AXN finds a 'Not So Ordinary Weekend' slot as English GEC genre gets hot

The 16-day marketing campaign is built on the proposition of 'Not So Ordinary'. The promos are already on air telling viewers what to expect in the 'Not So Ordinary Weekend'

Sarmistha Neogy | Mumbai | August 4, 2014

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There is a lot happening at AXN, the English entertainment channel run by Multi Screen Media. With the recent multi-year content deal with CBS Studios International, AXN viewers will now get to enjoy some of the longest running shows manly from the USA. To bring this deal into effect, the channel will introduce a new weekend slot named 'Not So Ordinary Weekend' from August 8, 2014.

Saurabh Yagnik

Commenting on the rationale behind this slot, Saurabh Yagnik, English Cluster  Head, Multi Screen Media, said, “A lot of consumer research was done primarily in the age bracket of 15-30 years and it was found that people are usually too consumed with their work throughout the week. And it is only during weekends that people get the time to chill and engage in doing stuff which are out of the ordinary and not so routine. We also saw that the core proposition of this 'Not So Ordinary Weekend' lies in the fact that all the latest shows from the USA with the biggest stars are to be aired in this time-band. Therefore, the challenge would be to build up this slot even as the shows keep changing, but the core proposition will continue to be the same.”

As of now four new shows including two from CBS Studios are to be shown in this special weekend slot. The shows are 'Extant' at 10 PM and 'Teen Wolf Season 4' at 11 PM on Friday. And on Saturday, there is 'Penny Dreadful' at 10 PM and 'Falling Skies' Season 4 at 11 PM.

“The programming cycle for any English GEC works from September to May. But this is not how Indian viewers are used to consume content as it gets very confusing for them. The biggest challenge for any English GEC is to create familiarity with the shows in the channel. Therefore, we decided to bring in the latest and the biggest shows from America and market them in such a way so as to create familiarity with the Indian audience,” added Yagnik.

Marketing strategy

The marketing task revolves around the proposition of 'Not So Ordinary'. “When we looked at the various ways of promoting the shows, we decided to run promos pegged on 'what is not so ordinary about the weekend slot' and also give the viewers the synopsis of the storyline so that they know what to expect. Secondly, we realised that familiarity can't be made just by making communication on a static medium; therefore, we focussed a lot on social media. The way we have designed this marketing campaign is not based on our shows, but mainly focussed on striking a conversation with the viewers and then building the right connect,” explained Yagnik.

The Facebook campaign highlights on what the 'not so ordinary generation' likes to do the most, like clicking selfies and being on social networking sites always. So caricatures are drawn on these different topics and posted on the wall to increase engagement and drive conversation. The promos of this 16-day campaign have already gone on air with the aim of telling viewers what to expect in this not so ordinary weekend. Static mediums have also been used with communication mainly being driven by 'Extant', which marks Halle Berry's debut on television.

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