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MUMBAI, April 2

THE `Sehwag ki maa' may be one of the most remembered commercials from the World Cup— and not necessarily for all the right reasons — but Pepsi was the most viewed brand overall.

And, while SET-Max is crowing about unprecedented TVRs, the outbreak of the US-led war in Iraq meant that news channels saw their viewership jump by almost 100 per cent, according to the S-Group of TAM Media Research.

Not surprisingly, Kolkata registered the highest viewership for the World Cup telecasts among the six major metros. The World Cup final got a rating of 39.2 for cable & satellite individuals 4 years+ on Max in Kolkata, while Delhi had the lowest rating of 17.5. On DD1, Kolkata got a rating of 38.2, while Delhi only got a rating of 15.5. Ratings in Kolkata and Mumbai have generally been high, while ratings in Delhi and Chennai have generally been low for the entire duration of the World Cup, said Mr Atul Phadnis, Director, S-Group, Tam Media Research.

But when it came to average viewing time, Delhi, which had the lowest TV viewing time before the World Cup — of about 128 minutes per day — registered a 16 per cent increase during the World Cup. Kolkata registered a 14 per cent increase in average viewing time — from 150 minutes per day to 171 minutes per day. In Chennai, which has the highest average viewing time of the major metros in general, of about 185 minutes per day, the impact of the World Cup was minimal — viewing just shifted to Max.

As for returns to brands, Pepsi was the most visible brand, with 3,082 Gross Ratings Points on the Sony network and DD in the six major metros. Reliance India and BSNL were next; some brands, like Mak, Samsung Plano, and Castrol Activ were only present on Max. As for the mileage that different brands got from the two networks, Reliance ads on the Sony network got greater viewership as compared to BSNL, which was present more on the DD network. "A brand like Pepsi assigned the same importance to c&s and non-c&s audiences, while Reliance assigned greater importance to the c&s audience, and BSNL gave more importance to the non-c&s audiences," Mr Phadnis said. "And the brands that spent more on Max scored more GRPs."

Now, the war in Iraq is keeping audiences riveted to their TV sets — only, this time, they are watching the news channels. All the news channels, and particularly the international ones, have garnered more walk-ins — or, people who have watched the programme for at least one minute — in the first week of the war. Weekly walk-ins of SEC ABC males 15 years and older to BBC World went up from 5.4 million in an average week to 12.5 million during the first week of the war, while on CNN, walk-ins went up from 2.8 million to 7.3 million. Even on CNBC, walk-ins went up from 3.5 to 5.4 million, according to TAM Media Research. Overall, the number of walk-ins to news channels went up from 41.2 million to 46.4 million.

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