The Newspaper Market in Gujarat Has Been Literally Set on Fire With the Launch of Divya Bhaskar...

7/27/2019 The Newspaper Market in Gujarat Has Been Literally Set on Fire With the Launch of Divya Bhaskar Three Months

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The newspaper market in Gujarat has been literally set on fire with the launch of Divya Bhaskar three

months ago.

The newspaper was launched in Ahmedabad with 453,000 copies, pre-sold, placing it on par with the

existing No1 in the market, Gujarat Samachar, a phenomenon achieved by none earlier in the Indian

newspaper industry.

The Gujarat market till then had been dominated by two newspapers, Sandesh, launched in 1923 and

Gujarat Samachar in 1932. On June 22, 2003, Dainik Bhaskar Group, the leader in Indian language

newspapers launched Divya Bhaskar in Ahmedabad, its first venture out of its traditional Hindi market.

Says a confident, Sudhir Agarwal, managing director, Dainik Bhaskar, "The decision to enter Gujarat was

taken in the beginning of 2002. For almost a year we studied the market, in terms of both product and

advertising before we actually entered the state. Further, Gujarat is one market, which still has huge

untapped potential.

Bhaskar has achieved its success, due to its innovative marketing strategies. A strategy that has evolved

at the time of its 1996 launch of Jaipur edition.

Every city that Bhaskar has entered, it was done through an elaborate consumer contact program, a door

to door survey. As a result, eight lakh plus households in Ahmedabad and 3.5 lakh households in the

upcountry districts like Mehsana and Anand, were called on in the month of March.

Says L K Dubey, circulation manager, Divya Bhaskar, The key findings of the survey were that 90 per

cent of the people wanted an unbiased newspaper.

After having recorded the consumer response and analysed it, Bhaskar started the second round of

consumer contact program called chali tumhari marzi. And they returned to 7.5 lakh plus households, 5.5

lakh in Ahmedabad and 2.5 lakh households upcountry.

The proposed newspaper had more pages, more colour and an innovative magazine format. Along with

these innovations in content, Bhaskar has also launched an innovation in an attempt to garner highershare in advertising revenue.

With no Audit Bureau of Circulation certificate being available for at least one-and-a-half -year, Bhaskar is

confronted with the reality of having to prove their efficiency as an advertising platform. For this, it has

launched a Direct Response Test exercise.

Bhaskar has commissioned a readership survey through AC Nielson ORG MARG in Ahmedabad, with a

sample size, which is almost similar to that of IRS and NRS.

This research has declared Divya Bhaskar as the largest read Gujarati newspaper in the city. It has a

readership base of 12.11 lakh and Gujarat Samachar stands at Number 2 position with 10.02 lakh

readers.

The future plans of Divya Bhaskar involve launching three more editions in Gujarat; Surat, Baroda and

Rajkot in 2004 and in Mumbai in 2005.

According to Agarwal, "The total investment in the entire project is to the tune of Rs. 250 crore. We will

maintain a debt equity ratio of 65:35. Debt is being raised through the banks and the rest will be through

internal capital generation."


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NEW REPORTWhenever Dainik Bhaskar, a media group, enters a new market, it uses direct marketing to establish a leadership position from

day one. Here is the story onthe transformation that happened inside the organisation because of this strategy.

In 1996, when we began transforming our group into a customer centric organisation it was difficult for us to accept the fact that

someone called the consumer exists and that he would henceforth have a greater influence in the way we publish the newspaper.

To cite an instance, during the launch of the Chandigarh edition of the Dainik Bhaskar, the pre-launch customer preference survey

showed that readers in that area preferred a newspaper in Hinglish (the spoken language, a mixture of Hindi and English) to pure

Hindi.

To gain popularity we had to adapt that language in the newspaper. So in this case the customers actually decided the language the

edition would carry. This was a new experience for us, especially the journalists and editors, and had a huge impact on the

organisation, its processes and its structure. Certain changes have now become a norm in our organisation.

Mind the gap

Involving the customer from the word go is a radical change in strategy, but we have adopted it across the Dainik Bhaskar group for

all our projects. We realised that there is a gap between the entrepreneur's perception of the market requirements and the actual

market needs. This gap may actually be quite minor and inconsequential from the management's view-point but it can make a huge

difference in the way customers perceive the product. Bridging this gap then becomes essential to win customer trust.

In our case, instead of designing the newspaper and then hoping to generate sales, we involve the customers, collect their

requirements, their suggestions and then design the project accordingly. This strategy has made the difference between success

and failure in many instances.

Let me illustrate. When we planned to start our Chandigarh edition, we looked to buy a property in a suburb called Panchkula as it

was economical and also suited our needs. But during the course of a conversation with a reader from Chandigarh, I came to know

that if we wanted readers to perceive our paper to be as prestigious as the Tribune, we should operate from an imposing building in

the centre of the town and not the outskirts. So this set us thinking, and in the end, we invested in a Rs 3.5 crore (Rs 35 million)

property in the city centre as against the Rs 50 lakh (Rs 5 million) we had actually planned. This extra investment ensured that

people perceived us as a Chandigarh paper right from day one and not just as any other newspaper.

