MxMIndia

Tag: Zee Group

  • Three channel bouquet of BIG CBS now available to viewers of Dish TV

    BIG CBS Spark now on Dish TV

    By A Correspondent

     

    Close on heels of closing distribution deals for BIG CBS Prime and Love, the BIG CBS Network, a JV between Reliance Broadcast Network and CBS Studios International has inked the distribution deal for the third channel BIG CBS Spark on Asia’s largest DTH provider – Dish TV.

     

    Positioned as the ultimate music destination, BIG CBS Spark offers the huge 12.5 million subscriber base of Dish TV access to the best music mix from the international and Indian market spread across genres.

     

    BIG CBS Spark, targeted at the youth audiences and catering to their entertainment requirements, is loaded with music and peppered with hit shows like the Cheaters, Maximum Exposure, Smash Cuts, Oblivious and Real TV.

     

    This deal takes the total reach of the BIG CBS Channels to a strong 42.5 million households, making sure it reaches its international English entertainment content to its relevant target audiences in India.

     

    With excellent synergies coming into play, the deal helps both businesses benefit with the digitization reform which is in the anvil.

     

    Speaking on the development, Salil Kapoor, Chief Operating Officer, Dish TV, said: “Dish TV, being the pioneer and market leader in DTH industry, has now the bouquet of Big CBS channels for all its valuable customers. We are proud to extend our partnership to the entire BIG CBS Bouquet – BIG CBS Prime, Spark and Love to our 12.5 million subscribers; Dish TV endeavors to bring entertainment at par best in terms of quality content, we hope that our alliance will mutually benefit each other.”

     

    Speaking on the alliance, Vishal Rally, Business Head, BIG CBS Networks said: “We are happy to have the BIG CBS Channel Network on Dish TV. This is part of our continued endeavour to reach the world-class content from India’s No. 1 English Entertainment Network – BIG CBS’s stable to audiences seeking English entertainment in India.”

     

    This alliance complements Reliance Broadcast Networks’ recent campaign called ‘Choose Your Set-Top-Box Wisely’, designed to increase awareness and empower consumers with adequate information to make the right choice while choosing their set top boxes, while parallely enabling operators to build their brand equity. Reliance Broadcast Network has a robust well crafted 7 channel and is ready to maximize from the digital wave.

     

    An equal joint venture between Reliance Broadcast Network Limited and CBS Studios International, BIG CBS Networks has changed the way English language television entertainment is served to Indian audiences. The JV, at start, launched 3 English language  Entertainment Channels marking not just RBNL’s, but the Reliance Group’s entry into the television broadcasting space and CBS Corporation’s channel  entry into India. The themed channels targeted at India’s fast-growing, upwardly mobile population are branded BIG CBS PRIME, a premium general entertainment channel, BIG CBS SPARK, India’s first international youth entertainment channel and BIG CBS LOVE, India’s first ever international entertainment channel for the contemporary Indian couple.

     

    Dish TV is Asia’s largest direct-to-home company and part of the biggest media conglomerate – Zee Group. Dish TV has on its platform 330+ channels and services including 21 audio channels with 12.5 million subscribers, which is growing. The company has a vast distribution network of about 1400 distributors and 55,000 dealers that spans around 6600 towns across the country.

     

  • It has a radical call-in concept for Dance India Dance, interactive features on its WAP side, and an unshakeable determination to milk social media for all it's worth. MxMIndia speaks to Marketing Head Akash Chawla about the Zee Group's galactic trajectory.

    Digital is the way forward for Zee

    By Rishi Vora

     

    The future is definitely Digital, and Zee Group has its sights set firmly on it. In addition to its recent launch of Ditto TV, the broadcast major has been fairly active in the digital space to promote properties such as Dance India Dance 3 (DID) and Punar Vivah.

     

    The channel has also taken a new and different step to enhance consumer interaction. It has introduced ‘free voting’ for contestants (where the viewer is asked to give a ‘missed call’ to his favourite contestant) as against the industry norm of pay-per-message.

     

    To further intensify its focus on Digital, Zee has now unveiled a WAP site and a mobile application that connect with DID fans on the go.

     

    The WAP site has interactive features which enable fans to interact with the contestants and judges and allows them to vote by a click of a button apart from a few other interactive features.

     

    MxM India spoke to Marketing Head Akash Chawla about these and other digital initiatives.

     

    Q: This whole focus on Digital… is this something that will take Zee a step ahead of competition?

    That is what we expect to do. We hope to be ahead of the competition with regard to this particular thing. From our perspective we’re not looking at how competition is doing on this front, because our entire objective is to be very close to the consumer. There are times when we do it by being on the ground and there are times when we do it by actually going to their homes. In the age of interactivity it is apt that we use digital media to the best. And that is exactly what we’re looking to do.

     

    Q: Does this take away anything from the way you use traditional media?

    The one mantra which we’re going after is driving conversations with the customers. So, even when we’re using the traditional media – a print ad for example – the attempt is to make it more interactive. Any my belief is that you can also use traditional media to drive a lot of audience on your social network.

    I’m not saying that traditional media is something we won’t do, but our attempt will be to drive more conversations through our communication.

