 Hello and welcome to the second edition of our webinar series on news is undervalued brought to you in association with ABP news. In these times of distress and a complete lockdown, it's news that is our ears, eyes and hope. And when we talk of news, it is not what we get through forwards or posts but authentic, factual and credible news that comes to us through reliable sources. That is being put together by journalists and editors, sometimes we're putting their lives at risk. So the question we need to ask ourselves is, do we value it enough? And to answer this and many other questions that live audiences will throw at us, we have Mr. Ashish Prasheen, CEO, APAC Dan and Chairman Dan India. Welcome to the webinar, sir. Happy to hear, Nazia. So sir, we've been doing these series of webinars to understand the news genre which has seen almost 200% hype in its worship in the last seven, eight weeks that we have been at home. Do you think despite these unprecedented numbers that have come up, news is getting the value and the price it deserves? So first, let me begin with the disclaimer that I'm an interested party in this and the reason being that not just in COVID times but I'm a very voracious consumer of news. Even on normal days, I read at least four newspapers, I watch lots and lots of news channels and I'm constant. So as a consumer, I'm a news freak, you can say in that sense. But having said that, so therefore I personally do find news very, very valuable. I think the times that we are currently going through are very strange. You mentioned two things, you mentioned value and you mentioned price. To my mind, those are two very different things. Does news bring value? Of course, it brings tremendous amount of value and particularly in uncertain times like these, where there's a high level of anxiety, everybody wants to know. As a consumer, you want to know. When Lavagarwal, the health secretary, every day comes and talks about what happened the last day all over the country, I'm glued to try and put it between my calls and try to find out what's the latest update. So the value that news brings is undeniable. I can't imagine how people don't watch more of news even in normal times in that sense. Price is something which is entirely different. Price is a function of market forces. Price is a function of supply and demand. We are currently in a very strange scenario where the viewerships are significantly going up on news. Like you said, 200%. I don't have the latest figures, but significantly going up. But there isn't enough advertising to cover it because the markets are closed. Markets are shut and other than few brands which are active, the universe of advertising has significantly shrunk. So therefore, there isn't that much of advertising. So I'm not sure if it will directly result immediately in price. But in the long run, I absolutely agree with the fact that it is a genre that brings in a hell of a lot of value. Not just in television, even in newspaper and even in some of the digital websites. And it is definitely hitting below its potential in my view. Sir, I have two questions. One, you said that because a lot of production is shut and brands are not advertising. But despite that, if you compare news genre right now with other genres, I think news is still doing far better than others. I mean, one of your last three person was telling me that news is still getting like 40-50% of the inventory is going into news. That is expected. I don't know what percentage is going in, but that is expected because that much of your ship is going in there. And if I were an advertiser, I would also want to put my brands on news on that. But by news, I presume you're meeting television news because in newspapers, there's another issue is that distribution is now slowly coming back, but the distribution of newspapers itself was impacted in many cities, including continuous to be even today in parts of Mumbai. So as far as television news is concerned, it is a great time. If you have to advertise, it's a great time in my view to advertise in general and specifically to advertise on news because it's not only viewership, it is the level of engagement. I mean, today, it's almost appointment viewing. You're almost waiting for the 9 o'clock show or the 4 o'clock press conference or something. And with everybody at home and everybody anxious and anxiety level so high, the level of engagement with news is extremely high at the moment. So yes, whatever advertising is there, a good portion of that is coming in on to news. But I wish there was a bigger universe and more would come on to it. My second question is like you said that these are the times that not a lot of people are advertising. But if you look at news genre throughout 2019, we had looked up elections and we had back to that state elections and there was a lot that was happening throughout the year. Even in that year, pre-COVID days, do you think that news was getting its due? I mean, people were still watching news. No, absolutely not. I think it deserves more and I think there are various reasons for it. One of the reasons, of course, is that I feel there are too many channels. I mean, my own thinking is that in any genre, not just in news, in the long run, there'll be no more than 3 to 5 players that will survive. Because there isn't space for that many. There will be consolidations. Some will occupy niche spaces but main players will be 3 to 5. I think in news, the number of players first of all is a bit too much so it does get a bit fragmented. Quite apart from that, there is a general perception that news is more a male skewed genre, etc. And some of these are factual and some of these are just deep-seated perceptions. I don't think news genre has done a good enough job to market itself. They're too busy competing with each other. If you watch any news channel, since I am an avid viewer of news channels, I can tell you that we have 16 number one news channels in India. Because every news channel that you put on, you can cut and slice and dice every data and you'll be number one in something, right? I'm the best male in... You're all breaking the same story as exclusive story. And everybody is breaking news, everybody is in that. So I think that whole focus unfortunately has been how to cannibalize or how to fight with, you know, I'm better than you, my viewership is bigger than yours. I just wish that as a genre they had taken a slightly different view and that view would be that we are a genre that gives you consumer engagement like no other genre can, right? When you're watching news, particularly if