their member agreement but we all know the situation. Surely only Time has the answer on this one.

    Meanwhile Industry waits for BARC to deliver the final bite.

     

    Sanjeev Kotnala is Head Catalyst at P1P2SOLUTIONS and can be reached at netkot@yahoo.com. The views expressed here are his own.

     

     * MxMIndia had partnered BARC to announce the roadshows

     

  • As the environment gets more distractive and options increase, the impact of content titling on its success has started to increase too, writes Shailesh Kapoor

    Shailesh Kapoor: What’s in a Name? The Art of Choosing a Show Title

    By Shailesh Kapoor

     

    SAB TV launched a show called Chandrakant Chiplunkar Seedi Bambawala last month. The long, tongue-twister of a name is now the longest show title for an Indian TV programme in my memory (I have discounted inconsequential taglines while considering titles). Star Plus broke its mould by titling their new show Nisha Aur Uske Cousins. At the box-office two weeks ago, a film released with a title that made it virtually impossible for the film to be taken seriously – Raja Natwarlal.

     

    As the environment gets more distractive and options increase, the impact of content titling on its success has started to increase too. A title may not be the most important determinant of a show’s success. That comes from characters, plot and treatment, of course. But a title can be an entry ticket or an entry barrier, depending on how it is perceived.

     

    Very little understanding of what’s a good title is available. It’s one of the least-researched areas in content. Which is odd, given that it’s the first introduction of the content to its target audience. Titling is still seen as a vague creative exercise. It is nothing but that. It is a marketing variable, but one that marketing departments in channels have very little say in.

     

    It’s easy to justify a ‘bad’ title, because there will always be enough examples of shows that worked with a certain kind of title and vice versa. That they worked despite the title and not because of it is a point that’s rarely understood.

     

    There may not be any tenets cast in stone, but there certainly are guidelines for good show titles, that we sense over many years of content and communication research in the Indian market. Here are five of them. Unfortunately, work ethic demands that I stay away from giving examples for them. But you should get the drift.

     

    1. The marriage of simple and catchy: Keep it simple and stupid? In the entertainment business, that won’t necessarily be a recommendation. There needs to be a sense of attractiveness (commonly can “catchy”). But, the catchiness should not come at the cost of simplicity.

     

    2. Avoid homilies and random musings: It’s amazing how some titles can be so “creative” that they communicate nothing. Innumerable TV and film titles fit this category.

     

    3. Enough of song names, please: It may have worked for some shows, more memorably for Bade Achhe Lagte Hain. But the excuse to use a song name for a TV show title is now simply an excuse of being lazy. Songs that were never even popular in their own time are now being used as titles. And in some cases, this “own time” happens to be the 50s and the 60s!

     

    4. Communicate the genre: The biggest marketing task a title can do is to communicate its show’s genre effectively. Choice of words in a title can be critical to communicate the heaviness or light-heartedness of treatment, the emotional tenor and the content bucket the show broadly falls in. I’ve often seen misleading titles being justified by that very standard and very lame explanation: It will be taken care in the treatment of the promos.

     

    5. When in doubt, use character names: In fact, you can make that: Unless in doubt, use character names. Over five years of show tracking (Ormax Showbuzz), we’ve seen that shows with character names (lead or the lead pair) generate 35% higher unaided recall in their pre-launch week on an average, compared to those without one. Importantly, such titles force the promo writer to write character-building promos. For fiction content, that’s pure gold.

     

  • While Bollywood has found sports in its attempt to find new stories, Indian television seems to have ignored this recent development

    Shailesh Kapoor: Bollywood embraces the Sports Drama Genre. Will TV follow?

    By Shailesh Kapoor

     

    MC Mary Kom’s biopic releases today. After the success of Bhaag Milkha Bhaag last year, the film, succinctly titled Mary Kom, is hot property in Bollywood trade. After all, Bhaag Milkha Bhaag was the first 100cr film that did not feature a big star in the lead. It was also the most-appreciated Hindi film in terms of audience word-of-mouth since 3 Idiots.

     

    In a different and yet not-so-different world, Sachin Tendulkar will be releasing his autobiography, in November. Co-authored by Boria Majumdar, the book, titled Playing It My Way, is sure to make at least some young Indians read beyond Chetan Bhagat.

