Q] Tell us about Zee5’s journey over the last 18 months and notching up 76.4 million monthly active users. Beyond this, what is the immediate target that you have set for yourself?
One thing that worked well for us was our ability to deliver content in almost all Indian languages - both the UI and UX are purposed in over 12 Indian languages, so that people are comfortable. The second was our ability to purpose our platform across various devices as well as ecosystems and operating systems, right from the bottom end of the pyramid to the top end of the 8K, 4K smart TV device ecosystem. We are present in every single device and browser today. We had to do that very effectively by building a lot of platforms, making sure that we purpose video also, in-coded for so many platforms. The last piece was about voice search, since we believe in the power of voice. Also, content exclusivity which comes from the legacy and the treasure of the content IP that Zee has created over the last 27 years really helped us in creating loyalty and affinity towards our characters, shows and the kind of stories that we tell, both on the catch-up TV side, as well as on the original side. Bangla, Tamil, Telugu, Kannada, Malayalam, Marathi and Hindi actually gave us affinity to so many different cohorts and different audience sets. Within that, our ability to offer different genres appeals to millennials, youth and to men and women. The promoters have been extremely supportive and have invested in this business because this is the present and the future of entertainment.
Q] You have a library of content across 12 languages. Can you give us highlights of the original content offering that has content IP sharing deals as well as digital sequels of cult TV content IPs, etc. What are your plans there?
When we started on our journey to create original content, we knew that we needed to do something different. Our philosophy around content was to keep it real, relevant and resonant. We believe that the new digital Indian is somebody who wants to see more real characters. We built a very different pipeline of content, right from the biopic of Bollywood star Sunny Leone, coming from the porn industry, called ‘Karenjeet Kaur’, to the biopic of a gangster in ‘Rangbaaz’, to a mentally disturbed pilot in ‘Final Call’ and what we did with ‘Kaafir’ too was a real story. We did RejectX, a youth show. We have done TV show or TV drama type content too; in fact a couple of steps ahead of TV dramas and we should be able to purpose that forward. That has shown us big results. We also partnered with Alt Balaji and Ekta Kapoor - it’s both co-production as well as an IP sharing and co-marketing deal. The content we ghet from there appeals to newer and different taste clusters, giving us more loyalty on different cohorts and different audiences. We have done some very interesting shows like ‘Cold Lassi’, ‘Mission Over Mars’ and ‘The Verdict’.
Q] What would you single out as the driver shows among your syndicated content offerings?
We have the Sony library which did really well, including the Spiderman IP. The other big library that has worked for us is the Korean library, and some very marquee Korean shows. We had a show called ‘Pablo Escobar’ which was his biopic and has been among our top 10 shows for very long.
Q] The cost of creating content and acquiring talent on OTT platforms these days could go beyond the cost of producing content for TV. What is the kind of investment that is going into Zee5 on the content front?
TV is a controlled environment. Here, it is largely real location and real stories, but for a limited series. It needs to make an impact today, because you are luring audiences to move to Digital, and have to give them something that they haven’t seen. It needs to have cinematic appeal, be of a genre beyond drama, and calls for a different production mindset, expensive locations in shoots. It’s an investment that the industry needs to make at this point in time, to get consumers to sample digital video and pay for it.
Q] OTT players in general are battling challenges such as lack of advertisement and subscription revenues because Indians love free content. Are users willing to pay for content in a market like ours, and what is the uptake for freemium or paid content on Zee5?
OTT advertising is possibly one of the fastest growing ad segments in the country. The OTT platforms don’t lack advertising. Most large advertisers are present on all digital video streaming platforms. We have seen some very good growth rates on advertising. On the subscription side, we are one of the top two or three subscription platforms in the country. If you have good grade content, you can get to a point where your platform will break due to traffic and you will face problems. It happened when we launched Rangbaaz in December, with almost a breakdown on the platform, with another breakdown with a new launch during Holi. Increasingly, we have seen almost double digit and a month-on-month growth on subscription numbers. Though we have taken away most discounts, our numbers have increased.
Q] How do you chart your distribution strategy?
One, we have partnerships with as many manufacturers and OEMs as possible, where we embed or partner apps across platforms like we have done with almost all devices in the ecosystem - Xiaomi, Amazon Fire Stick, Apple TV, Panasonic, OnePlus, etc. Connected devices are going to be the future. On the premium side, we partner large Telecom players such as Vodafone Idea, Airtel broadband, etc., which allows us access into those many homes or those many individuals and users. We also partner with broadband players, ISPs, who do individual distribution for us to bundle it up for data consumption among their users or houses that they supply broadband to. We also do cross-partnerships with those who are in the subscription business. We have partnered with Flipkart on their loyalty programme, with Gaana as a co-brand and several other large digital platforms like MakeMyTrip, etc., who do cross-sales or cross discounts. We also work with platforms like LG and Samsung to make our app backwardly compatible. Now, it’s not only the TV of today, even if you have a TV made in 2015, the app will work on it.
