India’s digital story is going to be fuelled by new language consumers: Archana Anand

Zee Entertainment Enterprises Ltd’s (ZEEL) new digital entertainment platform, ZEE5, has got off to a rousing start. A first in the country, ZEE5 brings India’s largest and comprehensive library of vernacular content with programming in 12+ languages. ZEE5 follows a Freemium pricing model, with both free and paid premium content to cater to a mix of audiences. Viewers who subscribe to the ZEE5 subscription pack will get access to the entire library of content at a special launch offer price of Rs 99 per month instead of the actual monthly pack price of Rs 150. 

ZEE5 offers viewers a completely integrated entertainment offering with both On-Demand and Live TV. It comes packed with 100,000 hours of On-Demand content, including exclusive Originals, Indian and International Movies and TV Shows, Music, and Health and Lifestyle videos across languages. It also has an extensive Live TV offering with 90+ popular Live TV channels. 

Commenting on the launch, Archana Anand, Digital Head, ZEE5 India, said, “We see ZEE5 as filling a definite need-gap in the Indian market for strong language content and navigation experience across Indian languages. We believe this market to be hugely underserved and hence, see this approach as key to driving our India win. Our platform will be as relevant to the urban elite as it is to the new digital audiences experiencing Internet for the first time. India’s digital story is going to be fuelled by new language consumers and that’s exactly who ZEE5 is for. Our Brand Anthem celebrates this spirited new India, globally savvy, yet happiest in the language of their comfort. Keeping in mind the distinct audiences, two versions of the anthem have been created - one for the North market and one for the South, each catering to the specific market nuances for authenticity and connect. Hats off to the trio of Nitesh Tiwari, Amit Trivedi and Amitabh Bhattacharya for creating an anthem that is just so much fun, and to our creative agency BBH for working with us on the same.” 

On rolling out the free and behind the pay wall content, Anand said, “We are going to have a large bouquet of content on our free side, but all of our Originals, digital first, premium international content, theatres and content of our Zindagi channel will be behind the pay wall. Having said that, we have a lot of catch-ups, movies, and regional content which are on the free side.” 

Citing the reason for putting Originals behind the pay wall, she explained that there is a market that appreciates the value of great content and are willing to pay for it. She further said, “I think it’s a story that we have built that Indians don’t pay, they pay for a lot of things. The fact is that they need to see the value, and with ZEE5, the most beautiful work we have done is that we are foraying in with 12 languages. A lot of people talk about regional, but ours will be the most authentic boost. Our offering is very rich in 360 ways with live TV, movies, music, originals, regional shows, news.” 

As far as the Original content is concerned, ZEE5 intends to be very prolific. The platform has launched with no less than 8 shows and going forward, every month one new show will be launched. “We have some fabulous content lined up, which includes long form, short form, binge watch, 5-6 minute content. So, we have a variety of formats completely catering to digital,” Anand added.  

Apart from giving viewers a large variety of language options, there are also a slew of international shows. “We believe that storytelling should not be curtailed because of language,” she maintained. ZEE5 is also doing a lot of content acquisitions. 

ZEE5 also has a strong focus on Theatres and Kids genres, which are also being explored heavily by competitors like Hotstar and Voot. When asked how ZEE5 would be strategising to differentiate its content in these genres, Anand replied, “If I worry about the fact that competitions are doing well in the genres, considering the time when we have launched, then how would we have done it at all. I think we have come in the market with a clear strategy and great offering that intends to address the real need gap of the Indians. I don’t think anyone can deny that on the Internet today only 2 per cent of the masses are consuming English content; the rest are watching national or regional content. We really want to become a go-to destination for all these new people coming into the digital bandwagon. I believe that there is a very big gap that will be genuinely solved by the new platform and it’s a perfect time for the brand to launch.” 

Speaking further on the Kids’ genre, she said that ZEE had been working a lot on kids’ content in the regional space. The group is partnering with a lot of companies, in fact, ZEE has acquired one company that is working on kids’ content. “We really believe that there is tremendous potential in this space. For now, this will also remain behind the pay wall,” she informed. 

Anand stressed that in all this, the focus would remain on great storytelling, and only then would come the monetisation. According to her, “If you are making content with the idea of making money, then you will not be able to tell great stories. The idea is to create great stories for the people and monetisation is business of business people like me.” 

When asked why ZEE had gone for launching an altogether new digital platform instead of building on its already existing platforms like Ozee and Ditto, Anand replied, “With Ditto, we were pioneers in the OTT space in India in 2012. At that time, the ecosystem wasn’t evolved, the bandwidth was horribly expensive and the infrastructure wasn’t there, but today we have Reliance Jio, great infrastructure, cheap bandwidth, and smartphone penetration has increased. It was a natural transition for ZEE as a biggest media conglomerate to future push its business and get into digital. While we have launched a new brand which has gone global and becomes our single digital destination across the globe, Ditto and Ozee both exist within ZEE5 but not as a brand. Consumers will seamlessly move to ZEE5 and the definition of Live TV will be there with Zee TV (Ditto TV) and definition of Catch-up will also be provided by ZEE5 (Ozee). They both will seamlessly migrate to the new property – ZEE5. The moment you log on to Ozee, it will upgrade it to ZEE5 in wi-fi zone, while for Ditto it will ask you for the upgrade. Along with this, we also have our news channel with live streaming on this platform.”

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