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'Radio
is one of the most interactive mediums right now' |
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| Published
on 26 March 2008 |
Be
it regulatory, royalty or infrastructure related, the focus of the Association
of Radio Operators of India (AROI) is avowedly on issues directly correlated to
ensuring the success of the nascent radio industry. In a chat with Aparna Joshi,
Radio City CEO Apurva Purohit, president of the AROI national governing
board, shares her views on which way the industry is headed. Excerpts:
How have the
last few years been for the radio sector?
The last two years have been
really good. The radio industry was helped by the sheer fact that geographically,
we could grow from 20 cities to 91 cities, and advertisers finally appreciated
the fact that FM is a national and not just a metro specific phenomenon.
What
kind of advertiser is FM attracting?
One
type is the corporate advertiser who is looking at a pan India presence, and the
local advertiser too, for whom it is still a local product. The industry has grown
at 40 per cent and the year ahead looks even better. Our own estimates match Ficci's
which say that radio will grow at 25 to 30 per cent in the next three years.
But
even after that, it will have a six per cent share of the advertising pie, whereas
internationally, it is eight to ten per cent.
What
have been the learnings for the industry in these two years?
New players
coming in, and expansion in terms of genres to whatever extent possible, have
been good for the industry. Consider Bangalore which is a really evolved radio
market, offering several different options in programming. The city already has
the largest time spent on radio among the metros, and it could well have the highest
reach of FM radio among all cities. That's a lesson for the industry - if you
give multiple choices for the listeners, the market will respond accordingly. Today,
radio reach is 55 per cent, which is very good considering that it is the only
medium that's growing, while television has plateaued. But the impetus given by
government policies would have been far higher had the new players tried different
content. | | |
So, why is there reluctance to experiment among radio players?
I would
not blame new players, because everyone is going for the lowest hanging fruit.
This is why we are aggressively asking the government to allow multiple frequencies
in a city and allow consolidation and tradability, so that existing players can
start alternative genres on subsequent stations. The reach will go up. The same
goes for the permission to air news and current affairs on FM. So, the faster
policy makers open up, the better it will be for industry. Has
the AROI been able to achieve its targets?
The success of the AROI has
been that it got the industry together and drafted the consultation paper in coordination
with TRAI, which has been able to release the paper in a short span of one and
half months. Our sub committees are handling each issue separately, particularly
the music committee which has been working very aggressively to come up with an
optimum solution on the music royalty issue which is one of the major concerns
for us. We
strongly believe that it is because of radio that the music industry has been
able to expand its reach, and radio has been music's biggest promotion mechanisms,
since Bollywood uses radio to market itself. Internationally,
too it's been proven that there can be excellent synergies between radio and music
companies. It's just a question of meeting on an equitable ground. What
about the problems faced by operators in places where shared infrastructure was
delayed?
It's mostly done, with just 10 cities left. But the huge delay
cost a lot of money for many players. India is the only country probably where
radio is growing at a time when TV and print have already matured, and new media
have come in. While radio is also perceived as a traditional medium, there are
also new media users who are realising that with radio, there is a good 360 degree
synergy. Research also shows that internet use and radio go well together, as
well as ground events which can gel beautifully with use of the Net and radio
to promote them. It is one of the most interactive mediums right now. Will
the mobile phone be one of the key drivers of FM listenership in the country?
It already is. We have data to show that people are willing to pay upto Rs
6500 extra to upgrade to a FM enabled phone. RAM figures also indicate that 60
to 70 per cent of the total listenership is happening on mobile phones. How
is RAM (TAM Media Research's Radio Audience Measurement) shaping up?
It's
still early days, but it has given a certain science to the entire media planning
process. It's a long term investment. It will definitely give more confidence
to planners to invest more money, but now the challenge for RAM is to go into
more cities. Even three cities are good to start off with, though.
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