Ananda Vikatan innovates with 3D magazines

Marking its presence from more than 8 decades in the Tamil publishing space, Ananda Vikatan is all set to enter its 86th year promising more innovative content in the media space. The team has come up with a 3D issue to mark its celebration and achievement. This is not the first time that the group is experimenting with 3D issue since they had launched the same for the first time in June 2005. Now to mark this occasion and revive the magazine’s presence, the group has planned to come up with 6 consecutive 3D issues.

Adgully caught up with Pravin Menon, National Head - Ad Sales, Vikatan group to learn more about their activities and initiatives to promote the 3D issues.

With Ananda Vikatan all set to enter its 86th year, when asked how the publication has kept abreast with the constantly renewing market demands and challenges , Menon said, "At Vikatan we have been constantly reinventing ourselves for the last 85 years. We have 12 magazines today in our portfolio and all 12 magazines have an online presence."

The group does events on a regular basis to get insights from their readers. They have a robust CRM system, through which they understand reader interest and requirements. "With these insights and reader feedbacks, we launched new magazines, such as Doctor Vikatan, Aval Manamagal, Timepass and Aval Kitchen in the last 2 years," he added.

The group is known for its innovation and differentiated content. To support this statement the best example could be the fact that they were the first Tamil magazine to go online in 1998 (www.vikatan.com). To keep up to the evolving digital space they were among the first ones to create an App for iOS and Android platform. "We connect with our readers via social media platforms; we are very active on this platform for all our brands. Hence we are on platforms where the readers are reading content," he said.

As stated above, though this is not the first time that they are coming up with a 3D issue, the main differentiator this time is the content break up and number of issues. With every issue 3D glasses will be given free along with the magazine. Moreover no change will be seen in the price of these special editions.

The group is spending close to 2crs for this entire exercise. To bring in new readers and inspire existing readers is the ROI that they are looking at. "More than just the revenue figures, positive feedback from our readers, sponsors SATHYA and PVP and other advertisers excite us even more," he added.

With their major campaign for these 6 issues the publication has an expectation of a double digit growth on sales. Hence a higher print run has also been planned anticipating new reader interest and a surge in the demand for the magazine.

The print run for Ananda Vikatan till date has been around 4 lakh copies.

In terms of Advertiser break up they have a 65-35 percent break up of TN advertisers versus National advertisers. "Our two sponsors for the first 3 issues are SATHYA and PVP and they are Chennai based clients. We are in discussion with other clients for the next 3 issues," said Menon.

Various events are being conducted by Ananda Vikatan in the state of Tamil Nadu to engage its readers. Apart from this, they have planned a 6 week promotion for the magazine across mediums. The channel is targeting to cover and use all mediums possible for promoting this issue. B2C and B2B campaigns have been initiated and there is a huge buzz on outdoor, print, magazines, online and TV ads to promote the magazine. In all their ground activation events, they will sample their issues. The 3D issues will also be promoted on the social media platform as well as the group website, Vikatan.com.

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