Media Organizations Must Brace Analytics

By Punam Sharrma, Director at MediaGuru Singapore

Punam Sharrma, Director at MediaGuru Singapore

The success of Star Wars franchise is no surprise, snapshot of how Harry Potter has aged over the decade long film series made it a box office prince and failed run of ‘The Lone Ranger’ could have been salvaged by data analyst. Welcome to the whole new universe of data analytics in the Media and Entertainment industry. The Media and Entertainment world uses analytics to draw revelations on revenue, ratings, viewer capacity, show attendance, number of prints, and most interestingly it can also foresee the possibility of winning the awards. It helps in slicing-and- dicing the viewer sentiment to make more informed business decisions as well as produce niche content catering to different palate of audiences. The major stakeholders- the viewers, the content producers and distributors, and the advertisers stand to remain benefitted by the emerging trends in effective analytics.

"Investment decisions of advertisers are now majorly driven by well-researched data and analytics"

Viewer is the King Maker

Today’s consumers are more content-warm than ever before. They are viewing, listening or sharing content constantly. Viewers seek constant access to content which is distinct to their preferences. With the explosion of digital media, consumers are now in the driving seat and they are demanding more content anytime, anywhere and on any device they want. Based on reviews, ratings and trends available, viewers decide on what they’d like to view. This data, in turn, helps media sector to understand the consumer sentiment, behavior and enhancethe viewer experience by offering relevant content and apply these insights into day to day operations. Viewers today have plenty of options to choose from and therefore, it has become important for the content creators, owners and distributors to clearly understand their consumers' expectations and preferences.

Trial of Content Distributors

Viewer-friendly content alone is not sufficient, it has to carry the potential of driving the traffic, capture more eyeballs and retain its loyal consumers.

That is exactly where content distributors come to play. Broadcasters and content distributors have to offer a good content mix to their audience. Content strategy involving decisions like type of content to be produced or procured, right platform, time, frequency, content promotion using alternate channels, duration of commercial breaks etc. need to be based on elaborate data analytics. Identifying and predicting content for its viewers is crucial for content producers. Netflix’s bid for ‘House of Cards’ is a classic case study of analytics in media. While bidding for ‘House of Cards’ Netflix knew that it was a high net-worth property. It bought superior data based on its rigorous analysis of viewers’ habits over many millions of viewings of shows. They were aware of the qualities which would make the show hit, the duration for which viewers stuck with similar format programs through seasons and the characters which left strongest imprint. That confidence allowed Netflix to make a bolder bid and win the show followed by three Emmy awards.The recent advances in digital production and distribution prompted by Redbox and Hulu have extended the overall productivity and reach of the industry. Social Media predicted the U.S Presidential Elections far better than the traditional sources.

Data driven Advertising

Investment decisions of advertisers are now majorly driven by well-researched data and analytics. Most organizations aspire to optimize their advertising effort. Current innovations in data analytics provide organizations timely information on statistic and psychographic features of a product. Such insights are applied for more cohesive target marketing initiative thereby increasing the ROI extensively. Data Analytics minimize the spillage cost of advertisement budget to a great extent. Procter & Gamble, one of the biggest global advertisers aspires to reach targeting accuracy through big data. When Facebook was launched in 2005, little did we know that its social media advertising revenue will touch approximately $8.4billion in 2015.“This Girl Can” Campaign of Sport England and FCB England is typical example where advertising budget was plugged based on research, data and analytics and it brought about desired results. The campaign had budget of $10million resulting in the video being watched 36 million times in Face book &influenced 1.2 million women in Youtube to begin exercising and that is where the life cycle of data analytics came full circle. Just by defining their target market, advertisers can get to their audience with a minimal media spillage. Analytics on digital media help them optimize their campaigns for overall spend, reach and ROI.

Future Note

Media and Entertainment industry is going through a transformational phase. Content has achieved insane upgrade in form of OTT (Over-the-top.) where content is delivered via internet without an operator (MSO). HBO NOW, OTT subscription video service offering full access to its library and original programming, was launched in the face of stiff competition by Netflix. The face of change sees emergence of VOD (Video-on-demand) players like Amazon and HOOQ. Invaluable professionals with analytical skills, cohesive competitive analysis and higher Return-on-Investment metrics will become order of the day. Coming decades will possibly see analytics play more power packed role than the age-old sixth sense, a predictive model will leverage more revenue than just major star cast and algorithm will put stamp on the box office collections.

Headquartered in India with offices in Singapore, South Africa and UAE, MediaGuru Singapore is a provider of end-to-end solutions and services such as digitization, digital media, technology solutions, and consulting to broadcasters and media organizations.