Adgully Exclusive | Readers appreciate CNT's India content approach: Divia Thani Daswani & Oona Dhabhar of Conde Nast Traveller India

The year in 2011 seems to be really exciting for Conde Nast Traveller. CNT, launched in October 2010, has had a year of very new and exciting opportunities. Certainly, a few things that stand out were their feature on 'Destination Weddings' in February 2011, which was well received resulting it to expanding it into a major story for Feb 2012. Their honeymoon issue in June 2011 featured Kashmir on the cover, which was extremely well received and really touched the hearts of the readers. Of course, the India Special Anniversary issue was truly special.

Speaking exclusively to Adgully, Divia Thani Daswani, Editor, Condé Nast Traveller and Oona Dhabhar, Marketing Director, Condé Nast India shared some insights about Condé Nast.

Daswani said, "I think readers really appreciate the new perspective with which CNT approaches our India stories. It's a source of great pride for all of us. Finally, our first Readers' Travel Awards winners were just announced and the number of votes came in from our readers was staggering! We obviously have very passionate, very well-informed and well-travelled readers. One last point would be some really pleasant surprises during the year: unlikely destinations such as Oman, the Greek Islands and Meghalaya really stood out to our audiences. Our stories put these destinations on the map for the first time for a lot of people, and that's really very satisfying."

Speaking about her vision vision for 2012, Daswani said, "More of the same, just better! We are just completing another round of intensive research with our readers, which allow us to hone our content and ensure it is relevant and timely. Our goal for 2012 is to introduce our readers to more exciting and different destinations, to give them great information and advice on destinations they love and visit regularly, to facilitate their travel as best as we can. "

The only way to continue being the Last Word in Travel is to make sure we (CNT) stay fresh, relevant, inspiring and useful.

Since this a very rare and hidden genre, sharing her thoughts on the genre and the way it will grow in the years to come, she said, "Absolutely! Outbound travel from India is increasing exponentially; we are at about 12 million now and are predicted to hit 20 million in the next few years; so the market size is certainly increasing."

Daswani has just returned from the International Luxury Travel Market in Cannes, and it is clear that the attention of the entire world is on BRIC nations for growth, especially when it comes to travel and tourism.

She believes that the Indian market has the advantage of a very sophisticated domestic hospitality and travel industry, of accessing the web in English, of having not just a generation of new money but old money as well, of very intelligent and discerning and value-conscious travellers who cannot be fooled. They value information, expert advice and understand the importance of travel in a global world.

Daswani said, "Our readers are best posed to answer this question! As far as I can tell, it is the combination of putting out a trustworthy brand, and inspiring and useful content. I also believe our 'Truth in Travel' policy sets us completely apart - we accept no free travel press trips, we pay for flights, hotels, transport, meals, etc so that our writers are under no pressure to state anything but the absolute truth about their experiences."

"And of course, the fact that the writers we use are world-renowned authors such as Suketu Mehta, Pico Iyer, David Davidar, Sonia Faleiro, Aatish Taseer, Fatima Bhutto and Amitav Ghosh - speaks for itself! And the photography is incredible! It's impossible to go through an issue and not wish you were on vacation," she added.

As told by Daswani, they have several partnerships and alliances in process, but will only be able to announce once they're formalised.

Speaking about the digital/social media strategy, she said, "Our website www.cntraveller.in was launched along with the magazine and the iPad version. We also launched a very successful app for the BlackBerry, which is CNT's Luxury Guide to India, which provides guides to 18 cities across the country and is GPA-enabled. It's important to take advantage of these platforms as again, we see this as a major growth area."

Speaking about circulation and new initiatives, Dhabhar said, "Our focus has been to ensure that magazine is available and visible at key bookstores and newsstand where the target affluent reader shops. We have always tried to create long term partnership with key bookstores like Oxford, Landmark and Crossword and other airport book stores. Today our titles are some of the highest selling magazine brand in these outlets."

With the year end round the corner, holidays and vacation would definitely be the minds of readers and CNT is sure to provide its readers some lesser known but exciting places to celebrate this new year's eve! | By Aanchal Kohli [aanchal(at)adgully.com]