The Hindu Business Line : Merry-go-ground

More and more television channels have started conducting on-ground events to connect with target viewers. The reasons: The medium is direct, localised, provides one-to-one interaction and, most importantly, effective.

WHEN National Geographic Channel India (NGCI) called for entries for Mission Everest, a joint expedition with the Indian Army to the Mount Everest, it received 30,000 applications. Channel [V] launched Popstars — its nationwide search for a girl band — and hundreds of young women besieged every venue. When SET-Max took Kapil Dev on a multi-city "gully cricket" tour, crowds of 3,000-8,000 gathered on streets, balconies and roof-tops. AXN's Who Dares Wins' India edition cancelled a part of its Chennai leg because they could not control the crowd. And Cartoon Network's Toon Cricket 2003 in Mumbai drew 50,000 little fans.

The numbers are the sort that marketers and advertisers dream of, and the environment — where a captive consumer interacts with the channel — can set the pulse of the most stoic planner racing. So, as more TV channels clutter the cable and satellite space, more of them are leaning toward on-ground events — from award shows to roadshows to guest speakers — as a way to connect with viewers, and deliver value to advertisers and, even key distributors.

Of course, the big-budget advertising campaigns continue: Last year, TV channels spent more than Rs 100 crore on print ads alone, according to TAM Media Research. But, there is a growing realisation that a presence in your living room is not enough, and that while print ads and on-air promos communicate the basic brand message and draw attention to specific programming, events are far more effective to build a lasting connection.

"It's as important for a TV channel to do on-ground as it is for any brand in any category — especially where there are so many brands competing for the same share of mind and eyeballs," says Ravi Kiran, Managing Director — West & South, Starcom. "Brands have to touch lives, build bonds, and thereby build equity; a TV channel is no different from any other brand, and an event is a terrific opportunity for a channel to create excitement and come alive before its audience."

That seems to be the objective of National Geographic: Its Adventure 1 events drew crowds of 50,000-1,00,000, and Mission Everest, with a budget of Rs 11 crore, is its most ambitious India initiative, according to Zubin Gandevia, Managing Director, NGCI. The nine-episode series — which will track the journey of five participants from their selection to their training to their destination at Base Camp — will see a 40 per cent growth in ad revenues and in viewership, and further establish the association with `adventure', he expects. "This genre (infotainment) gets less than one per cent of total cable and satellite viewing, so besides integrating more local content, our plan is to make the channel experiential, interactive and involving," he says. "We have involved people in more subliminal ways in the last two years or so, and try and incorporate a touch-and-feel element as much as we can."

There is not much by way of physical exertion at CNBC India's events, which include the quarterly Managing India Brainstorm (MIB), the CNBC Mutual Funds Awards, the CNBC Autocar Awards, the annual Industry Vector and the occasional Storyboard events. MIB is the extension of the on-air property and was launched in March 2000; Storyboard, a programme for the advertising and marketing community, has hosted Jack Trout and ad expert Prof John Philip Jones in a series of events. This year's Budget coverage also saw several ground activities. "Ground events are extremely effective for the channel, and are a natural, logical extension of what we do," says B. Sai Kumar, Head — Business Development & Alliances, CNBC India. "We need to deliver our product, but it is our responsibility to also need to reach out to the various segments of our audience."

Events also bring in "fairly significant revenue leaps" for the channel, and this "incremental revenue" is important, as commercial airtime is finite, Sai Kumar points out; in the last two years, the number of advertisers has gone up from 28 to 92. However, the promise of money and a chance to shake hands with viewers are not reasons enough to do an event; any event must be relevant to the channel, and not all on-air programmes lend themselves to ground extensions, Sai Kumar cautions. "An event is not just something you do outdoors or in a hotel ballroom — you will lose the edge if it doesn't have the right context or relevance to your core product," he says. "A cricket match would bring us a lot of money, but it wouldn't be right for our brand."

Also, the logistics can be complex: Outdoor events require permits, security and crowd control, and even indoor events require months of planning, and most channels hire professional event management companies. It is also easy to lose sight of goals, so networks must be very clear about the basic brand connect, the objectives and the kind of experience they want consumers to have, emphasises Starcom's Kiran. "Also, if people had to do something that would qualify them for the event, it would be more effective," he suggests.

That is the modus operandi at Channel [V]: Popstars, its biggest ground effort, involves screening of thousands of aspirants, and even Club [V] and [V] Live require passes. The channel has done about 40 [V] Live (concert) events over four years; each event attracts 8,000-10,000 youngsters who can interact with the VJs and sample [V] merchandise, according to Keertan Adyanthaya, Vice-President — Content & Communication, Channel [V]. Besides one-off events like Freedom Express on August 15 last year, and a series of contests tied to bands or movies, the channel also has taken two on-air properties, Crush and Panga, on-ground. "These programmes are designed so that there is interactivity and involvement, which are essential to music TV programming," Adyanthaya says. "Our audience is really the youth, so instead of using mass media, we focus on what they like to do, and while we don't see an immediate response, we've built trust with our viewers. It's about being a part of their lives."

