IPL | Social Networking and New Markets

Can IPL5 make a comeback for advertisers?

January 17, 2012 Leave a comment

After four editions of the IPL that went successfully for advertisers, the last one saw a decline of 40% in average viewership from 5 to a little over 3 in TRP ratings. With 160 mln viewers expected this year again across the 70 odd matches, the sponsors may not lack visual display opportunities but add on advertisers esp those who pay match day list prices may not be willing to keep the budget for IPL5. that’s still 5 mln people per game in this countruy of 1.1 bln with 500 mln Tv Sets (300 mln TV households )

Global sports brands like the Superbowl will also be looking at lower aud

Image via Wikipedia

ience participation this year , even the NBA restricted to a smaller schedule. Only the premier league has managed the usual 200 mln plus audiences other than a disappointing Liverpool year for Stanchart, and the Top 3 moving down, viewership kept up nby new teams like QPR and our own Venky’s Blackburn.

Chennai of course will not be primary this year both Srikanth and Dhoni having stolen sponsor dollars with their non performance outside India and irreparably damaged the Superkings brand for some. There will still be Indians, Gayle force , unless he has retired, Royal Challengers and others.

Sponsors and ad buyers may also split budgets from the IPL 5 this year in favor of the Diwali F1 extravaganza and SET MAX might not hang on to list prices on the card for long. Last year the rates had jumped between 500k to 900k per 10 seconds, from 300k per 10 seconds in the opening year. Superbowl spots still retail for a $1 mln per spot

The latest edition of the IPL starts two months after Superbowl Sunday.

Also read our Superbowl opener for Marketers
Are you ready for Indy? | Superbowl XLVI | Social Media and New Markets http://bit.ly/villendy

BCCI: Billionaires Control Cricket in India (thehindu.com)
‘IPL not responsible for poor India show’ (cricketnext.in.com)
Cannavaro, Pires, Fowler, Crespo, Okocha all likely to be a part of India’s football IPL (tribalfootball.com)
The Ipl 2012 Pledges And Requirements (microphone-film.net)
IPL 2012 Live: Will Chris Gayle Play For Bangalore? (sbnation.com)
IPL V starts on April 4 in Chennai (thehindu.com)

Filed under Lifestyle Brands, Marketing, Sports, Sports Marketing Tagged with Chennai, Dhoni, Diwali, India, Indian Premier League, IPL, Iran Pro League, Royal Challengers Bangalore, SET MAX, Social Media, Srikanth, Venky, Wikipedia

Of IPL Stakes and the inherent brand valuation | Advantage Sports

August 2, 2010 3 Comments

Kings Punjab XI has more reports to file but the buyers are prepared to pay $300million for their 93% stake and get Preity Zinta as an ambassador for 7% stake as a partner. In the meantime, while India Cements has audited its stake in Chennai Super Kings for a brand valuation of $1 billion presumably based on the performance of the team in these three years. Of course, tho monetise this brand value the owners have to take the call to sell a stake to private parties or the public or leverage it as collateral to raise some serious financing for Cricket or for its own businesses.

Nevertheless, the difference between the two valuations shows a variation in brand perception and thence the methodology used to show case the brand value especially for a sports brand with high emotional attachments. The second valuation of course is not contingent to any deal but nevertheless holds value in terms of merchandise sales, gate and sponsorship receipts and also for conducting business with the owners in any area of cricket/ sports and business.

Also why limit Franchise valuations to annual sponsorship and gate receipts. Brand Valuation has to span the entire lifetime of the brand and each franchise is today averaging around $30 to $38 m in tangible revenues that translate to a $375 mn brand value at the very minimum. Also currently most have been financed by equity and convertibles but once the intangible value is showcased ( and we are ready to do the job with or without E&Y/PWC we can prefer more knowledge on the subject. As one Brand valuation methodology mentions ( inangiblebusiness.com) CSK captain Dhoni alone earns $37 m in endorsements, $10million a year and he is a part of Chennai Super Kings

Filed under Cricket, IPL, Marketing, Sports Tagged with Chennai Super Kings, IPL, Punjab Kings Xi

The Coca Cola Tour of the World!

