DTH Companies play ads on their platforms, to make fat money!

Direct-to-home (DTH) companies like - Dish TV, Tata Sky and Airtel are working out on some creative ways like ' the ads play up on television when powered. And, static ones that are displayed on the electronic programme guide, besides interactive ones -all to monetise a medium that's still too small to attract advertisers in multitude.

DTH subscriber's main motive is to touch 29-30 million more consumers, by the end of the next financial year. If it happens it will be a 50 per cent jump, as of now there are only 19 million viewers.

There is a time to reach there, till then, DTH subscriber's are working on the medium's capabilities. Like, Tata Sky and Dish TV with a subscriber base of over 4.5 million and 6.5-million has seen 30-35 brands, including - Coca-Cola, Pepsi and Hindustan Unilever, in tie-up with it over year and a half.

However, Dish TV who has been the oldest in this service still has been slower, with fewer brands associating with it. On this, Salil Kapoor, chief operating officer, Dish TV said that the company is moving fast on that. Then, Sugato Banerji, chief marketing officer (CMO), DTH Bharti Airtel said, "We have attracted advertisers like - Maruti, Cadbury, Nestle, Hewlett Packard and Yahoo," as per media reports.

As per media reports, on the DTH subscribers having different models in place, Vikram Mehra, CMO, Tata Sky said, "Tata Sky has the default, power-on channel available for advertising, besides the interactive application platform, where advertisers can associate as content providers, thereby getting their branding on the channel. Or, they can do interactive ads on our platform."

Mehra further added, "So, a viewer interested in a particular ad can click a button that appears on the screen. This takes him to a page that provides relevant details. For more information, the viewer has to type in a short code that appears on the screen, using his mobile. This information is then passed to the relevant advertiser. The latter can accordingly get in touch with the viewers, based on leads we pass."

Moreover, DTH companies are promoting the interactive ads on their platforms, including Airtel, on this, Banerji said, "There is a lot of traction we are seeing for it. When you switch on your DTH connection, the first screen that appears is the booting screen. From there, it goes to the default channel in the case of a few operators. Our technology takes the subscriber straight to the last-viewed channel from the booting screen. We have monetised the booting screen. In the case of the electronic programme guide, a subscriber is using it repeatedly during viewership. So, that is another property we have monetized," as reported by media.

Also, every DTH subscriber has a different costing exercise. Interactive ads are charged on the basis of costs per lead, while ad rates on the default, power-on channels are worked out on the basis of half-hour and one-hour slots. For e.g. Tata Sky charges anywhere between Rs 6 lakh for half-hour slots and Rs 12 lakh for one-hour slots for a period of 30 days.