Media brand owners accepted that too much emphasis was being laid in marketing brands through advertising and promotions. The need was to ensure a good product, which would then lead to a great brand
What happens when media stalwarts such as Bhaskar Das, executive president, The Times of India Group, Shekhar Kapur, filmmaker, Santosh Desai, managing director and CEO, Future Brands, Monica Tata, vice-president, advertising sales and networks, India and South Asia, Turner International, and Paritosh Joshi, president, advertising, sales and distribution, STAR India, come together to discuss the task of building a media brand? Fireworks!
Anuradha Sengupta of CNBC-TV18, who was moderating the session, skilfully controlled the temperature in the hall as each of the noted panelists made point after point about the fate of media brands in India and what the future has in store. Emphasising how crucial brand building was, Sengupta said that at CNBC, every reporter and camera person is told incessantly that not only do they represent the company, they are also brand custodians.
Joshi of STAR India predicted a few trends in brand building, keeping in mind the gradual shift to the digital world. “Branding will become three-tiered,” he said. First, there will be network branding to achieve source credibility, followed by channel branding to benefit proposition, and then show branding to generate entertainment quotient.
In order to get a clear perspective on how to brand, he said one has to take note of the segmentation that the television market is currently experiencing. According to him, segmentation among Hindi GECs (general entertainment channels) will happen in the next 12 months. It will take an additional year for regional GECs, but it is bound to happen, he said.
In the past, whenever a GEC has tried to create distinctive positioning for itself, be it Sab TV or STAR One, the rate of success hasn’t been overwhelming. What Joshi was probably saying was that those were the early days and the market was still premature. Now, it would seem that the market has evolved and such changes might happen.
Das of the Times Group believed that the word ‘brand’ is used very loosely in the industry, often without understanding its relevance. “Consistent delivery of trust across media platforms where the brand builder and consumer co-create content” is how he defined the process of branding.
He harped on fast-changing media consumption patterns, saying that prime time is now ‘my time’ for the viewer, as choices expand. According to him, a brand has to take the ‘surround sound’ and ‘multi-sensory’ approaches. He cited examples such as ‘The Da Vinci Code’, which stands for curiosity, Oprah, who stands for friend, philosopher and guide, and ‘American Idol’, synonymous with instant fame.
Monica Tata of Turner, another panellist, used a common sense approach to building brands. A brand is one that can strike an emotional connect with consumers. This friendship can be achieved by creating a distinct identity and a pan-media approach to branding and building a bond with the audience, she said.
Desai of the Future Group offered a completely different view. He said that the whole idea of marketing media brands was scary. “The key to building a powerful media brand is having a point of view,” he asserted. Advertising, promotions and the implementation of multi-media were just the ‘mechanics of marketing’.
He said that ‘Aaj Tak’ was a powerful brand because it understands news and exemplifies immediacy and urgency. “Brands don’t become powerful through ads,” he stated. All media brands must engage in a conversation and have a unique take on the world, instead of getting into the mumbo-jumbo of marketing, he added.
Filmmaker Shekhar Kapur set the audience and the panellists thinking with his perspective on branding. “I run away from branding,” he confessed. According to him, getting branded was his biggest fear. About media brands, he believed that it is a habit that creates a brand. “Every morning, people are habituated to reading the newspaper, so that is the brand,” he said, “but is ‘The Times of India’ a brand?” In his opinion, one can’t build a brand by being entrusted with the task of building a brand. It is a gradual process that shouldn’t be tampered with, he said.
Everybody on the dais was convinced that without good content in place, no amount of marketing or mechanical brand building would be of any help. Striking the right connect with the consumer and relaying it across multi-media platforms was the right formula to build and nurture a media brand in the long haul.
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