a serious event is going on and it's not necessarily COVID related like you said, it would be the budget, it would be elections, it would be anything, the level of engagement is so, so high. I think if that were marketed well enough and substantiated by facts, it would and it should get much better than what it is. It's actually detrimental to this genre that everybody is bickering with all the players on it. So if there are news associations and news bodies and that also is now fragmented. I believe there are two of them instead of one, I'm not the expert on that. But I think it would do them well for their common cause to come together and educate clients, media buyers and planners, as well as public at large that what is the importance of news in your life. I think that will eventually lead to more eyeballs and whenever there are eyeballs it leads to more advertising. Also what we have seen in last few years, there's a sudden search in the number of mediums giving out news. You have so many forwards. So does that also make now traditional news houses like print or newspapers more important because you at least can rely on these, on the sources they... In my view, it definitely does because I think the biggest generator of news is the University of WhatsAppology these days and you never know which of that is fake. In fact, you do know most of it is fake in that sense. But it's very difficult, half of the time it's very difficult to figure out. I mean at least to... It sounds so credible, right? And as a consumer, you're not even sure whether it is right or wrong. But I think the biggest trick news is missing. What is news as biggest USP? News as biggest USP is credibility, right? And presumably the bigger television houses, the bigger publications and some of the... Not bigger but I mean the well-established publications, well-established news houses, television centers and some of the digital news players, they should bring in that credibility so that the non-credible news gets filtered out. That's their biggest strength. Unfortunately, they don't play on that strength. The fact that it is... And the reason why they are not playing on that is they're busy saying the other guy is not credible, right? Instead of saying that news that comes to you from certain set of television channels, certain type of publications or certain digital is really credible. This is real information. This is not what you will get on the Institute of WhatsAppology. Instead of saying that, they're saying, I'm the right guy. This other guy has got it all wrong. That's all rubbish. They're biased, etc., etc. And you know, I'm also not... I also don't buy that argument that you only watch news for news and you shouldn't have views. That's for the consumer. I watch some channels for views. I know clearly that they have certain biases on certain topics but I watch it to get that point of view and I watch another channel which might have a diametrically opposite point of view to get their point of view. So the news houses not only today give you news but also give you views which as a consumer are important for you and important for you to have the balance. I think if you can bring in credibility instead of trying to dice data to show that you're the best because that fools nobody in the end, I think it will do the news genre a lot more benefit in the long run. And in times like these, I mean, from a news perspective, I don't... viewership perspective, I don't think you'll ever get a time as good as this. So what I've understood so far is that first they need to stop competing within themselves and position themselves better to the clients and the marketers as what their real USPs are. I mean that they have eyeballs, they are in position to give credible news and what else do you think they can do to prove their... I'm not saying they should start competing with each other. I mean, you have to compete, you're in the marketplace and you will compete but it can't be the only thing you're doing and don't denigrate each other. Because in a way, when you denigrate each other, you kind of bring the whole genre down in that sense if you're repeatedly, constantly doing it over a period of time. It's like a common minimum program. The news channels need to come together and evolve that for the industry, for our genre, this is like the base which all of us will do. Of course they have to compete, it's a business establishment, it's not for profit, it's not, you know, so therefore I'm not against the competition. I'm just saying that collectively if they can... Shift the focus. Shift the focus and agree on a certain minimum thing which is of interest to everybody. That might just help in that process. Sorry, I interrupted your question. We have some 10 minutes left and I would want viewers to now send us questions from Mr. Basin. Sir, one last thing I want to understand from you is how do they address this fragmentation issue? Because it all started with print, you know, more additions, more ads, then it came to television, you start bringing in a regional channel and too many channels. So are they competing with within themselves? Is it helping? So if you can elaborate on the fragmentation issue. Look, it's different in print in my view and different in television. I think having district-wise additions or more and more additions is not a bad thing because today a consumer wants local information. If I'm sitting in Bareilly, I want to know what is happening around me in addition to what's happening nationally or globally. So it's not a bad thing and that's of much higher interest to me. You also get your local advertisers. Well, I mean, I'm going the other way round. I'm first saying that from a consumer's point of view that does make sense and therefore there is a need for it over there. Of course, if you have it then you will get your local advertisers, your retailers, etc. who may not need to advertise nationally but in that area they might be big enough players and therefore you can. So I think that's the right thing for print but you can't overdo it. You cannot go on fragmenting it and then trying to fill that by coming. So it's that balance that has to be found. As far as television is concerned, I think there will definitely be a consolidation and that will happen across the industry, partly forced by digital and partly forced by the fact that there just isn't that much space for so many players. Many of them have their business model based almost entirely based on advertising. There isn't that much of advertising going around. In general, news in India has to start valuing itself and