Reliance Broadcast Network Ltd, a media and entertainment company, has built a strong radio network with its 92.7 Big FM radio reaching out to nearly four crore listeners every week in 45 cities.

Its television channels Big Magic (comedy), Big Magic Ganga (regional channel of Bihar and Jharkhand), Big Magic International (for India diaspora in North America) and BIG Thrill (action entertainment) have given it a large customer base across India.

With the rapid proliferation of social media, Reliance Broadcast is creating content that can be integrated across all platforms – radio, television and social media. And advertisers are happy with this move as they get consumers across different platforms for the same content they participate in, Ashwin Padmanabhan, Chief Operating Officer, Reliance Broadcast, told BusinessLine in an interview. Excerpts:

With social media getting big, how are you integrating content with radio and TV?

Today, content cannot be created for just one medium but for multiple mediums – radio, television and the Internet.

Linking them all is critical. For instance, lot of our television testing is done on social media to get feedback before we go live with the show.

While we connect with the audience, we also listen to them.

Could you give an example?

Gaurav Ghera of Shopkeeper Chutki was a sensation in YouTube.

We signed him up and brought him on to the television. He became more popular.

The one-minute capsule is now on our radio and television channels. Consumers are able to reach multiple platforms on the same programme.

Advertisers who come to that content get multiple consumers across all platforms.

That’s why more advertisers are working with us to create cross-platform content.

This means you command a premium in ad rates?

Yes, in the last one year, our advertisement rate has gone up by 40 per cent across all mediums. The fact is that when the product is doing well, there is a demand.

Even at this 40 per cent increase, today, we have demand for 40 minutes of inventory in an hour in radio.

We do about 20 minutes of advertising every hour. Our demand is 40 minutes.

This means, we let go 20 minutes of advertising every hour.

In other words, the demand is double of what we can fulfil. There is a lot more elasticity in pricing.

The tariff across 45 station network ranges between ₹12,000 and ₹14,000 per ten seconds.

At any point of time, we service 1,200 advertisers every month.

Why did you let go half the ads? What are your options?

We are trying to convert them as sponsors like the Big Golden Voice that we do across verticals.

It’s a singing talent hunt with Shankar Mahadevan as the mentor and Benadryl as the key sponsor.

It has become a case study in Johnson & Johnson. That sponsor is worth ₹4-5 crore.

What’s your revenue stream?

Radio channels are free to air and don’t have subscription revenue but only advertising revenue.

It is the only category in the media that has to buy licences from the government through bidding, similar to telecom. One can apply for a licence for a TV channel and get it immediately. We have a revenue share of 4 per cent for every station with the government.

As an industry body, we are asking the government to make this medium more open. We still can’t do news.

In Phase III, they are allowing us to take news but from All India Radio and play it back.

The sector needs a lot more freedom the way other sectors in the media have.

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