We’re offering 650 hours of curated content for Tata Sky World Screen: Arun Unni

DTH and OTT service provider Tata Sky has fortified its offering with the introduction of international entertainment content on its platform. Christened Tata Sky World Screen, the offering will feature prime content from across geographies and multiple languages (Arabic, Russian, Spanish, Belgium, Israel, Cuba, German, French, Italian, Portuguese, Hindi, Swahili, Japanese, Chinese and Korean.) 

Arun Unni, Chief Content Officer, Tata Sky, informed, “With the launch of Tata Sky World Screen, we are offering cinema and television aficionados over 650 curated hours of great stories, not just from Hollywood, but from around the world, ad-free. Our analysis indicates that consumption patterns are evolving, and there is an audience looking for exciting and diverse content, unconstrained by language. Our handpicked list includes some of the most popular and critically acclaimed movies and TV shows across the world, a lot of which has never been seen on TV before in India.” 

The content will be available to Tata Sky subscribers on their TV sets through the STB, Tata Sky Mob App and the web app of Tata Sky. 

In conversation with Adgully, Arun Unni sheds more light on the new offering, the growth strategy, introducing more verticals and more. Excerpts: 

What was the strategy behind launching a service like Tata Sky World Screen?
Audience tastes have evolved with time. There’s a lot of content available – both on linear and digital – where language does not matter. The biggest and most obvious case in point is the series ‘Narcos’ on Netflix. The multi-lingual series set off a boom in terms of availability of interesting content that transcends language barriers. We then decided to do an experiment on our platform to find out whether such content was only a digital thing or was it something that would work on television as well? Is there a general awareness about and inclination towards content that goes beyond traditional languages and genres that we have been seeing so far? 

Sometime around March-April last year, we ran our experiment and called it Tata Sky World Series. We ran two seasons of ‘Gumora’, an Italian language show, back to back for a month every day at 9 pm. During weekdays five episodes were aired. The response was so encouraging that we opened up this to the entire English base. We monitored the viewership and consumption very carefully. We saw that entire funnel of people who used to start sampling the channel would converge very quickly to a smaller funnel, because not everybody was inclined to watching an Italian language service with sub-titles. But those who did convert were so loyal to it that it was one of the top services on our platform. This gave us the confidence to launch the service. 

To Read More Visit Here.

The way we look at a lot of these things is that we identify the gaps. There is this offering that the consumer already has from various sources. But we thought that this is the segment where there is still a gap that needs to be filled. That’s how we identified that Indian audiences did not have an option at a reasonable price and had to go to other OTT platforms, where they had to pay more. This helped us in identifying the niche need gap. We know that others have tried this in the past, but what works for an advertising driven product and what works for a subscription driven product are two different things altogether. So, that was not the right benchmark for us and we thought of doing something that catered to the audience’s needs. 

The objective here is to give consumers the kind of content that they would otherwise not find very easily to discover and consume. We are curating content from around the world. 

Where do you see this vertical six months down the line?
We don’t start off with a target number in mind. The way we look at it is the entire English base that we have and also the HD base are obvious starting points from within which a segment can be found. A reasonable percentage of our English and HD base should find some kind of attraction to this offering. Outside this, we believe that even those who are not necessarily affiliated to English, there could be some audiences there. 

What is your marketing strategy for this new offering?
The segment varies in terms of whom we are talking to and about what. The tools that we use are pretty much similar as we have an array of tools to converse with the audience. Also, we have Channel No. 100, where we have banners and messages that keep going out in yellow boxes on the top of the screen. Therefore, we have multiple ways to reach out to the consumers. Besides, our Tata Sky Mob App is playing a very strong role in taking us to the consumers. We revamped our app six months back and have been getting a lot of traction on it. 

With so many specialised verticals, are there any plans to start your own content production facility?

We don’t have any plans on those lines as of now, because there is a lot to be done before that. Adding another studio to already existing studios is not adding value to the consumer, they don’t need another studio. What they need is somebody who brings them a product that is reasonably priced, is convenient, which makes it easier for them to consume. We have a large role to play there before we get into other stuff. 

What about your sports vertical?
As far as sports in concerned, we typically don’t go for acquisitions. Live sports is a big thing and we don’t go and acquire live sporting rights. Broadcasters already do that, for which they pay a lot of money too. There is no value for us to go and do that again. Instead, we work with the broadcasters to enhance the experience for our consumers. 

How do you view the competition?
This is not a new competition. It’s not like a new player has entered the market. To that extent, we are as much focussed on the market as we have been in the past. We don’t operate by looking at the competition. From a consumer’s perspective, things don’t change. Those offerings existed in the market and will continue to be there. 

To Read More Visit Here.

How did you arrive at the pricing?
We don’t try to extract a premium on our pricing. We feel it is one of the lowest. Making the product available to the largest potential audience is our objective. It will be difficult to price any product below this price point. 

You have kept your base price low for quite some time now. What’s the strategy behind this?
There is no fixed base price as such. We keep adjusting our prices and packages in line with what the consumer requires, with cable being the significant target for getting consumers on board.