INTERVIEW INDIA SPECIAL EDITION JANUARY/FEBRUARY 2019 7
India’s Ananda Vikatan has a long
and rich history in print, but the
publication has also been very
active
online, and launched a digital
subscription
model early on, which
quickly proved itself successful.
Ananda Vikatan was established in 1926 as a
monthly publication. Over the years, it evolved into
the Vikatan Group in the Tamil Nadu magazine industry.
The Indian Readership Survey in 2017 saw
Anada Vikatan as the second-largest read regional
weekly.
In this interview, the group’s Managing Director,
Srinivasan Balasubramanian, tells us how the group
forayed into the digital space more than 10 years
ago, while still being profitable.
WAN-IFRA: Ananda Vikatan was India’s second
largest circulated magazine in 2017 and the
largest circulated Tamil weekly magazine.
When did you decide on digital subscription?
SRINIVASAN Balasubramanian: Ananda Vikatan
boasts of a strong legacy in content creation, curation
and credibility in the magazine industry for over
93 years.
In the late 1990s, during the early internet era,
we forayed into the digital publishing space as an
exploratory medium rather than as a subscription
based one.
Our digital journey was fuelled by our desire to
serve our loyal NRI readers whose copies were delayed
in transit, hence becoming irrelevant in the
ever-changing digital space.
Our content was free, but Vikatan was incurring
substantial investments in infrastructure costs. To recover
those costs, we decided on digital subscription
in 2005 as an experiment. To our surprise, our operations
turned profitable in a span of about 100 days.
Please break down for us the brand’s subscription
model, and the thought process behind its
implementation and pricing.
Our magazine and e-books have been behind a paywall
since 2005. Readers can purchase products for
as low as Rs 15 for a single issue, to Rs 16999 for a
lifetime subscription to all our products, except ebooks.
Our highest-selling subscription product is the
annual, all-magazine combo pack of 12 that includes
access to archives since 2005. This product
retails for Rs 1499 and sells for an average price of
Rs 1249.
The thought process behind the pricing model is
simple – we took the magazine pricing, deducted
the trade commission, the paper and printing costs
and selling overheads, and arrived at the mean content
creation, curation and publishing cost.
How have your print readers responded to the
paywall?
We have been operating on a freemium model
where our readers, who fall under two groups, enjoy
a limited amount of free content.
Traditional print readers – both domestic and
Tamil diaspora – migrating online because of ease of
access. Paywall is not a restriction for them.
New digital readers, who can be classified as
‘social scanners’ and ‘content discoverers.’ Social
scanners are content skimmers who access free content
across the internet. Content discoverers display
strong brand connect and loyalty. They are willing to
pay for curated content and go beyond the paywall.
Publications are increasingly putting long-form,
investigative, exclusive content behind paywalls.
Do you see hard news being monetised
similarly in the future? Tell us about the content
you put behind the paywall.
Vikatan’s storytelling abilities are a derivative of its
strong magazine background, that is narrative, longform
and often exclusive. We have evolved our own
investigative brand of journalism through Junior Vikatan
Magazine.
Our readers don’t come to us for breaking news.
Our exclusivity, curation and credibility are the core
values that drives Vikatan’s journalistic philosophy.
Subscription is a compulsive step for loyal readers,
both online and print. In this era of fake news
and user generated content, online readers are
slowly evolving from being passive consumers of
junk to active consumers of credible content, and
they are willing to pay for it.
We have been putting high quality long form
content behind the paywall for a long time. We are
now serving our readers with exclusive long form
and interactive content. A plan to have more nonprint
content behind the paywall is in the works.
Media houses in India are facing declining advertising
revenues. How do you think implementing
a paywall has affected this?
On the contrary, our digital revenues – including pay
and ad revenues – have been growing by a compound
annual growth rate of 35 percent over the
past four years, ever since we started our digital
transformation journey.
We have advertisers who swear by the response
and audience connect on our site. Several of our ad
campaigns are response driven.
A paywall strategy for content is an equally compelling
revenue model. Though not a substitute for
declining ad revenues, it is a conscious move towards
quality content and reinventing core journalistic
ethos through credible content. I’m confident of
news media finding alternate revenue sources to (or
sans) ad revenues.
Paywalls can cut into the number of readers
coming to the site and decrease the effectiveness
of the advertising space. Do you agree?
Implementing a paywall is a balance that every
media house learns to achieve through experience
and experimentation. We have been practicing this
for more than a decade.
Do you see mainstream media implementing
the paywall soon?
I would love to see mainstream media follow our example.
Business Standard is doing it; pure digital
players such as The Ken and Bloomberg Quint have
also been practicing it in India.
However, when I peer at the crystal ball, I would
say, not soon. It is unfortunate that the greatest of
risk takers and marketing genius that led to the outburst
of the newspaper and the print revolution in
India, are refraining from taking the plunge and pricing
their content.
When Facebook, Google and YouTube are shoring
up the bulk of potential ad money that flows
through internet pipes, I am confident that a pay-toread
model will prevail.
If Netflix, Amazon Prime and Hotstar can charge
for premium ad free content, why can’t we?
What is the brand’s revenue from print circulation?
Could you give us comparative percentage
of the last three years?
Anandha Vikatan boasted of the second-largest regional
magazine readership in the Indian Readership
Survey 2017, with a total readership of 2708 (000s)
TR. The percentage of print circulation revenue has
remained relatively stable over these past years, even
though the advertising revenue has, unfortunately,
faced pressure.
Are paywalls a way to make up for lost print
circulation?
Why would I make up for lost circulation? I am creating
new readers online – on mobiles, on applications.
Digital, now, is a formidable part of our ecosystem,
contributing (paywall and advertisements,
together) 10 percent of our FY 18-19 topline. In
three years, this number will be a third.
“Indians don’t pay for news,” “India is not
ready for paywall.” How true are these
phrases?
With an internet user base of 450 million and growing,
Indians are adapting to a digital news consumption
culture and will, I assume, pay for the value received.
The question is: Would we be willing to understand
the desire of the customer value perception
and able to consistently deliver it?
Ananda Vikatan – Second-largest read regional weekly
Regional Periodicity IRS 2017
Vanitha (Malayalam) Malayalam Fnly 6 126 000
Ananda Vikatan Tamil Weekly 2 708 000
Mathrubhumi Arogya Masika Malayalam Monthly 2 269 000
Kumudam Tamil Weekly 2 269 000
Mathrubhumi Thozhilvartha Malayalam Weekly 2 235 000