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Interview: Ritu Kapur, Programming Head, History TV18, A+E Networks | TV18

History TV18 has carved a niche for itself with its edgy and differentiated programming mix featuring shows with greater emphasis on creating fact-based entertainment, thrill and action formats that appeal to a much wider audience

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Interview: Ritu Kapur, Programming Head, History TV18, A+E Networks | TV18

Interview: Ritu Kapur, Programming Head, History TV18, A+E Networks | TV18

“History TV18 has carved a niche for itself with its edgy and differentiated programming mix featuring shows with greater emphasis on creating fact-based entertainment, thrill and action formats that appeal to a much wider audience

October 18, 2012

publive-image Ritu Kapur

It's been a year of History – a year of differentiated content and of expanding the factual entertainment genre since the launch of History TV18 in October last year. The youngest factual entertainment channel witnessed success from the first week of its launch and kept itself on track as it completes a year this month. BestMediaInfo.com spoke to Ritu Kapur, Programming Head, A+E Networks | TV18 on the journey and the road ahead for the channel. Excerpts:

As you celebrate one year of History TV18, what would you say are the main achievements of the channel?

The last one year has been quite fascinating, we witnessed accomplishments and have had a healthy disrespect for established rules of the game and have challenged the same. Immediately after the launch, History TV18 accelerated growth for the entire genre from 2 per cent and 15 per cent in 2010 and 2011 to a whopping 29 per cent post launch. The channel now reaches over 72 million viewers and is available in over 55 million households across the country while reaching a million fans on Facebook.

We are consistently No. 1 in time spent per viewer. History TV18 delivers the highest time spent per viewer at 26 minutes against Discovery's 25 minutes and NGC's 19 minutes.

 

The Greatest Indian, our first local production in India, generated enormous buzz over a three-month period with over 20 million votes coming through missed calls and online. The campaign also sustained a healthy engagement on social media platforms reaching over 20 lakh Facebook users through viral content. A large number of interesting comparisons and discussions followed on Twitter with hashtags related to the initiative trending consistently and reaching over 2 lakh users daily.

What have been the main differentiating factors in the content of History TV18?

The channel has carved a niche for itself with its edgy and differentiated programming mix featuring shows with greater emphasis on creating fact-based entertainment, thrill and action formats that appeal to a much wider audience. The other sub-genres that have worked for us have been information and technology, topical and tactical programming like '60 Hours', '102 Minutes that Changed America', etc. Apart from this, India-centric content has found reasonable traction.

Being present in different languages was one of our key differentiators which helped us grow the entire genre. It has been one of our greatest strengths.

Do you still see any gap or shortcomings in terms of programming?

What we would really like to have, whether acquired or produced locally, is a series that has a capability to sustain viewer interest on a long-term basis. This will also help us allow to strip the same (run it every day at the same time), thereby building viewer traction for a particular time band. We are focused on this and are sure that we will be able to crack something in the near future.

The channel's content is almost entirely foreign. Going forward, are we going to see more Indian/local programming?

There are strong research-backed insights on why factual entertainment channels depend on foreign content if we may call it so. Audiences are used to and expect a certain kind of programming from themes to visual appeal to production quality and values in these channels. That's precisely the reason why they come here. And global productions, given their budgets, production values and thematic ideas, allow for the same.

Having said that, History TV18 has already begun local production initiatives starting with 'The Greatest Indian'. Going forward, we will engage in more such initiatives so far as we are able to mount them in a way the audience would like to watch them. We also have a lot of India based content in the mix; in fact, 'India Unlimited' is a special stunt that we will start this Diwali.

The channel claims to have expanded the factual entertainment genre since its launch. But NGC and Discovery also fall in the same category. So what is History TV18's USP vis-à-vis them?

Besides what I have already said before, History TV18 also has a very distinct look and feel, which is as refreshing as it is innovative. Also, we have considerable breadth of content cutting across genres of factual entertainment, be it adventure, wildlife, contemporary history, action, survival, food, travel, which is unparalleled.

We also have a great affinity with premium and young audiences, compared to the others in the genre.

Has the channel been able to achieve its targets in this one year and where do you see when it completes three years? What will be the focus from here on to maintain the momentum?

We are well on our way to achieving our targets as far genre growth, market share, revenue, etc., go. The focus will now be to consolidate our leadership in the 1mn+ town class and expand our footprint to all-India. We will also continue to strengthen our programming mix with width and variety. Local initiatives are also being planned. We plan to replicate the success of 'The Greatest Indian' through similar innovative and path-breaking concepts

History TV18 will continue to excite, enthuse and push the envelope in terms of a differentiated, clutter-breaking, world-class programming mix; and thus grow the genre.

Which specific programmes have given the highest eyeballs in the first year?

We have had a variety of shows that have done well in the last one year, such as 'Pawn Stars', 'Targeting Bin Laden', 'Food Tech', 'Ice Road Truckers', among others.

Talking about advertisers, what major change do you see in their response in one year?

I think for most advertisers the factual entertainment genre is a key category. It is very positive for them to see this genre grow in recent times where fragmentation seems to be the norm. This genre also allows clients and advertisers to take chances with innovative brand solutions and differentiated properties as the risk is not very high as in the case of big-ticket properties of more mainstream channels.

Do you feel the factual entertainment market has reached saturation point or is there scope for more channels in the genre?

Genre growth is the key for any category to accommodate more players. Until the same happens, I think all players will tent to only cannibalise audiences. This has been our agenda since launch. Also, other factors like yield increases for this genre are very important, else sustaining many players will be a challenge.

Info@BestMediaInfo.com

Info@BestMediaInfo.com

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