Times Now On Nautanki.tv; Thoughts On Video Content Online

Times Now, the English news channel from the BCCL (Times of India) Group will be going live on Nautanki.tv’s network, Nautanki CEO Sunil Nair informs us. Nautanki.tv is an online video network, with widgets spread across more than 6000 sites. Available online will be Times Now’s prime time show The Newshour, and feature shows No Full Stops (health) and The Foodie (a food and travel show). Times Now intends to eventually expand its offering on the network. 

Nautanki.tv has a strategic investment from Hungama (Virtual Marketing India Ltd), and claims that around 20% of their publishers are bloggers covering news, analysis, finance etc. Nautanki.tv also has content available from another BCCL TV channel - Zoom TV, as well as STAR TVs Channel [V]. 

Thoughts On Online Video Content In India, and Advertising

(more…)

Alcatel Lucent Files Contextual Advertising Patent For TV Over IPTV

This should be particular interest to Media companies - Telecom major Alcatel-Lucent has filed for a patent in India, for contextual advertising on IPTV networks. Since advertising will be delivered to the screen over the broadband network, it gives them the opportunity of contextualizing ads based on location, personal TV viewing habits etc. The ads will probably be stored on the Personal Video Recorder (PVR) or Set Top Box (STB), and delivered during specific TV spots, based on selection.

Examples of what their service can do
– Delivery of context specific ads on television channels during the “ad insert period”, based on selection of a bunch of advertisements.
– Location based advertising, for specific Distribution Areas, also based on demographic information and/or proximity to advertiser.

The idea is to provide better targeting on Television - provide ads to consumers closer to the advertisers place of business, as well as target neighbourhoods where the psychographics favour the advertisers services - thus allowing an advertiser wants to advertise to and only pay for advertising that reaches subscribers who are likely potential customers.

Challenges: Television spots normally range from 15 seconds to 90 seconds, with 30 seconds being the usual length. One challenge for the service will be to maintain a standard length of an ad break (say 3-5 minutes), and yet ensure that the dynamically placed ads all total up to the same length of the ad break. The bigger challenge, however, is selling the concept to media planners and channels. 

Company: Alcatel Lucent 
Patent Number (International): PCT/US2006/062081
Filing Date (India): 17th June 2008 (Details)
Download: PDF

Northgate Reports Q2 Profit Of Rs. 22.4 Crores; Bharatstudent FY08 Loss At Rs. 3.96 Crores

Northgate Technologies, which owns the social networking site Bharatstudent.com, Online Advertising network Axill, and VoIP and IPTV solutions provider Globe7, has reported a consolidated profit 22.40 crores, up marginally from Rs. 22.43 crores last quarter, and Rs. 20.21 crores for the Q2 last year. Northgate Technologies, by itself, contributed only Rs. 3.6 crores, down from Rs. 6 crores last quarter. Consolidated revenues for the group were up at Rs. 189.37 crores. A majority of the groups business revolves around Online Advertising, and there’s been a “Traffic Acquisition Cost” of Rs. 102.14 crores, down from Rs. 107.05 crores last quarter.

The consolidated results include digital subsidiaries of Northgate - Social Media India Ltd, which runs Bharatstudent.com, Northgate Investments Pte Ltd and its subsidiaries Globe7 Pte Ltd, Globe7 Inc, Axill Europe Ltd and Globe7 HK Ltd.

We also went through their annual results, in particular, seeking more information on the performance of their subsidiary Social Media India Ltd, which runs the social networking site Bharatstudent.com. This are rather bleak there -

For the year ending March 31st 2008, Social Media India reported revenues of Rs. 9.85 crores, and a net loss of Rs. 3.96 crores. All in all, Northgates Online Media Properties’ (OMP) contributed 18% to the total revenue, and were at Rs.100.21 crores, with an EBITDA margin of 13.4% in FY’08, down from 27.3% in FY’07. Northgate launched Ziddu and Egglad in FY08, and saw an increase in marketing and promotion activities.

Q209: Financials,
Q109: Financials, Analysis/Report
FY08: Annual Report

Related:
– Q1-09 Results: Bharatstudent.com Parent Reports Rs. 22.43 Crores Profit; Globe7 - Baidu; VoIP Over WiFi In HK
– Northgate Co Globe7 To Power Casual Games Site For Malaysia’s New Straits Times

Zapak Adds Single Player Mobile Games From Greystripe

A few months ago, we’d written about the launch of Zapaks mobile site - Zapak.mobi, in collaboration with Cotopia. What had suprised us then, was the sheer lack of games - just seven. However, we’d also pointed out then that the games launched were essentially turn-based multiplayer games.

Zapak has now launched single player mobile games in partnership with Greystripe, which has a far more robust catalogue of over 900 advertising supported games. Also worth nothing that the turn-based multiplayer games have been pushed into the background with this move, and the single player games load on the front page. Remember what Jump Games CEO Salil Bhargava had told us - Single Player Casual Games are what sell in the mobile gaming business.