     

    Q: You’ve been fairly active on social media and that seems to be a big thrust going forward as well. But there is a saying that social media is a double-edge sword and that it could well turn out to be harmful to a brand like yours.

    It is too soon to say that. In the case of iconic brands or sectors such as automobiles you can see a sizeable community. In the GEC space we’re just beginning to do that. So our first objective is to build a sizeable community. Once you get a sizeable community then how to use that is the second objective. Traditional media will irrespectively be required as social media in India is growing.

     

    Q: This missed-call concept which you’ve introduced for DID is something very different altogether. How did you come up with a concept like that?

    At Zee, we’ve been doing talent hunts such as Sa Re Ga Ma and DID. When we started this interactivity thing in 2005 with Sa Re Ga Ma Pa Challenge, we used to get a lot of votes. If we sit down and draw a trend, votes have actually gone down over a period of five to seven years. Most of the formats today are interactive in terms of asking for votes. Second, the credibility aspect. Consumers have come up to us and said that it is just a revenue making mechanism because the SMSes are charged higher than the normal SMSes. Frankly, as a broadcaster, for us, at this particular time, it is more about building the brand salience than the small amount of revenue that’ gets generated through votes.

     

    Q: That revenue – is it that small enough to be left out?

    It’s a tradeoff. Tomorrow we may not be able to do it for all our reality shows, but at the end of the day if it is about a brand like DID – from the consumer’s perspective, credibility is of primary essence. And whatever brings us that credibility is something we would want to go in for.

     

    Q: Is this a beginning of a new trend in broadcast?

    You cannot do this for everything. It is not a model that can be followed by all brands. There are certain attributes of DID in terms of how many people were connecting with it, in terms of it being a brand which is already known and the kind of credibility it has at this juncture…

     

    So I don’t think it’s a concept that’ll fit all brands. How many more people will start following us on that? We don’t know. But we did try this again for another show, Punar Vivah. We decided to apply that to the show because as a concept it applies to a segment where we could afford to be more interactive and it gave us phenomenal results.

     

    Q: Does a show like Punar Vivah attract a lot of traction on social media?

    Actually if you go to our Facebook fanpage, Punar Vivah is one of the topics that is heavily discussed. You’re right that you cannot do things on social media blindly. And I’m worried about that. If something is successful people will start using it as a formula. The aspect we’re following for Punar Vivah is very different. We’re doing Punar Vivah symposiums across 18 cities of India, where every week we have a couple of symposiums which includes a psychotherapist, a marriage counsellor and one reputed NGO of that particular city or state. We also have people on the panel who have gone through the remarriage process, our viewers and media.

     

    Our attempt is to bring this so-called taboo topic out of the closet. You may do with social media with a particular level. But, we feel for Punar Vivah that is the one that is actually more relevant than just social media. So yes, you’re right. Social media has to be used keeping the segment that you’re chasing in mind.

     

    Q: You’re at No 3. Neck-and-neck with your nearest competitor. Where next?

    No 1 next. It was a matter of 1 GRP with Sony last week.

     

    How long for No 1?

    (Smiles) I told you three months ago that we will be No 2 in three months. We’ve become No 2 in three months.

     

  • Girish Agarwal, Director, Dainik Bhaskar Group spoke to MxM about the readership wars and the perceived threat of Internet

    We are a silent partner in DNA: Girish Agarwal (on Video)

    The Dainik Bhaskar Group has been making rapid strides in publishing and its expansion into hitherto uncharted territories like Maharashtra have led to questions on where the group will head next. Girish Agarwal, director of the group, spoke to MxMIndia’s Shruti Pushkarna in an exclusive interview on the sidelines of Ficci-Frames 2012.

     

    Dainik Bhaskar was among the first to innovate in order to get more readership. What are the new frontiers… where are you headed next?

    We operate already in some 14 states in India. We have recently launched a Marathi newspaper, so we have some time to spend in Maharashtra as well as Jharkhand. At the same time, the states which we are already present in, like Rajasthan, Gujarat and Punjab, we need to work a lot there also to grow, because those states have a huge potential for us to grow. A large part of the growth we’ve been seeing in last 10 years, is coming from our existing states, so we need to work hard there.

     

    [youtube width=”400″ height=”250″]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UN43L63SCoU[/youtube]

    Technology and internet hasn’t really taken off as well as it was expected to have taken off. What are your views on the same?

    Internet penetration in India is roughly around 7 to 8 per cent, so with this kind of penetration, I don’t think we need to fear anything that they would take away from us. But at the same time we need to prepare for the future. For example, our website in Hindi today is the largest website in Hindi news as well as the Gujarati one, so we are preparing ourselves for the future. But at the moment, is the business shifting from the print platform to the internet? No.

     

    How do the readership wars affect newspapers?

    I think it is pretty good because anything that’s good for the market is good for the organization too. For the readership war, you actually go out and try to take more readers, for that you need to ensure that you are still relevant to the reader, because if you are not relevant, the reader won’t buy you at all.

     

    There is talk about Dainik Bhaskar opting out of DNA, how true is that?

    Yes, it is true that DNA is currently managed by our partner, Zee Group, which has the majority in DNA. We are a silent partner.