MUMBAI: The BBC has for the first time, kicked off a two city promotional campaign to expand its listenership base among FM listeners. As part of the campaign, BBC will promote its popular shows BBC Ek Mulaqat', BBC �Take One' and �BBC EK Minute' in Mumbai and Gwalior.
South Asia BBC Global News Marcomms head Vaishali Sharma says, It is been some time now that the BBC has been providing content and secondly, radio audience base is expanding and within the last year, there has been tremendous growth in this sector. With FM listenership increasing, we thought it essential to go out and make ourselves visible....
Referring to the target audience, she points out, FM is essentially for the younger generation with only the popular chartbusters being played. But with this campaign, we wish to target even the professionals and others and broaden our listenership....
Among the radio stations, Radio One in Mumbai and Radio Chaska in Gwalior will air the commercials. On the print side, there will be one generic ad and three individual ads on some of the leading dailies like Mumbai based Maharashtra Times, Mid-Day and Mumbai Mirror and Dainik Bhaskar in Gwalior. The radio campaign comprises a generic spot on BBC content in the FM space and three distinct spots each talking about BBC's three shows, BBC Ek Minute, BBC Ek Mulaqat and BBC Take One.
OgilvyOne, the creative agency for this campaign has designed the radio and print ads. Talking about the campaign, OgilvyOne business director Harshad Hardikar says, BBC is a recognised brand for its content and the challenge was to showcase the same credibility in the FM space....
Adds Hardikar, We are not completely looking at targeting the youth through our campaign although FM is directly focused on youth. We are targeting working professionals as the out of house listenership is also picking up as well as housewives....
Quizzed if the BBC presenters would be a part of the campaign, Sharma states, The ads will also use the names of the presenters like BBC EK Mulaqat with Sanjeev Srivastav and BBC Take One with Puja Tewary, who are the USPs of the brand....
The main idea was to acquire a whole segment of listeners who are not aware of the BBC capsules on air. Print and radio would be our primary advertising mediums apart from the on ground promotional activities,... says Sharma.
BBC tailors infotainment content to radio stations across 13 cities in India. Apart from its FM partner, Radio One in Delhi, Mumbai, Bangalore, Ahmedabad, Chennai, BBC slots are can also be heart on Gwalior based Radio Chaska, Radio Choklate in Bhubaneswar and Rourkela, Radio Tadka in Jaipur and Udaipur, Radio Tomato in Kolhapur and Radio Misty based in North Bengal and Sikkim.
Although BBC provides content to stations across different categories and regions, the ads remain the same across all stations. Sharma explains, The creative idea of the ads is universal in nature and will be the same across all the stations be it the Metros or small towns. The ads will only don the regional flavour with changes in language like Marathi in Kolhapur, Hindi in Gwalior etc....
Apart from the radio and print campaigns, BBC is also going to conduct on ground activities in Mumbai and Gwalior. We have an extensive ground activities planned for one month with activations planned for every weekend at malls and public areas in Andheri, Goregoan, Mulund and south Mumbai. Activities on similar lines have been planned in Gwalior market as well....
The campaign is now planned only for two cities but it will further spread across all the remaining cities in the next couple of months including other mediums apart from sticking to only radio and print,... states Sharma.