Rating is the reflection of what audience watch says L V Krishnan, CEO, TAM

Ever wondered why the K-serials went on for so long? It is because, obviously, all those homemakers watched them so damn much. But do you know how did we all get to know what made them the most watched soaps? Well, it's all because of a body called Television Audience Measurement (TAM). We at Adgully met up with the man behind this all ' CEO of TAM, L V Krishnan. Our meeting went something like this:

Adgully (AG): According to you what role does TRP play for the success or failure of any soap on GEC?

L V Krishnan (LVK): Rating is the reflection of what audiences watch and engage themselves in. It is not a barometer to say the fact that a particular content is ideal content or not. So you got to look at the ratings from the point view of the fact that how long do people watch and how do they engage themselves with that particular kind of content and therefore how should we tailor make the programming to cater to that particular segment.

AG: When advertisers invest in a television show, do they consider the TRP ratings?

LVK: Certainly. It is because that tells them the kind of content audiences are engaged with. So, it tells you the fact that If XYZ show in the soap genre is where actually audiences are engaging much more than another programs, they will take a call about where to put the advertising money so that they can communicate with a particular set of consumers to whom they are trying to sell the product.

AG: What changes have you noticed in the past decade in the way investors look at the TAM ratings?

LVK: Well do you know what the advertiser is trying to do? He is trying to sell a volume of products to the end consumer which means the fact that if he is selling around a 100 thousand units then he will try to look into the fact that at least 200 thousand people see it so that the 100 thousand people go and buy the product.

So therefore he will require programs that are able to cater to that 200 thousand people. Hence, he will pick up any media or any channel or any program that delivers that kind of a size of audiences and that's where ratings help him in deciding in that perspective. It tells him this: a. The program which caters 300 thousand people; b. The program which caters 200 thousand people and; c. The program which serves 100 thousand people.

So he gets a choice whether he should take "b+c' and reach out to 300 thousand people or whether he should take only "a' and reach out to 300 thousand people or should only be satisfied with program "b' and reach out to 200 thousand people. So that's where the rating systems help the advertising in the fact that where should the money be put so that the advertiser can do his communication of the product with the consumers and, in turn, consumer seeing the product and purchasing the product.

AG: In past five years what is the number of subscribers for TAM ratings and what has been the growth of TAM?

LVK: It has been going on continuously and more consumers coming aboard. The users keep increasing on a year on year basis.

AG: If you have to put the growth of TAM in a percentage figure, from last year to this year what would you quote?

LVK: It depends on the industry. If the industry grows we grow. If the industry grows by 10% we will also grow by 10%.

AG: Tam is already very important and contains immense research data. But still, in the next 5 years where do you see it going, be it advertising, be it media or journalism?

LVK: Audiences' consumption for the content is increasing and its appetite for consumption is increasing, so obviously advertisers are looking at the fact that if the audience is consuming cinema they may want to consume music and if something different is happening and fantastic content is being delivered in sports, then he might consume sports.

So the audiences' diversity of content consumption is increasing day by day. So their diversity of portfolio of genre consumption is increasing and as that keeps increasing their engagement with television itself will see a growth over a period of time.

So the audience is also becoming pickier and while they are consuming more, they are also becoming choosy about what they want to watch. And therefore what you see is influences in different touch base. Promotion and marketing becomes important, distribution becomes an extremely important variable to sample to people content.

With pay channels, pricing also playing a role. All these three factors play a role in marketing, distribution and pricing. It plays a role in allowing the end consumer to sample the product somewhere or the other. If the product sampling happens and if he likes the content obviously the engagement starts and if engagement starts everything works perfectly for the product.

AG: What are the latest developments at TAM?

LVK: The fact that there is a huge amount of enthusiasm from the market on the sports data that we have released for IPL, and now on World Cup T-20, on brand exposures, will evaluate the brand exposures not only in terms of visibility but also in terms of audience engagement in that.

Second there is a huge enthusiasm on the PR side because PR is even bigger. We are measuring PR through "Icona' and is something where a lot of work is happening. Third is on the television on TAM itself, that's expanding to more markets and to more small towns so we are getting interesting data for those markets. On Radio side, there is a part of economy that has started to dwell. It is going beyond the four metro cities and the behaviour pattern is more visible which are different from what people think.

And that is where we shook hands and asked for his permission to leave. Meeting such icons like L V Krishnan always helps as you get to learn so much about the things happening, and more importantly, what's driving the movement and engagements. We left with a clear understanding of media sources out there and the importance of the measurement of audience engagement. Adgully thanks L V Krishnan for giving us the insights.