Adgully Exclusive | Cricket Nirvana: Salvation from subscriptions

Nirvana promises complete bliss and delight ” according to Hindu and Buddhist thought ” usually in the afterlife. But for Indians, bliss and delight are afforded by cricket and Bollywood, two entertainment rituals that enrich a billion earthly lives. In an exclusive conversation with Adgully, Jose Felix, vice-president (new media) of Nimbus Communications, explain how his company is fulfilling the new India's quest for temporal exaltation.

"Nimbus New Media has multiple properties," Felix told Adgully. "One is Cricket Nirvana, which is our key property, and the other is Film Nirvana. We also have a mobile business through which we provide cricket content. This is a small business, but is expected to grow with the advent of 3G." Felix said that Nimbus New Media's current focus was on Cricket Nirvana. "It's a two-year-old site," he said. "But since its inception, the growth of Cricket Nirvana has outstripped the normal industry growth rate in terms of user acquisition, revenue growth, and in provision of services that are not available in the market. That is probably our key differentiator."

Adgully asked Felix to elaborate on the difference. "See, traditionally, cricket sites provide scores and typical cricket news," he said. "When we started, we said we would provide an interactive score card. Say, I want to see Tendulkar's profile; I just click on his name on the Cricket Nirvana website and I get all the info about him: profile, career card, and his scores in the five previous matches. We have the entire data for all the players in the world."

The data resource would be manna for cricket aficionados no doubt, but how does the site manage to present the information without confusing the user? Felix said that the site used graphics to elucidate statistics. "We have a graph system on the site and if you want to know, for example, who has scored the maximum runs in a game, it will be shown through the graph," Felix said. "This is a flash application and it is real-time based." He said that the interactive section also offered exciting challenges; for example, the prediction of the winner. "Earlier, we used to give away prizes like a bat signed by Harbhajan Singh," he said.

Felix said that, in addition, the site featured the highlights of the matches of which the site had internet media rights. "We held the rights for the past four years," he said.

These offerings seem to be a big draw for people, numbers seem to suggest. "According to February's figures, when India played a series, ESPN's Crickinfo attracted 106 million page views," Felix said. "Cricket Nirvana had 87 million page views, and Yahoo Cricket had around 34 million. On the whole, we are Number 2, so we oscillate between Numbers 2 and 3. In terms of growth rate, we are probably the fastest growing cricket site at the moment."

Adgully asked Felix if he was worried that India's bandwidth constraints might hamper Cricket Nirvana's growth; after all, it is a site that relies heavily on interactivity. Felix, however, seemed upbeat. "No, I don't think that is the problem at all," he said. "We have cracked a technology through which quality content will be served at a very high speed on the normal bandwidth. And we all watch matches online."

The response spurred Adgully's next question: if technology is not a problem, will the cluttered field of cricket sites be? "The difference [between us and others] is the content," Felix said. "On other counts, we are at par with other sites. Crickinfo is a 19-year-old site, Yahoo is a very old internet player, and we are just two-three years old. Talking about text content, it might take another year or two to bypass these guys. We are focused on key differentiators. At any rate, we are going to launch a new and restructured site."

As for the revenue model, Felix said that the site operated with multiple revenue streams. "Basically, it is the advertising revenue" he said. "The difference in our case is that we also have video advertising revenue. The video content is the solid differentiator. In terms of video advertising, we are the most expensive medium in the country today."

But Felix said that the company's marketing strategy was not based on "unnecessarily burning cash on acquiring traffic by advertising left, right and centre." He said that the traffic came from the content the site offered. "In addition, we advertise on NEO Sports and Neo Cricket," he said. "And we are likely to break even in this financial year."

As for the product, Felix said that Cricket Nirvana was revolutionary. "Mostly, it works on subscriptions," he said. "And since the Indian consumer is not used to paying, we actually had to adapt a model which serves ads between live streaming. We are proud of the fact that companies like Youtube have copied our business model."

Besides, the site has built a large player which is comparable with television, Felix said. "Plus, you can scrutinise the score card, watch replays of whatever you want and whenever you want," he said.