Mumbai: This year the IPL is a different animal altogether, with two different entities Linear TV and Digital fighting it out to garner eyeballs and Ad revenues. It was an overwhelming day for Disney Sports yesterday as the data showed that viewership on Linear TV has increased and there has been a 23% jump in watch time as compared to the last year.
Indiantelevision.com caught up with Sanjog Gupta, Head - Sports, Disney Star on this data published today, the reach of Disney Star, revenues, innovations on Linear TV and much more……..
On the data released yesterday of the opening day of IPL with 606,230 Crore minute watch time. A 23 per cent increase as compared to the previous IPL your thoughts on this
Firstly, it's overwhelming, the love and support that we have received from fans of IPL and fans of Star Sports. To have this kind of a response to IPL clearly shows that there is a compelling proposition for fans to actively watch IPL on the big screen or linear television. Also, one part of it has to do with the growth compared to last year, but I think what is even more heartening, is the fact that these numbers are the highest ever in IPL history. The number you mentioned is 606230 Crore minutes. The second-highest watch time for the first eight days of IPL ever, other than the 2 years of COVID.
The reason why we don't consider those two years of COVID is that one was at home and had nothing to do but sit in front of the TV and watch. But the fact that the watch time in the first eight days is the second highest in IPL history, affirms a lot of confidence in our strategy. It reinstates the power of television as the platform of choice for big marquee sporting events, where viewers and fans aggregate in large numbers.
We’ve had 31 Crore viewers over the first eight days, which is the highest ever, it's now tied with 2019 for the highest-ever number of viewers watching over the first eight days. It reinstates the reach of television, its depth and its width across various demographics, and regions and depth in terms of how deep into tier two and tier three towns TV has penetrated and goes to show that television will continue to be the preferred platform or destination for crores of fans wanting to watch any marquee sporting event. It's a great day for the industry in general, for IPL and the sport as well. At the end of the day, the growth of IPL is great for the sport and it's good for the ecosystem.
On the revenue how it has dropped from last year by 20 per cent
I think it's genuinely too early to estimate what the revenue for IPL is going to be for three big reasons. One, it's a unique IPL, because it is the first year of the new IPL rights cycle and the rights are fragmented in a way that the industry or the market is not used to. The second big reason is the fact that ad spending in general, both in India and around the world and across content genres have been facing significant headwinds, and those headwinds have started dissipating only towards the end of Feb. So far, we've seen a real recovery of ad spends in April and it looks quite strong. IPL started at the end of March and there will be a pickup in AD spends on IPL as well, as both the confusion around platforms and media choices that an advertiser wants to make as the genuine rebound of ad spends happens in late March, and now in April, and perhaps we'll go into May. So, unlike previous IPL the combination of these two factors means that the bookings or the revenue on IPL will not be as front-loaded, as it used to be where all advertisers wanted to spend a disproportionate share of their outlays in the first week itself. This is much better spread out than past editions.
I think the pickup has already started. The data for the opening day and now will help agencies, as well as advertisers to firm up their decisions on outlays as well as platforms. As I was saying the recovery and the pickup in AD spends will also mean that some categories that had chosen to perhaps not advertise on IPL, to begin with, will now start kicking in, as they're seeing recovery and they want to spend more. So, categories such as FMCG, for example, have been increasing their ad spends on media and entertainment in general over the last three weeks or so, and at least a part of it will come into IPL. The typical curve for IPL as I said is front-loaded but will look different this year because there is pickup which is happening after the IPL has started. Typically, you will have a lot of the inventory being sold fairly early for the IPL.
Unlike the earlier years, if you look at six months back, which is November and December, the macro-economic environment, combined with the pressures on ad spends and costs, combined with certain sectors being completely muted. Sectors like EdTech, which relied on VC funding meant that the bookings didn't follow the same pattern. This is a unique IPL in terms of everything that is happening at the same moment in time. I think the final word on this will not be written as early as we are typically used to in IPL.
On the innovations on TV, is it only across DTH platforms?
I think it's important for television itself to redefine itself and evolve. Just because the perception of television is that it's a traditional medium doesn't mean that it should operate like a traditional medium, it should always look to innovate and evolve into something more relevant and with a clearer view of addressing consumer needs. That was a big thrust of our strategy for IPL 2023, which was how do we do TV redefined, was the big clarion call for us.
As part of that, we identified three, or four consumer needs that we felt television needed to meet if it wanted to stay relevant, and one of those was value-added features, which we're seeing in Tata Play. So, the first thing was we had to identify the operators who could be able to deliver a seamless experience of these value-added features and that was largely to begin with Airtel and Tata play. The features range from real-time on-demand stats to highlights available at all times for the part of the match that you may have missed key moments and a playlist feature which allows Star on any given day to customise for the consumer we believe who is going to be watching that day, for example, yesterday CSK was playing Rajasthan Royals, for someone for one reason or the other, tuning in late at some point of the match, the highlight should be available for you to quickly catch up on everything that has happened before or during the live match is going on.