Events make up about 40 per cent of [V]'s marketing and advertising efforts, and the channel recently launched Popstars 2, a nationwide search for a mixed band, which will also be on air from April to August. Coke is the presenting sponsor this time too, as the event provides "a fabulous platform" to connect with the youth and associate with the property's aspirational qualities, says Avinash Pant, Marketing Manager — Brands & Media, Coca-Cola India.

Cartoon Network is another example of a channel that has built ground properties focused on its target audience, kids; these include Toon Yatra, School is Cool, Save Dexter's Brain and the recently launched Toon Cricket, the channel's biggest marketing initiative this year. More than 50,000 kids attended the two Toon Cricket matches in Mumbai; earlier events have also seen participation of tens of thousands. "For us, events are about extending the magic of cartoons beyond the confines of the TV set — it's a platform that offers fantastic active and non-passive interaction opportunities to involve fans in another way," says Ian Diamond, Senior Vice-President & General Manager, Turner Entertainment Networks Asia. "(And) our localisation strategy includes increasing interaction between our viewers and the Network's cartoon stars."

At one level, the events help increase current viewer involvement by enabling them to participate across multiple platforms — on-air, online and on-ground. At a second level, the Network is able to raise the visibility of its characters and popularise them among non-viewers by enabling them to sample the Cartoon Network experience, and hopefully convert them into viewers, Diamond adds. The events also help develop Cartoon Network as a "lifestyle brand" by integrating the channel into different activities of consumers, he says; all events are backed by on-air, on-line and on-ground promo efforts, he adds.

The integrated approach to events — combining online, offline (print) and on-air elements to promote on-ground — works very well for ESPN STAR Sports, too, whose ground properties include the School Quiz, the Corporate Cricket Challenger Trophy, pub screenings of Formula 1, the Corporate Quiz and Play Zones, and the recently launched Premier League Junior and the Golf Basics clinic. Nearly 2,000 schools from 41 cities — from Udipi to Ketti to Palampur — participate in the School Quiz, and ESPN plans to increase its focus on activities around school children. Cricket Sabha, launched around the World Cup with roadshows in seven cities, was one of its largest one-off ground activities. "Our objective is to provide wholesome sports entertainment, and we do this via our four Os approach: on-air, off-air (print), on-ground and online elements," says Manu Sawhney, Managing Director, ESPN Software India. "On-ground activities are direct, localised, offering a one-on-one interaction with the target audience ... a captive audience that is more receptive of the messages and the communication."

And then there is SET-Max, which used ground events to increase visibility for the channel, and build an association with cricket and movies. After Max acquired the ICC property last year, with Kapil Dev as brand ambassador, it launched "gully cricket", a travelling roadshow that leveraged Kapil's massive appeal to build equity for the Max brand and for its cricket property. Starting last July, gully cricket was taken to about 15 towns before the start of the ICC Champions Trophy. The channel also used branded vans in small towns to carry the message that Max is for movies. Prior to the ICC World Cup, to which Max had telecast rights, the channel did a "signature" campaign using vans in small towns. "On-ground contributes to the overall positioning of the channel and keeps the brand alive," says Rajat Jain, Executive Vice- President — Max. "Certainly, one gully cricket cannot meet all our brand objectives, but it works as part of the entire marketing mix." Gully cricket was a runaway success, delivering enormous salience and recall for the brand; it worked particularly well because mass media is not as effective in small towns, he adds. So get out of the living room, and into their lives.

Effectiveness measurable

WHILE TV audience measurement systems can now provide minute-by-minute numbers on viewership, most channels use ad hoc methods — like attendance and casual feedback from the trade — to measure the effectiveness of ground events.

But a channel can quite easily determine how successful it has been in achieving its objectives, says Starcom's Kiran. If the objective is to raise the level of awareness of the channel, or a specific programme, one needs to simply measure the level of awareness of the brand in the market before and after the event, among people who experienced the event, he says.

If the objective is to build certain attributes, one can check what qualities people associate with the brand before and after the event; for example, if people associate National Geographic with `adventure' rather than `wildlife' after Mission Everest, its mission would be accomplished. "It is not difficult to measure effectiveness — but most are quite comfortable just doing the event," Kiran says. "But this is true of most marketing activities."

There is also the matter of cost: While no one will reveal how much events cost, everyone claims they are cheaper than a mass media campaign.

However, while the absolute cost is lower, it is not lower when you consider cost per thousand, which is the correct measure to use, Kiran says. "Anything will then become more expensive than a TV spot, where you can, in one shot, reach millions across the country," he says. "But, while an event delivers a smaller audience, it delivers to a group that is more relevant, and it has a greater impact as it is in a relatively less cluttered environment, and delivers more than just a brand message."

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