At present, there are essentially two players competing in the Indian market. Both Greystripe and Hovr provide games to users for free, and monetize by displaying advertisements before and after the game. Greystripe had tied up with the ABP group to launch Mjoy4free a year or so ago, but that was eventually was shut down. Hovr has since partnered with Indiatimes and NDTV Convergence to power their mobile games sites.

Difference between Hovr and Greystripe (more…)

Reliance Entertainment To Enter Online Advertising With Kyphy

Update #2: While Reliance Entertainment declined to comment before this post went up, they subsequently told Alootechie that Kyphy is intended to be an ad network, not an ad marketplace. So, yet another publisher is entering the ad-network space.

Update: That Reliance BIG Entertainment is looking to enter the online advertising space is confirmed, but it appears that the agenda for Kyphy isn’t very clear - whether it is intended to be a network or an exchange. We’ll try and get more clarity from Sudipto Majumdar, former CTO of Zapak, who is leading this project.

Original story: Reliance BIG Entertainment is in the process of launching an advertising marketplace called Kyphy. According to their website, Kyphy will “create an automated advertising exchange to enhance the efficiency of both buying and selling inventory.”

There are a large number of advertising networks in India, but this is the first attempt at an online advertising exchange. This is essentially the marketplace model, which connects both advertiser, ad networks and publishers, and appears to be based on a concept similar to that of the Right Media Exchange; Yahoo had acquired Right Media for $680 million in April last year. Right Media takes a commission of around 10 percent cut from the transaction between advertisers and publishers.

Reliance BIG Entertainment has online properties like BIGFlix (Online Movie Streaming), BIGAdda (social networking), Zapak (Casual and Massively Multiplayer Online Gaming), and will probably sell inventory from their properties as well - thus there is a case for a conflict of interest between the exchange business and publishing business. The exchange will have to be transparent and independent of their websites, and indeed, of an ad network if BIG Entertainment were to launch one.

There have been attempts at advertising exchanges on the Internet in the past in India - Dentsu India launched LastMinuteInventory.com earlier this year, to enable TV channels to sell last minute television inventory. There were some concerns though.

I wonder why Yahoo hasn’t launched Right Media in India, though. I’d former Yahoo CEO George Zacharias the same question when Yahoo had acquired a significant stake in ad network Tyroo, but he hadn’t offered a specific answer.

Update: Reliance Entertainment has declined to comment on Kyphy at this point in time.

India Today Digital Launches Site For Cosmopolitan India; What’s Next?

India Today Digital (Digital Today) has launched yet another property online - the Indian site for Cosmopolitan Magazine was recently launched, albeit in beta. The site has a few interactive elements - Blogs, a “confessions” page, as well as a section on fashion and beauty. The site is still new, and there’s very little in terms of content: the Issue page has the most content, for now. Do note that unlike in case of their other India Today magazine properties, they haven’t chosen an e-magazine format for Cosmopolitan. Update: They have Cosmo in an e-magazine format, here.

It’s also interesting to note that they’re pushing SMS based services - tips on Love, Beauty, Health, and News via their short code 52424. Take a look at this image.

What next?
Monetization, I suppose. Over the past year and a half, starting with Money Today, India Today Digital has launched a number of properties online: A horizontal - ITGO , Magazine properties - Business Today, Money Today, Prevention Magazine, Mens Health, Woman, and a TV content related property in Aaj Tak.

What’s interesting is that the portals are either hosted at digitaltoday.in, or itgo.in domains (the latter is their horizontal). India Today could well integrate all its portals into one single host, and sell it combined, not unlike what Web18 appears to be doing with In.com. But the traffic comparison, if you take Alexa, is startling:

Note: we don’t endorse Alexa as being an accurate measure of traffic, but that holds true for Comscore as well.

Bear in mind that India Today appears to have been more prudent with their online marketing spends - we haven’t come across any online advertisements from them - while expenses on account of In.com spends have resulted in a staggering Rs. 24.2 crores loss for Web18.

Disclosure: I own an inconsequential number of shares of Network18

Related:
–Digital Today Launches Aajtak Website In Beta
– Kalli Purie To Head India Today Digital
– Digital Today Launches Two Properties: ITGO And Woman; Aaj Tak, Next Month

PatentWatch: Yahoo Files For Behavioral Targeting Patent In India

In May 2008, Yahoo filed for a behavioural targeting patent in India. According to the filing, the advertisements delivered to a particular user are selected based the users short-term and long-term behaviour, which is determined from information collected on the users online activities and linked to specific interest categories. “A first long-term score, models awareness with respect to a given category. A second long-term score and the short-term score are response-oriented scores that model the user’s interest in making a response with respect to a given category, such as by purchasing a product or service within the category.”

Technology aside, behavioural targeting is used to make advertisements to relevant to users, and this often has an impact on the click-throughs. Greater relevancy is what Google also pitches - both in terms of search results, as well as advertising.

View the patent filing here.