Amid much fanfare and with some claimed explosive breaking News, Republic TV was launched on 6th of May. Available across MSOs and DTH platforms, Republic TV will also be aired on Hotstar.
Looking at the launch advertising campaign and content for first few days, it seems to be positioned at young India metro. Currently all English News channels combined covers about 0.2% of total TV viewing population in India. With 4 English News channels already operating in this market, any new player would find it daunting to garner share.
Times Now continues to be the market leader even after Arnab’s exit. However, the margin between No. 1 and 2 is much smaller now than what used be in pre November 2016 days. Now with the launch of Republic TV, the leadership position will further get challenged.
As per an article in Livemint: “Broadcast Audience Research Council (Barc) India shows that the ratings for the time slot between 9 PM and 11 PM on Times NOW have dropped significantly since Goswami left the show on 14 November. According to average four weeks (week 43 to week 46) data before he quit, this time slot saw .198 million impressions. In the four weeks after Goswami left, the same slot saw its number of impressions decline to .163 million (in week 47 to week 50). In fact prime time registered an even lower viewership in week 51 to week 2, at .076 million. Impressions refer to the number of individuals a target audience who viewed an event, averaged across minutes.”
In terms of advertising, brands have been uneasy with Times Now since Arnab’s exit. Brands like Patanjali have significantly brought down their spending. Will these marketing Rupees go to Republic or CNN IBN or India Today TV still needs to be seen.
Advertising rates for Republic TV is quite competitive. Check out the rates to advertise on Republic TV here. With pre launch tie ups, there already seems to be some traction to Republic TV brand. What will be interesting is how these brands and rates behave once BARC starts reporting the impressions. Analysis would run on who is losing or the English News category is gaining overall.
Keep watching this space for more.