has to start charging for itself. Our newspapers are the cheapest in the world. Today, thankfully, Seba of India was very gracious and he's sending me newspapers from the physical copy because I feel very incomplete without it. I tweeted that and he was kind enough to send that. But today, if I weren't getting my newspaper, if somebody said, will you pay 50 rupees to get your newspaper, I would pay 50 rupees to get it. There is no reason why my newspaper should be charged at 50 rupees. I mean, you have to have confidence in your product and you have to start charging the right price over a period of time and not rely solely on advertising. I think the universe there is limited and in fact is not going to grow for a while and it could do news well to start believing in itself and charging for itself to the consumer who's consuming it. You've almost answered the question asked by Raguna Thais. When masses are subscribing to a number of oddity platforms by paying substantial prices, what's your advice? Should print raise the cost of subscription to rupees 15 to 20 a copy and be a credible medium? I don't know whether 15 to 20 or what's the right price point but I definitely feel they should raise it but before raising it, you have to add more value. Otherwise, why as a consumer will I pay that? Also, it's something that the whole ecosystem will have to do. If one person raises it and all the other players don't it's not likely that person is going to be able to sustain it for long. So if you value your product, if you are adding more value to your consumer then I think you have a right to charge a little more for that value and gradually over a period of time get it to a right level. You cannot keep it artificially suppressed forever because if you are relying on advertising, the advertising universe is not growing. A lot of questions are coming to us for print media. I'll clap the questions. One is how the print media will compete in the existing circumstances and there's another one who wants to know what should print do differently to get back to the younger readers. I think both the answers are in some ways connected. This is a very difficult time for everybody but for print it is particularly a difficult time because there was already a trend. English newspapers particularly were under pressure even before the COVID situation happened. The original press was still, regional readership was still doing okay and that ties in with what I was saying that you want your local news etc. However, there is a big opportunity. Print players in my view have missed an opportunity. They still have a chance to do it. They cannot fight digital, they have to adopt digital. If I am getting my news, today for example when you weren't getting the newspaper, when you aren't getting the newspaper you are reading a digital version of that. Either through a PDF or through a website etc. Over a period of time, I think they have the best ability to distribute news. They have the best ability to gather that news. They have to stop this that this is print and this is digital and digital is impacting print and print is dying because of digital. They have to adapt it. They have to have their strategies together and they have to start monetizing that as well. That is the way the consumer is going. That is the way the young reader is going. If they keep ignoring it, I think it's at their peril. They have to see digital and print together in my view. We have discussed this question in brief but you can give a detailed, elaborate answer also to this because this is also the theme that we are discussing. Credible news comes at a price. Shouldn't the ad also follow the credible news channels and the print media, whatever medium gives you the credible news. Is this how the ad should be driven or should only be driven as per the eyeballs? A lot of news channels have also started giving you too much of entertainment kind of stuff. The fact is that advertising follows eyeballs. It depends on the context in which you are advertising. This makes a big difference. The key primary thing is that I am paying so much. How many viewers am I getting at what price? That is the basis on which... Viewers in my target audience are eliminating the base stage. Fortunately or unfortunately, the people who do what some people call not credible are the ones who get maximum eyeballs. If you get eyeballs, that means viewers are going there. If they are going there, advertising will start flowing there over a period of time. I think what's important is that there will be different niches that different people can occupy. There are some channels that can become more premium, more credible. For example, the positioning of Hindu as a newspaper is different from the positioning of Times of India as a newspaper. It's different from positioning of Hindustan Times as a newspaper. Somebody stands for something, somebody else stands for something. So I think over a period of time, they have to start evolving their positioning and their strategy, their monetizing strategy should be according to what suits their positioning. I think that will be the long-term direction. A question that Mr Chaudhary has sent is also a little similar to what we were just discussing. Do you also agree that digital news publications will have to go behind the paywall because they need to create differentiated content as readers need value? It will have its own strategy, but in general, yes. However, in India, I've also noticed that people don't want to pay for content. Everybody assumes that if it is on the internet, it is free. The only people who first, I think, kind of burst this to a small extent is Netflix because that's one place where they started charging for content and have got people in substantial numbers to do so. I would still be keen to see how it expands because it's easy to get the top 1%, 5%, 10% in the market in India about how it expands down the pop-strat upward, but at least they've made a beginning. By and large, people are very averse. Other than a small band of people, they're very averse for paying on that. So every digital news channel will have to strike that balance. How much do they put behind the paywall and which they will be serious readers or will want to pay for that? And how much of it do they keep it free or get more traffic and therefore subsidize it through advertising? So I know you have to log out by 12. I'll take up this last question. It has been sent up by Mr. Sundeep Nagwal. How does a news channel or the genre as a whole establish its ability to engage? After all, it is so intangible and that too