April 2, 2010 1 Comment

As of March 31, the FIFA World Cup Football Trophy has reached Belgrade in Serbia on its way to Jo’burg for the princely open

In the mean time, IPL continues to draw audiences of 240 million till date in the 3 week tournament. You know what to spend on when you pend on Tv. F1 seems to be stabilizing with the new rules too. Bahrain is going to be very well attended from the comfort of one’s own homes.. Imagine an audience of 200 million together with access to social media…

Filed under IPL, Marketing, Sports Marketing Tagged with Football, IPL, NFL, Soccer

In Stadium revenues are rising for IPL | Advantage Sports

March 23, 2010 2 Comments

Much leass was available when we started the SPorts Marketing Channel on our Marketing Blogs here. Well today with the two new teams bidding for a starting value of $700 million, almost at par with the one Manchester United and much more than other EPL clubs, IPL has definitely arrived. More than the online chatter and Brand extent in TV ratings that routinely exceed 4 and reach a TV audience of even up to a 50 million on a single match day, it has posted a serious challenge oto NFL and NBA in its impact on gate. Where earlier Gate revenue for a ODI in Cricket was a healthy INR 40 million in a sell out, the Current IPL ticket prices are budgeting for INR 80 million or an extra $ 1 million from each of the matches at the less than 50,000 capacity Chinnaswamy Stadium in Bangalore.

Wth an annual outgo of $37 and $33 million from the Pune and Kochi franchises, they have to work that much harder to keep operational expenses like stadia rents low and gain on the team sponsorship and in-match revenues while making the mandatory player spend of more than $15 million and consequntly operational expenses to keep the franchise afloat. The Central sponsorship pool from the IPL dwindles starting from year 3 as well

In Stadia revenue from each packed out stadium would mean in excess of INR 3600 million or closer to $100 million for the current 8 teams in the third season, while the added teams would have a little less revenue value per ticket in Pune and Kochi but may more than make up for it by enthusiasm.

Filed under IPL, Marketing, Sports, Sports Marketing, T20 Tagged with IPL, Marketing, Sports, Sports Marketing

The IPL Ad bonanza | Advantage Brands

March 9, 2010 1 Comment

I must right now say the disclaimer as well, just in case you have expectations of more inside stories. Well, this here is just an attempt at collating all the brands that have put together campaigns in the last 2 months and as such would be likely appearing in the 50 day long IPL3..Sony having sold 600 hours of advertising in the two month fest.

The GM Cruze vs Volkswagen Touareg would definitely set the league on fire with Cruze going so far as to show two racing cars. The Tide vs Rin challenge is however unlikely to appear. A good plan would be for the SBI Life and the even newer ICICI ‘Khayal aapka’ old lady making it in the IPL. Does not sound so sporty but the older set would really appreciate during the dinner games every day from 8 pm

And come March 12, we should be rid of those abhorrent Ads from SET MAX showing gly IPL lead ins..The one about the young set commentating there is especially a known put downer. Of course, the hits keep coming from both Airtel and Vodafone..people looking forward to more Zoo Zoos. Also with the strategy break only 2 and a half minutes, there would be more urgency to stay on field. On Display boards and in stadia advertising we should get the usual supporting evidence of Hero Honda and Samsung/ maybe some LG. That is total should cover all my household purchases excet for some Tea and cookie ads..but yes the biggest budgets are likely to be that of Coke with Imran and Akshay from Bollywood and Pepsi with all its drinks and food brands, adventure sport campaign from Mountain Dew a virtual certainty

Canon’s come back story seems to be a well kept secret in the marketing circles, and we are almost sure their campaign won’t be a featured run.

[YouTube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7fkq6EpbKgM&feature=player_embedded]

A lot of the sponsor brands have run out of time to make their presence felt. I would have suggested higher visibility for some of them. and of course Irene’s Cadbury Kraft story too..

More gossip and cricketainment here..

When there is a new Pepsi/Coke campaign on air, you know that summer is near. Coke launched its new campaign with a new brand ambassador – Imran Khan. This is the first brand endorsement deal of Imran Khan. And he follows the footsteps of Mamujaan Aamir Khan who has been endorsing Coke since last few year.

Imran stars with Kalki Koechlin in the new Tv commercial. The new campaign “Open Happiness” has been conceptualised by the creative team of McCann Erickson that includes Prasoon Joshi, Ashish Chakravarty, Tirtha Ghosh and Nakul Sharma. And the film has been directed by Dibakar Banerjee. If you havent seen it yet, click the play button.

Filed under Bollywood, IPL, Marketing, Sports Marketing Tagged with IPL, Lifestyle Economy, retail lifestyle, Sports Marketing

IPL on Steroids | Advantage Sports

February 15, 2010 1 Comment

With so much going on, it’s a wonder I still need to say that. Sorry Shane Warne, the title is not directed at you.

Here’s the hotlist of suitors for IPL’s new teams going under the hammer in a month and our Delhi Darling and mint publisher’s mainstay hindustan times is the one being quoted with this piece of big time noose::

A. ADA Reliance, Anil Ambani is going to float another company. For the Ahmedabad team
B. Cyrus Poonawalla, a local Vaccine tycoon from the race horse city of Estreet and now the North Main street..let’s say his first preference is Pune (His organization is Serum Institute)
C. Sahara’s Su’brat’o Roy who also has the Team India’s Title sponsorship – let’s say then Kanpur would be next on the radar
D. Hero Honda group, which did not buy the Punjab Kings Xi have also denied direct interest in buying a team. Their current sponsorship of the Hockey World Cup has seen them getting a range of Olympic athletes and celebrities to promote Hockey on the mind again. However, Pawan Munjal is looking to get the team under a brand of his own. He has even been linked to a Dharamsala edition.

