With a plethora of platforms across media and entertainment under its umbrella, IN10 Media Network began with a single channel Epic TV in 2014 and now boasts a multifaceted network spanning broadcasting, production, OTT and music label.
In an exclusive interview with exchange4media, the network’s Managing Director, Aditya Pittie, shared his vision, marketing strategies and the journey of the network.
Here are the excerpts from the interview:
With a diverse background spanning various industries, please tell us about your ventures and how has the journey been for IN10 Media Networks.
EPIC is our flagship channel with which our network started. It is the only Hindi infotainment channel in India. We have interesting shows and legacy famous shows. This channel continues to be our flagship brand and is also a part of our subscription bouquet. Our subscriber base is growing by 50% year on year basis.
We have our interactive music channel ShowBox. All our channels have large levels of interactive properties and are powered by WhatsApp chatbots . You give a missed call to a number and automatically get a WhatsApp message on your phone and there is a high level engagement that happens with the audiences with contests, questions etc.
We have Filamchi Bhojpuri movie channel, where 50 world television premieres are lined up. We have a library of 350 titles, out of which 250 are original.
Apart from these, the network consists of broadcast channels Gubbare, Ishara and Nazara, 2 OTT platforms (DocuBay and EPIC ON), 2 production houses (Juggernaut Productions and MovieVerse Studios), a music label (Let's Get LOUDER), a technology arm (Stream-Sense), gaming (Platanista) and news platform (LatestLY).
What was the idea behind venturing into such diverse platforms? Is a sports channel also in the pipeline?
Sports is not in the pipeline currently. It is extremely expensive and the economy of sports is very different. But we are looking to add more TV channels to our broadcasting business and we want to do regional channels as well.
What is your marketing strategy? How are you pulling viewers to your platforms?
In television, we usually promote our channels across the network. Sometimes we promote our channels on other TV channels by getting ad spots. But because of the nature and the reach of DD FreeDish and the fact that we have a very good understanding of the DTH players, we get a lot of organic sampling and reach for our channels. So, if you have good content on TV, you get organic reach.
For our OTT business, we have a very robust marketing plan. I believe if you have good content, you don’t need to push in marketing. We like to build an audience base slowly and attract viewership step by step rather than going all out in one go.
How much is the acquired and original content on your platforms?
Each channel varies. In acquired content, some deals are five years, some are for one year. On the music platform ShowBox, most of the content is acquired from music companies. For Filamchi, we have exclusive long term deals. For Gubbare, most of the content is original. For GECs, we have acquired some content from outside for the last couple of years but now with the kind of originals that we are making, we will hopefully reduce the dependency on acquired content. On an average, across platforms, 25-30% of the content is acquired and the rest is originals.
As noticed in the annual reports, ad revenues of many top broadcasters have seen a decline from FY22 to FY23. What’s your view on that?
We are a very young network as most of our channels are less than three years old. Our ad revenue has not reached its base level. Our objective is to double our ad revenue this year. The impact of the overall market on us is there but it is not as much as other mature networks as their revenues are at an optimum level. For us, the impact is not much because we are still getting a larger piece of the pie. I believe that the ad revenue market has seasonal challenges but overall, I think the ad revenue market for television continues to grow.