     

    Evidently, the impact of sport on other media has increased in the last year or two. Traditionally, “sports” meant restricted live telecasts and news coverage of the same. Everything else around it was strictly ancillary. The only other place where sportspeople featured was the gossip column, when they dated a film star (at times, starlet).

     

    While Bollywood has found sports in its attempt to find new stories, Indian television seems to have ignored this recent development. We are not a sporting country by any means, but that does not mean that we don’t have sporting heroes. Yet, no stories on television have covered them, their lives or the drama associated with sport in general. The last attempt of any sorts was back in 2009, when Sony aired a daily called Palampur Express. The show was based on a fictional character, not a real story, and had severe story-telling concerns, none of which were about “sports” as such. It went off-air within weeks.

     

    In my growing up years, I remember watching the Bodyline miniseries with awe. The idea of recreating real sporting action with such authenticity was fascinating. Hollywood has also captured sporting drama in dozens of films, including the behind-the-scenes action in films like Jerry Maguire and Moneyball.

     

    I understand that the economics of sports channels may not allow them to invest in fiction series around sports. But isn’t sports drama a part of the wider umbrella called “general entertainment”? We dish out talent shows by the day, but there haven’t been any that search for the next potential Indian cricket team member or the next potential Saina Nehwal or Sushil Kumar.

     

    Sports drama can be excellent viewing for weekend audiences. It ticks most weekend boxes – it is male-skewed, it is kids-inclusive, it has a rush of adrenaline, and certainly a big scoop of inspiration.

     

    A big network like Star, with equal interest in both sports and general entertainment, is best aligned today to bridge this need gap. A crackling sports drama or sports reality show can open up a new area of television programming in India. Otherwise, like it took a Richard Attenborough to tell Gandhi’s story, it would take another Brit or American to tell Dhyanchand’s story on TV or celluloid.

     

    Bollywood has taken the first step. It’s time for television to follow and embrace the world of sport outside of live action. Anyone listening?

     

  • Presenting the 100th 'TV Trail' column by Shailesh Kapoor, Founder and CEO, Ormax Media

    100 Episodes Young!

     

     

    Happy 100!

    So why did Show X do well on Television Channel A and Show Y flop on Channel B despite a huge marketing blitz?  As mediawatchers, we have always asked this question and often relied on our own personal views or that of people around us.

    However, there had got to be a scientific way of figuring why certain television works, and why some doesn’t. We needed to pick the trends and dig for the insights.

    A few months after we launched MxMIndia, we felt we weren’t servicing the needs of our readers well enough if we didn’t provide these insights. It wasn’t enough to carry plugs of what the channels want to say. It wasn’t enough to interview business/programming heads/CxOs and ask the predictable questions.  Or quiz a cross-section of media planners and marketers on what show worked

    We didn’t have to look around too much to know how we could bridge this gap. The answer was to get Shailesh Kapoor, Founder and CEO, Ormax Media to write for us. We had read his tweets and some very interesting posts on his blog.

    It took me longer to meet him than to convince him to write. The rest, as they say, is history.

    Today, Shailesh Kapoor’s weekly column hits a century of appearances. Yes, what you see here is the 100th edition of TV Trail and at MxMIndia we are proud to publish his column and have him associated with us.

    We are also delighted that all our readers have embraced his column right from Week #1 and the views he has expressed.

    For those of you have come in late, do dig into our archives. TV Trail by Shailesh Kapoor is Essential Reading for ALL stakeholders in the business and craft of the Indian media.

    Congratulations, Shailesh!

    – Pradyuman Maheshwari
    Editor-in-Chief, MxMIndia

     

     

    By Shailesh Kapoor

     

    TV Trail completes 100 episodes today! A century is always special, be it on the cricket field or here on the Internet. It’s easy to indulge myself in this hundredth edition of this weekly column and write about the experience of writing it. But that would be ironic, given that I have spent at least ten of these 100 columns criticizing some of the common indulgences in our TV industry.

     

    Instead then, here’s my pick of the seven pieces I enjoyed writing the most, in chronological order, with excerpts from each in italics. Click if you want to read any of them in full. To use TV language, I’m hoping this piece can convert some of the irregular readers into regulars. And for those who have been regulars already, thank you for reading.