Whichever be the second city, the Ahmedabad team would definitely roll out in a months time and with a reserve price of $225 million or INR 1000 Crores would outstrip the Mumbai Indians 2007 price tag by a factor of 2. The reserve price itself is a build of 4.5 times over the $50 million for the 2007 edition. Season Five would again see two new teams being added, and there do not seem to be speculations in the final round from more Bollywood stars this time. Patriarchal Crowd sourcing from India’s armchair tribes?

Filed under IPL, Sports, Sports Marketing Tagged with ADA, ADA Reliance, Cricket, Cricket India, Cyrus Poonawalla, Hero Honda, IPL, Lalit Modi, Pawan Munjal, Sahara, Sports, Sports Marketing, Subroto Roy

IPL Diaspora getting a global Identity | Advantage Sports

February 8, 2010 Leave a comment

Though there were unfounded rumors, the first owner club of Bollywood Celebrity and Star Preity Zinta, Ness Wadia and others may give away the team for a $260 million payment to the sports denizens. Other First owners like GMR Group and Deccan Chronicle may also be scouting for partners or buyers as larger investments do bring a faster apocalypse. Hero Honda group is likely to continue as flagship sponsor of many World Sports events in Cricket, Olympics and Hockey. A valuation of $260 million is more than 3 times the base price two years back, still sounds conservative and less than the final tab for public or seconds ownership. The sources of the story, priceless. It’s a shame that such a joke was perpetrated on the serious sports audiences. Also, the Royal2020 must recover its negotiations with each Cricket Board as the planned series is again in the malignant eye of the English Board, saving the English from the game.

The Rajasthan Royals co-owned by Raj Kundera, Lachlan Murdoch and chaired by Manoj Badale and Emerging Media were recently valued at $300 million. The team is set to grow the game franchise and take a larger piece of the growing pie. The Royals are on way to owning four more International T20 teams, The Victoria Bushrangers now to be known as the Victoria Royals, The Nashua Cape Cobras, The TNT team that will become the TNT Royals and maybe one more in England or Pakistan. All these teams made it to the Champions League of National Champions / Victors in the first edition of 2009. The Royals will own a sable stake in each of the teams and share revenues and expenses correspondingly with the current owners in each case.

Rajasthan Royals get a greater stake in the game

IPL as definitely been the story of growing franchise and easy access to investment in the world’s greatest sport ( after the Saints kept their part of the bargain in NFL of course).

The no. of foreign players in each IPL franchise was recently raised from eight to ten, while four can play in each game. RR’s wider ownership of teams will de-risk team revenues from such patriotic and seasonal vagaries and bring more certain cash flows investment bankers love to see in any product for sale.

The current Sponsors proudly displayed at the RR WEB

Punjab Kings XI meanwhile have recruited a local industry luminary to support its marketing and are looking to offload a similar ownership stake in India or abroad for their $300 million team, that fared well in the first edition and is looking to come back in the third edition with a new captain. Shane Warne captains the Jaipur based Rajasthan Royals

Filed under Bollywood, Cricket, Digital Media, IPL, Sports, Sports Marketing, T20 Tagged with CLT20, Emerging Media, England, IPL, Manoj Badale, Pakistan, Raj Kundera, Rajasthan Royals, Royals, Shilpa Shetty, Somerset Royals, South Africa, T20, TNT, TNT Royals, Victoria Bushrangers

And here’s IPL, live on You Tube

February 4, 2010 1 Comment

and selling gate on Set MAX

..it’s definitely the decade of female empowerment in South Asia. IPL plays host to 80 International Cricketers this year and 120 next year. Also ten cities host tournament matches. Ofcourse, calculations are currently a little at a loss with Kiwi and Aussie players facing a backlash for the racist and the local meme so strong in the beer we drink..

Also common to Sub Continent campaign themse this year are celebrities from Hollywood and Cricket, Salary Pay days and an unerlying theme of fun and joie de vivre in regular hum drum life. More and More are shot against a ‘real life’ backdrop – a not so rich office decor, a slummy street, a heritage mumbai building. That last one is one of the most shocking yet.

Catch this one from one of the new product launches in poor India by Max New York Life.

Thanks to Campaign India for a wonderful selection

Another like Cadbury India has thankfully no break despite the global takeover drama with its 2010 Campaigns rolled out. Prices for IPL are 50% higher than the first season IPL’s brand valuation will go up steeply because of the new reserve price and two addded teams in the franchise. Re-Auctions of the player pool also start off within a year.