relative to other genres. Do you suggest that news channels conduct their own research individually or syndicated? I think it is... So as far as the viewership research is there, there is a common accepted currency which is Bach and I don't think there is a need for doing a separate research on that. But on qualitative factors, it's very easy to establish engagement. It's not very difficult. A little bit of research if it is done and it might vary from player to player. But let's say if the news players got together and if they did a study, I'm pretty sure what they will come out with is that in times of crisis, in times of events, in times of elections, in many, many, many times the engagement level will be many, many times higher with news than it will be with any other genre. So yes, there needs to be that research and more importantly, even if that is a research, it has to be used for educating both the readers, the advertisers and the advertising agencies. There's no point in just doing the research if it's not going to be used. Yes. The last question I want to ask you is we have seen that there is surge in the viewership during the COVID-19 time for news channels. How do you see the future? Like going ahead once this is settled, I mean this will take very long to settle. But do you think overall the genre will benefit and this viewership surge will continue even after this lockdown is over and things start to get back to normal. If you can give me some example from China because that's one market to understand and better than most of us because you're heading that market as well. What has been the trend there for the news channels? I can't say to be an expert on China. But in general in China, digital is far more stronger and prevalent than it is in India, both in percentages and so on. But coming back to India, I don't think these kind of viewerships will be sustained after, I mean just how people are in lockdown. So it's not just news. Every genre is benefitting, digital is benefitting because people are at home, they have nothing else to do. They are going to watch TV or are going to be online. So I think one of the growing genres is going to be news. Generally advertising will not do well and you're absolutely right for most parts of this year. Presumably around Diwali is when we might start in the first signs of upturn but until that time it's not going to be great. But on a relative sense, I think the growth of news as a genre will be more and a lot of it will depend upon the news players themselves. What are they able to do? Just now the difference scenario, it's an emergency situation. This is not going to last forever. Whether it is 18th May or 18th June, one day it will open up and things will start going back to normal. It is then what they do and then how they behave and then how they act which will determine how many consumers come back, how sticky are those eyeballs and how long they are able to sustain this growth. But by and large I'm optimistic. I feel the base of news is low in India and it can only grow. Yeah, five minutes. Can I take one more question? There are so many questions coming in. Credibility is a subjective analogy. Media bias attached how much of importance on this parameter? Because a lot of the way media planning and buying is done today is done based on data, based on facts. But wherever, and there are enough examples of this, wherever you are able to convince the media planner or the media buyer. And remember that a media planner's job is a very, very difficult job. They've overworked and they've got hundreds of channels and newspapers and digital sites on which they are A, relying on data but B also on their own instinct etc. Wherever over a period of time a channel or a genre has been able to convince that look we are more credible than the other person. There is some premium you've always been able to attract. You can see it in programming as well even within a channel. If the program is credible in that sense or is of a higher order, higher quality as far as consumers is concerned there is a little bit of a premium gets attached but that happens over a period of time. That is not a substitute for getting numbers. Finally, advertising will follow eyeballs. So it's not a substitute for that. It is in addition to that. Before we close, if I can just sum it up the discussion that we have had today. Correct me if I get anything wrong. One what I've understood is that news genre is likely to perform much better than other genres throughout the year and it's likely to evolve better because of various factors. And one of the things, couple of things that it must do to evolve which Mr. Basin has suggested is that position itself better to the marketers and clients more as someone who's as a medium that is engaging and giving you credible news then competing amongst themselves. And they also need to address the issue of fragmentation how do they address the issue of fragmentation because that's not really in their own control. That market forces will address over a period of time they will be weaker, stronger players will buy over the weaker players some will merge, some will close down etc. So that you cannot do but I think the biggest message I would like to leave is that the biggest strength of news is credibility. Every news channel, every newspaper, every digital source of whatever is the credibility which is most important. That credibility itself is coming under question. And because it's coming under question for a lot of players it's actually now coming under question for the whole genre itself in some ways. That's their biggest asset. They need to build on that credibility. Everybody today understands that news coming from WhatsApp is not to be relied upon. Everybody is looking for a credible source of news. More that you can build on credibility and position yourself on credibility and hear your lab to walk the talk, not just put a slogan that I'm credible. I think the better it will be in the long run for the players as well as for the shop. Thank you so much Mr. Basin for joining us. I'll repeat that the session was brought to you in association with AVP news and we have three more parts to this series. We'll be back next week with another very senior industry person. We'll give you more insight on the news genre. Thank you so much Mr. Basin for joining us. Thanks a lot for all the audiences. I couldn't take so many questions because Mr. Basin has a very hectic day and we promised him that we would close the session by 12 o'clock because he has too many things to attend. Thanks everyone. Thank you very much.