Pricing against the market

I strongly believe that the market is no one to set the prices. As entrepreneurs engaged in the day-to-day running of the

organisation, only we know the pros and cons of what price the customers will accept for our product, of how much we can take and

how much we cannot.


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Pricing is ultimately the entrepreneur's decision based on the market affordability and the nature of his product. Take telecom rates

as an example. An owner of a telecom company once told me that two and a half years ago, his company prepared a report, which

said that if they priced below Rs X per minute the company will be doomed. Today even after selling at half that price the company

is making three times more profit than what it was earning three years ago.

There will be times when you may want to introduce a premium product at a price point which the current market pricing will not

accommodate. But if you are firm in saying that you want this price and are confident of it, you will definitely get it. In the newspaper

industry, pricing plays a huge role, but we have realised that pricing is not a standalone element. Quality is as important in deter-

mining success. Customers will never accept average quality; they want value addition in their product. They expect their rupee to

go the extra mile and give them the best quality.

Flexibility is key

No system or plan is sacrosanct. Systems and plans are essential but they should be flexible enough to undergo a last minute

change. Otherwise they become a bottleneck. This was an important lesson we learnt during the Ahmedabad [ Images] launch. We

had initially planned two city supplements for Ahmedabad as Ahmedabad is a city of 5mn readers. One edition would cover eastern

Ahmedabad and the other the west, thereby providing more local news. So we planned our processes to accommodate two

editions. But a reader survey revealed that though readers residing in the eastern suburb may not frequently travel to the west, they

like to be up-to-date on happenings in the western part of the city and stay connected with their social circle residing there. Acceding

to market demands we had to combine the editions and make the necessary changes in our systems.

Customer choice played a similar role in Chandigarh. Here we planned a feature based city supplement to our main paper. It was to

be printed earlier than the main paper, saving costs. However, we discovered that customers preferred a news based supplement.

We had to change our process and print it along with the main sheet. This called for a major process change and we had to

reschedule our activities.

Nothing comes cheap

Haryana is just about six hours drive from Chandigarh. So when we conceived the Haryana project we planned to print the edition

from Chandigarh. But much to our surprise, we discovered that readers in Haryana resented a paper printed from Chandigarh.

There was a feeling that, "I am Haryana, I am Panipat, I am Karnal and why should Chandigarh play boss to me". So we had to

change our plans: we infused fresh capital and set up two presses at Panipet and Hissar. The extra investment made in Chandigarh

to feed Haryana was a setback. But we had to do it because the market demanded that. But in the end the success of the Haryana

edition made it worthwhile.

Sometimes we have no option but to invest in extra infrastructure to get an edge over competition. In printing, editorial matter is laid

out, color separated and printed on acetate sheets (called positives), which are then photosynthesised onto metal rollers, which are

mounted on the printing presses.

We are now contemplating investing in the latest printing process where editorial material transfers straight from the computer to the

plate, without going for positives. This saves about fifteen minutes time. To save those fifteen minutes for the customer we are

contemplating a move, which involves changing the entire process.
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But we have to do it; we just have no other choice, especially in our business where time is of the essence and we compete with a

dynamic media like television. A normal household generally goes to sleep by 11 o'clock in the evening and any news between

11pm and the time we wake up will catch the customer's interest. So we have to continuously extend the time we can work, see until

how late into the night we can cover events.

Ultimately it is your call

You can conduct a survey, get customer feedback, get advertisers' feedback, the works. But ultimately it is your decision. Your

customer can say he wants X, Y and Z. But to what extent you want customer needs incorporated in your plan is up to you.

This is the biggest decision and it depends on the entrepreneur's or the marketer's skill. At times you may try to short change your

customer based on your convenience. Sometimes you may be able to get away with it, but personally we do not think it is possible.

You can put your foot down and say I will give in only this much to customer demands. Or you can take a call on your costing,

growth and other needs and try and find a compromise.

And this decision differs from company to company. Some companies may say I will not let my profitability be affected. Some will

take more risk and see how it works. Some will strive to achieve a balance. I will try to satisfy a part of the customer's demand. If the

customer is asking 100 per cent, I shall give 50 per cent. That's a call that companies have to take.

There is no fixed formula and there cannot be also because it is so subjective, so dependent on human vagaries. In some markets a

price cut works wonders and in others, it doesn't.

Recently in two of our markets the competition started a price war by slashing prices. In one market we also reduced the cover price

and we doubled numbers but in the other one we grew the numbers without the price slash. It is not just luck. Broadly speaking luck

is the environment around you. Earlier you may not have studied it properly. It a ll depends on the marketer's perception.

The Newspaper Market in Gujarat Has Been Literally Set on Fire With the Launch of Divya Bhaskar...

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