Exclusive | The kids genre is a very serious place for us: Turner's Eyers

As the demography’s and psychographs’ of the world have changed over the last decade with growing number of people entering the affluent classes, the growing exposure to media and its surroundings as well have influenced the behavioral and consumption patterns of people across age groups.

Understandably creating content for the youngest age group – the kids is certainly no child’s play. Who better to tell us this than Turner International Asia pacific’s Chief Content Officer, Mark Eyers who has been associated with the segment since a decade.

Adgully caught up with Mark Eyers to talk about how localised content is the way to go ahead, why digitization hasn’t affected the brand ‘Turner’ greatly and Turner’s plans to work towards branded content.

Edited excerpts below:

Adgully (AG): Share with us your insights of the television industry in general and specifically kid’s space.

Mark Eyers (MK): Every industry goes under consolidation and adjustment stage. Back in 2008 there was half of the kid’s channel then what we have today. One thing is that the space is growing and developing and India remains key market for us. We’ve been in India for the past 20 years, along with that, the other interesting fact is that Pogo turned 10 this year and we couldn’t think of any other company than Pogo and Cartoon Network in India in No.1 and 2 positions in the same genre. Turner’s entrepreneurial spirit and drive to become the first mover in the genre by taking advantage of a gap in the market has always benefitted us. Being one of the first kids’ brands in India

AG: Tell us a bit more about the strategies and plans to differentiate content in the space that you are in.

ME: Cartoon network is a global brand and Pogo is relatively a younger brand and has a mix of international and local content. We have ‘Lights, Camera and Pogo’ where we showcase movie franchises and invest a lot in terms of content and we also have long form productions of original content. ‘Mighty Raju’ would be an apt example of this and we’re very proud of it as well as of all our acquisitions. We follow a strategy across APAC where 80% of Cartoon Network content is common or shared content. We must also remember that as part of a successful global brand, it is important to be consistent and more importantly to meet our two major criteria. The strategy we have adopted at Pogo is a bit broader than that at Cartoon Network, as Pogo has evolved into more of a ‘general entertainment for kids’ channel; so you’ll see some young content on that channel.

AG: How would you define kid’s genre in the Indian context?

ME: I think India should recognize its own audience. Kid’s space for us is very serious; and as a responsible broadcaster we need to take care of our audience as they (kids) are important for us. Secondly we need to be reinventing ourselves and content as well, as I believe that content must grow with the child as well! What’s working for us is comedy amongst kid’s content, while comedy animation around the world is one of the powerful spaces. Humor is massive and the key thing about humor is that it caters to both, boys and girls. You must understand one thing that what you make is important as how you make. For me C is not for Content but Curatorial – how you place the brand and curate it. But comedy too has its own shelf life, but for example comedy clubbed with action works really well as in the case with on Toonami!

AG: Share with us your understanding of the Indian kid’s psychology in compare to the kids from the rest of the world.

ME: I’ve been in India from last 18 years. We have right mix of content which we produce in India and Taiwan, Australia and other parts of the world. At APAC, we know that producing content is tough task as our audiences have distinct taste and that we need to produce something which can complement each other. We cognizant our product where in terms of content, 50% is visual. In India, we produce shows in Tamil, Telugu and Hindi language in compare to other countries.

AG: Media is no more a one-man show. Every space / genre or piece of work has a competitor standing across. Tell us a bit about the competition in kids’ space.

ME: Competition in kid space is mature now and has increased with time. Cartoon Network which has been at the top of the charts in India already occupies 43% of the kid’s space. The other big players in the game in the kid’s channel genre here in India (about four channels) have about 38%. One thing is exciting that kids’ space doesn’t store or stock up stuff, it keeps changing. So we try to look through new changes and invent ourselves. Strategies that we follow is – ‘the best person to disrupt you should be yourself’; so before competitors take a step ahead we should be ready with our next step. Working in that direction, we are launching new channels and will be re-launching Toonami later this year.

AG: As you mentioned about content in different regional / native languages for India, give us a sense of how localization of content worked for Turner.

ME: We look at our channels across all dimensions and so we wouldn’t differentiate within the categories. Local or otherwise, it is better to have more ideas than money. So our attention is not necessarily polarized between local or international. We need to have plenty of irons in the fire! Having said that, we have to find a great blend of both kinds of content and that definitely works in favor for us.

AG: What are the marketing initiatives you plan to initiate for Indian market?

ME: Communication focus should be same throughout the mediums as we are using to engage with our audience. The trick is that experience should be same, be it on television or on-ground experience. We try to give kids more and more on-ground experience too apart from digital and on air.

AG: What are the plans on the digital front?

ME: We’ll continue to do what we are doing on digital space today. We believe that ‘Content is King and Distribution is Queen’. It has to be understood that distribution is important in digitization phase. You have to put your consumers first and want them to come back to your brand. Digitization will become better in India and abroad too with time. Cartoon Network has always adopted a strategy to have unique content for the digital medium which complements television content, whether its shorts or games or extensions of the storytelling from the primary channel. The viewer needs to have a compelling experience in the digital space that should leave him/her wanting to come back for more.

AG: What are the growing trends you've noticed in kid's segment, both in Indian and international market? 

ME: Live action and animation, more TV experience in digital space, more cartoon channels in India is our observation. What is more different and what we are seeing here is that viewership of TV isn’t going down. We are seeing that the short attention shift towards the second screen and others is complementing the linear view. We have launched Carton Network ‘Watch and Play’ in APAC where one can watch the channel in clips and play the game at the same time. In APAC we have had three million video views in January from Asia alone. The perception needs to be corrected that the volatility is complementing the linear view. Across APAC, we saw 10% increase in ratings of our international channels in 2013 which is good news for linear platforms.

AG: What is your take on the on-going TAM controversy?

ME: The industry and stakeholders should get together. It’s early time. We are global broadcasters and we have to work in the currency and the environment of market and have to respect that.

AG: You've been part of Turner from almost a decade. How's the journey been for you?

ME: We need to give people enough space in an organization and so for that I have to trust my guys; they can come to me anytime and share their work with me. It’s not like what I do, but what I enable my team to do. A major highpoint in my journey till date is when we completed APAC, Ben Ten, The story of Aliens. We worked with great producers and directors across the world. The plus point is that we produced international property work with APAC. Original video production in India has been a great high for us like War 21, Kumbhkarna among others. Also, our first comedy series will be produced in Australia soon.

AG: Lastly, share with the current position of Turner and the plans for the year 2014.

ME: Everyone is seeing that we’ve made a mark as a brand. By 2020 we will be doubling our revenue in Asia and our focus would be investing in the space to grow. We need to be beyond kid’s news; across APAC and so we’ll make investment beyond that as well.

Mark Eyers is Chief Content Officer at Turner International Asia Pacific Limited. Responsible for all aspects of Turner’s kids’ content business, Mark oversees the acquisitions, original production, programming for Boomerang, [adult swim], Cartoon Network, Cartoonito, Toonami and POGO across Asia Pacific.
Mark first joined Turner’s Creative Services team in 2004 and was previously the Vice President of Content. He was responsible for the implementation of a unified programming vision across all Turner brands by integrating the original production and development unit within the programming division. Prior to joining Turner, Mark was the Senior Manager – Head of Creative Department at Walt Disney Television International in Singapore for Asia Pacific Disney Channels. He has also worked as Director/Producer with BTQ Channel 7 in Australia. A graduate from the Queensland College of Art in Australia, Mark holds a bachelor’s degree in Arts – Film & TV Production.

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