Filed under Cricket, Financial Services, IPL, Marketing, Sports, Sports Marketing Tagged with Advertising, India, India Advertising, IPL, Max New York Life

Some Live streaming Options off the hook | Advantage Social

February 3, 2010 Leave a comment

It’s here. Our primary reason for inventing Bell’s grand device, or this hellish broadband competition where everyone’s changing providers every three months just a 100 years later (more) The eponymous podcast has gone live.

A lot of the work of the world gets done using Cisco and Nortel’s Video Conferencing Systems and all that infrastructure. For the consumer, they all are beyond the wallet..A lot more of the brands are getting a whiff of it with digital media revenues picking up speed in the last few months. This boom is riding what essentially started with downloading songs, and the iTunes store was one of the first in the legally validated ones with a great repertoire of mostly audio, not even 7-8 years back.

In these last two-three years however, these developments have just raised the bar to where people expect more uninterrupted direct telecasts / webcasts on the web for work, for play and with twitter and Facebook among others, just plain instant fun. The business model is definitely unproven. It is the fancy or a vector of the amount of fancy taken by each new user, that has pushed money behind most of these ventures almost instantly. The latest one is ustream.tv. After a $11.1 milion financing in April 2008 from Asia Centric Doll Capital Management(DCM). Please get all the linked links at Mashable and FT, for all the stories that led to this one.

DCM has backed Intuit’s Paycycle, Cisco’s Arroyo and quite a few NASDAQ listed network companies. After the early round Ustream.TV got a $75 million dollop from a group led by Softbank( these guys manage to get a group every time) Ustream gets 50 million unique views a month and 10 m users but depends on advertising for revenue. Kerrplunk!

There are others in the video live streaming business with flawless reproduction. The infamous You Tube is getting on the job with the latest hot button game from India. The $2 billion IPL franchise has given exclusive rights to You Tube to get its matches telecast live to millions across the globe. the #1 in Sports, NFL has been pretty up to it with Videos on the web as well. Through the available audio streaming for live games, it has done well commercially with the products. The time delayed Video snips and the entire repertoire available online has been able to let them make a boast about their online business and the NFL Network. The game videos are a big success on the Itunes store afterwards, but lastng arrangements have not been made. The live score trackers would be an amazing model to recreate for IPL and others in the Soccer world that want to compete for the game

I love my 12seconds.tv I find a lot of young urban followers getting on it in my tweetdeck beta since last year. Livestream.tv was a screaming success with MSA and Zhu Min natting in Davos about our new Economy with Larry Summers and Dominique Strauss Kahn from the IMF. in.com is among some others who got tired of even thinking of making a commercial case and have put all the Viacom business channels on the web free in live streaming.

I am still a little sensitive about Online advertising though. Except on a few select sites like Hula.com and NFL, it is mostly of a denigrating quality and does not seem like a lasting basis for revenue. Catch the latest video viewership numbers? These could simply be live streaming numbers in a couple of years?

Online video viewing is more ubiquitous than ever. According to comScore, in the month of December 178 million people watched 33.2 billion videos, with the average viewer watching 187 videos per month in the U.S.

MASHABLE

Filed under Apple, Digital Media, Facebook, Social Media, Sports, Sports Marketing Tagged with Davos, F1, IPL, Live Streaming, Livestream.com, Livestream.Tv, MLB.TV, NFL, ustream.tv, You Tube

The NFL Web: Videos, Audio streaming and Franchise

February 3, 2010 Leave a comment

After spending every Sunday at the site for the last three years during the season, I can definitely say the American game is a visual rich phenomenon

The #1 in Sports, NFL has been pretty up to it with Videos on the web as well. Though the audio streaming is what is made available for live games, it has done well commercially with the prodyucts and the quality of time delayed Video snips available has been able to let them make a boast about their online business and their network. The live score trackers would be an amazing model to replicate for IPL and others in the Soccer world that want to compete for the game.

The range of videos on the home page cover previews, controversies and coach points of view on the game among others. No riff raff.
The Game Center tracks all the 16 games in a season weekend live, with the game interface allowing you to trace all game drives and getting you special live treats in the red zone ( when the ball is in for a score) The F1 web is a sight too. But NFL is good.

The PEPSI sponsored fantasy tidbits and the full fledged fantasy game for example definitely should be beating the bezezes out of CBS and ESPN. Why it hasn’t translated to the NFL network making a grander statement on TV is another matter

The infamous You Tube is getting on the bandwagon with the latest hot button games from India. The $2 billion IPL franchise has given exclusive rights to You Tube to get its matches telecast live to millions across the globe.

Filed under NFL, Premier League, Sports, Sports Marketing, Superbowl Tagged with IPL, NFL, NFL Network, Online Business Model, Sports, Sports Marketing, Web