     

    Films Stars on TV – Free For All (August 2012)

    Channels allowing filmmakers free access to their medium has always baffled me. Two years hence, not much has changed!

     

    Why should a producer, who pays upto Rs 3 million for a print ad, not pay a rupee for getting a wider, more contextual (audio-video and entertainment) medium to meet the same objectives better? Because TV has never asked for it! Because the pecking order is twisted enough for old-school film producers and stars to still believe that they, and not the channel, are the ones extending a favor by making an “appearance”.

     

    Trite Tributes To Film Legends (November 2012)

    How news channels cover the passing away of cinema legends embarrasses me. 2011-12 was a period when we lost a few stalwarts. This piece was written a few days after Yash Chopra passed away.

     

    The ‘programme’ names often border on being ludicrous. A channel covered Rajesh Khanna’s death live, under a program called ‘Oopar Aaka, Neeche Kaka’. Looking for alliterations and puns in tragedy is not exactly the most sensitive thing to do, but if you choose to do it, choose words that at least make some sense. The commentary is frantic, almost as if it’s a race against time. After-death is anything but that, both literally and metaphorically.

     

    It’s All About Hindi Vindi (December 2012)

    Why Hindi channels use English in their on-air and off-air communication that even Newton would have struggled to answer. Things have got a wee bit better since 2012. But only a wee bit.

     

    This obsession with English extends to channel packaging and taglines. There are two strong stereotypes at play here. One says: In the metros, English is now widely used, and hence, can be the main language of communication. This is classic mother-in-law research (or my-friends-circle research) at play. In cities where slow-paced songs are called ‘silent songs’ and horror movies are routinely referred to as ‘horrible movies’ (by the youth, no less), using English for brand communication of a Hindi channel is pure futility on display.

     

    Why Imam Siddiqui had to ‘lose’ Bigg Boss 6 (January 2013)

    I rarely write about specific programs, but Bigg Boss has been the subject of about four pieces. I enjoyed exploring India’s moral compass in this piece.

     

    Over years, the ambitious Air Hostess (Kitu Gidwani) and the beer-guzzling Tara were replaced by Tulsi, Akshara and Priya. These are strong characters in their own right, but outright positive ones, with no shades of grey at all. During this period, the villains became even more menacing and unidimensional, scheming and plotting all the time. Television, over the last 15 years, has separated the black from the white, the way our cinema did in the 70s and the 80s. This slotting today cuts across all television. Imam Siddiqui is “good to watch”, but that doesn’t make him the positive-type good. He was clearly the villain of Bigg Boss. A villain, who may display his soft side once in a while, but remained a villain nevertheless. Imam Siddiqui was “bad”. Probably 200% bad.

     

    Five Tips For Young TV Executives (May 2013)

    Easily the piece closest to my heart. There’s nothing more satisfying than nurturing talent, and how little nurture is happening in our TV industry always pains me.

     

    Be Curious: There is a world at work, beyond your assigned work, i.e., the show or the client or the campaign you are working on. Seek learning from that world. Talk to people in other departments, ask them questions, find your “intrigues” and then find answers to them. Learning never stops, but there is no real, sustained learning unless the mind is curious. And curiosity can be a deceptively under-rated concept. Make it your big idea.

     

    Are We A Noise-Loving TV Nation? (November 2013)

    I have written a few pieces around Arnab Goswami, but this one used him, Gauhar Khan (Bigg Boss) and Taarak Mehta Ka Ooltah Chashmah as examples to make a larger point about the desirability of ‘noise’ on Indian television.

     

    You would normally not associate positive emotions with the word ‘noise’. It’s generally assumed and accepted that noise is bad. In context of television too, the media has propagated this notion for a while now. But there is very little real evidence to accept this belief. In fact, there is telling evidence to the contrary.

     

    Reality Shows: Trendy No More? (May 2014)

    The decline of reality television (barring Bigg Boss) in the last two years has not been understood well or discussed enough. This was one of the two pieces I’ve written on this subject.

     

    Today, the reality shows genre is facing imminent decline. The audiences who grew up watching these formats would have recently got married or are likely to get married soon. The impact of marriage on TV content preferences can never be overstated. And no young generation likes to inherit what the “oldies” liked. They want to create their own trends, their own hits.