"There is still enough market for both OTT and linear satellite to co-exist"

Ever since the pandemic began, the regional OTT platforms have acquired a large audience base. In 2022, these platforms will up their game with viewers watching more web content as compared to TV. The new year will witness more investment, growth, and diversification of language-specific content providing more value to customers. 

TV has always had a mass appeal, but the times are now changing. Today, to attract more audiences, television not only needs to change its content strategy, but also the distribution and marketing strategy. Content is the king and the shift of viewers from TV to video streaming platforms can be attributed to the quality content offered by these platforms to engage and entertain young minds. There is still enough market for both OTT and linear satellite to co-exist if television breaks set patterns and undergoes an overall reinvention of content to woo viewers. 

However, if this is not taken care of, the coming year will see OTTs becoming completely mainstream. More so, it will be a year of regional cinema as many players are doubling their investments to retain the loyal user-base they have acquired in these two years. 

Having been in business for 14 years now, I witnessed all trends, launched three channels and now an OTT platform. Chaupal was launched keeping in mind the present needs of the consumers who prefer content that is different and easily accessible. The fact that our OTT has already clocked in 5 lakh downloads in the first quarter is proof enough of the audience preference. Chaupal streams content in three regional languages – Punjabi, Haryanvi, and Bhojpuri. In 2022, the platform is planning two seasons of a show called ‘Shahi Majra’, besides movies like ‘Kade Haa Kade Naa’, ‘Umran Ch Ki Rakheya’, ‘Miss Tania’, ‘Ghoda Dhai Kadam’, ‘Sab Phadey Jaangey’, ‘Shagan’, ‘Vyah Da Laddu’, ‘DJ Waley Babu’, ‘Aaja Mexico Chaliye’ and ‘Mull Di Janani’. 

Our strategy to break through the clutter in 2022 is to provide relevant world-class content to viewers and to fill the void in the regional entertainment space so that more people join regional platforms and create a new wave in the OTT industry. 

Authored by Sandeep Bansal, Director of Pitaara TV and Chaupal OTT