So that is a big thrust of the features we wanted to build on. By the way, yesterday, if you watched the live game, we also had a camera on M S Dhoni. At some point or in a situation where Dhoni wasn't central to it, the camera on him allowed you to watch what he was doing at any given time during the match. It allows us to customize for viewers and what viewers want to watch. That's really at the core of what we're trying to do with TV redefine, on how to personalise and customise the experience to the extent possible on the linear stream. We call it the hero cam. So, on days when Virat, Rohit or Dhoni are playing, we have dedicated a camera at the stadium to these guys and follow them around. Because there's a lot that they do, which is never seen on screen.
The other feature that we've introduced on Select, it's not so relevant for people watching at home, but because we wanted to drive the culture of community viewing, groups watching together in restaurants, pubs, etc. to feel they don't miss out on the full experience we've introduced something called live commentary and subtitle it as an on-demand feature. For example, in a single TV household, a norm in this country maybe someone's sleeping and you don't want to turn up the volume to listen to the commentary, you can turn on the subtitles. Similarly, in a restaurant where the music is loud, the restaurant owner or the restaurant manager can switch on subtitles so that you can follow the game better. The idea is to drive community viewing and how can we enhance the service such that viewers genuinely enjoy watching TV in a way that they're not used to.
On the ‘Shor on, Game on’ campaign
The marketing campaign is very simple. It's all about community viewing. It's saying that the real enjoyment of the sport is in togetherness and experiencing better together. The best way for you to experience sport is on the big screen with people around you experiencing all the ebbs and flows of the game and the emotions that are associated with that.
On Fan Parks and other on-ground initiatives
Yes, those are happening and the additional thing that is happening this time is we're also sending some of our key talents to screenings that we are being invited to. We've opened it up to anyone in any society saying, look, if you're having a watch party in your society, invite us and we may just send one of our commentators to the watch party to be part of it. So, we've sent Yusuf Pathan to societies in Ahmedabad, Mohammad Kaif to societies in Lucknow, Sandeep Patil to societies in Mumbai and Krishnamachari Srikanth to societies in Chennai. What we're trying to do is we're trying to get people to come together and give them incentives to do so.
On breaking many records on the opening day
Opening Day was also a record-breaking day for us, incidentally, we registered the highest ever peak concurrency, which is the number of viewers watching at the same time and recorded at 5.16 crores and which is more than 3x the peak concurrency that digital has had in the first eight days, which was 1.8 crores. So again, it's a big validation of our belief that live marquee sport is the thing that will continue to be preferred on a community viewing platform like the big screen or Linear TV.
On language feeds and the reach
Frankly, speaking, we don't see languages as an independent factor or an independent variable. The way that we approach what we call customized fields is that it must go hand in hand with a 360-degree marketing plan, which helps take the feed to those who are not watching the game earlier. Otherwise, why are we introducing these feeds, the reason is that news feeds are that we should be able to get new viewers to connect with the game through these feeds.
The first thing that we've done is we've identified the regions where we believe there is headroom for growth, which can be activated by presenting a customized feed for that region. What the customise feed entails is not just language commentary, but actually, different visuals as well, including graphics in the local script, including pre-and post-shows customised for that region, and surround programming, which goes beyond the pre- and post-shows as well, which cater to those regions, in the same way as regional entertainment channels. It's not just about the live game, it's about 24 hours of programming, which is what we're doing.
Thus, more than adding languages, we've focused on how we go deeper within certain regions. So, for example, last year, for the first time, we introduced Gujarati. In one year, we are seeing significant growth in Gujarat on the back of the Gujarati feed, but it's not because of the feed it is also because we have tied up with Hardik Pandya to promote the game in a big way and build followership for him as a hero and the leader of Gujarat Titans. We have also made Gujarat a P one market for us as far as our campaign is concerned, where we have disproportionately invested in building audiences for IPL in that region.
It's not just about introducing a new language; we can keep doing languages. But frankly, we'd rather focus on the languages rather than the feeds in certain states, which we believe can help us get new viewers or deepen the engagement of existing viewers with the IPL. We have 10 feeds this time and we've largely focused on Kannada, Telugu and Gujarati as being the three feeds that we want to get behind and grow. We're seeing great returns in Karnataka, Gujarat and Andhra.
On some sectors having dropped out this year, is it affecting your revenues?
EdTech yes, Fintech is not muted as Rupay is one of the advertisers, a lot of startups were depending on the next rounds of funding, which have not come through and are not advertising this year. For a lot of advertisers, IPL is one property that most advertisers don't like to skip because of how big it is. Now, we're also seeing new categories emerge, and some categories double down on IPL. As I said, it's too early for the last word to be spoken on this IPL.
