BARC India launched, Releases data for Week 16

The wait is over. It’s a momentous day in the history of Indian television that will change how content consumption will be monitored and measured. The wait for the Industry is over as BARC India rolls out its first set of data.

Today, is indeed a day to celebrate for the shareholder apex bodies – IBF, AAAI and ISA, to launch in 2 years what Countries across the World would have taken at least 5-6 years.

The uniqueness of cultural and media consumption diversity of India makes it the most challenging service governed by a single joint industry body for the entire Country and like none other across the World. It’s a brilliant example of Unity in Diversity that Indian media, marketing and advertising industry has achieved.

Initially, BARC India will be releasing data for 1 lac+ C&S markets which corresponds to a sample size of 10,760 households. BARC India will actually monitor 12,000 sample households for this, using a stratified random sampling technique that is proven statistically. This will go up to 20,000 reporting homes, with addition of the less than 1 lac urban markets and rural areas to represent “What India Watches” in line with the Government of India, Jan 2014 notification.

With over 300 Channels being watermarked with this world’s leading technology for measurement, BARC India relies heavily on the technology backbone, which is state of art. Technology will also help BARC India to be future ready and increase robustness.

BARC India Media Workstation (BMW), the user software is another offering which the entire Industry is raving about. Having already trained over 3,000 people across the Country, TEAM BARC India has been proactive with its customer engagement and servicing initiatives.

SpotTrek - launched a month earlier and is already popular with subscriptions for its services. It’s a third party Certification service from BARC India to track the commercial Spots and Movie Trailers Telecast on TV by next day of telecast through monitoring of over 360 channels.

NCCS or the new SEC system will now be the new standard, to enable smarter decision making processes with the new socio-economic consumer classification. Both content planners and advertisers will find the new NCCS system to be more objective as it captures the affluence parameters of a household.

Security and Vigilance is another priority for BARC India. BARC India  uses as many as 28 partners across key processes within the larger framework of meter management, panel management, DQA, IT security, playout monitoring etc. Information integrity is ensured through ‘the right hand not knowing what the left hand is doing’ principle.

For BARC India the journey has just started as we usher in a whole new era of intelligence and analytics.

FACTS ABOUT BARC India:
·        Phase I : 1L+ C&S HHs – Empanelled – 12,000, Reporting - 10,760 households (1L+ C&S)

·        Phase II : Including Less than 1 Lac - Urban + Rural – Empanelled – 22,000 HH, Reporting – 20,000 HH

·        6 control variables -  Population Class, NCCS,  Gender, Education of Individuals, Mother Tongue, , Household Size

·        Reporting Parameters are as follows:
o   Minute by Minute Data
o   Weekly Reporting
o   Week Definition – Saturday to Friday
o   Release Day – Wednesday
o   Reporting at Household Level (in Phase I)

·        The minimum sample below which a market will not be reported is 200. This is irrespective of individuals or households.

Partho Dasgupta, CEO, BARC India said, “I am thrilled to share the first set of Data and Highlights. Solving this Puzzle has been an exciting experience and TEAM BARC India is proud to be creating history as the World’s Largest and Future Ready Television Audience Measurement Service. Thanks to IBF, AAAI, ISA and all our partners for coming together and making this happen.”

Punit Goenka, Chairman BARC India, MD & CEO, ZEEL said, ""BARC India is committed to build a world class television audience measurement system. With an aim to bring in utmost transparency within the ecosystem, BARC India will certainly be the best solution to report what the nation is actually watching."

HIGHLIGHTS AS FOLLOWS:
·        Star Plus is leading Hindi GEC channel of the country (HSM)
·        Zee emerges strong in Regional channels like Telugu and Marathi
·        Aaj Tak is the leader in Hindi news (HSM)
·        Times Now leads in English news category (All India)
·        IPL days put Sony Max in strong position
·        Sun TV is a dominant leader in Tamil Nadu market
·        ETV Kannada is the market leader in Kannada market
·        Nick is the market leader in Kids category (All India)
·        Zee TV HD has the highest Time Spent in the current week followed by Sony Six HD & Colors HD across HSM.
·        Discovery is the leader in the infotainment category (All India)

1.           Hindi GEC – Top 10

2.           Hindi GEC – Top 3 (Prime Time)

3.           Hindi Movies – Top 3

4.           Tamil GEC – Top 3

5.           Telugu GEC – Top 3

6.           Bangla GEC – Top 3

7.           Marathi GEC – Top 3

8.           Sports – Top 3

9.           Hindi News – Top 3

10.       English News – Top 3

11.       Kids – Top 3

12.       Infotainment – Top 3

*In the Hindi news genre, India TV was recorded for only three days out of seven. We are privy to only their data and are not aware about other errors that have occured. Well every system always has scope for improvement and we hope that the issues are resolved in time to come.