Big FM has been creating a lot of buzz in the FM space by roping in Sonu Niigaam as brand ambassador and changing its music positioning to ‘Chillax hits’. The 45 network station network consolidated its network and despite the slowdown succeeded in snapping up local advertising. Being one of the patrons of listenership measuring system RAM since its inception in late 2007, the radio station along with the Association of Radio Operators of India (AROI) is beginning to get vocal about the variance in listenership measurement data.
As the station completes three years of its existence, Big FM chief operating officer Tarun Katial, in conversation with Radioandmusic.com’s Anita Iyer, talks about the challenges of completing three years, changing advertising trends and potential of FM commercial radio in India and importantly, the role of RAM in the radio sector.
Big FM would be completing three years this month. How has the journey been?
There have been quick lifecycle changes in the business and it has been exciting journey to build value for the brand, shareholders, listeners, advertisers in many different environments.
In the past three years, we got access in 200 cities with 45 stations and many advertisers on board. Last year witnessed the slowdown where the true value of radio was discovered and we as radio players, identified the significance of listenership in semi urban and rural India as captive consumers are located there. The advertisers are also looking seriously at semi urban, rural pockets and a platform like radio is coming into play more effectively now than it did a year ago.
Do you mean the slowdown actually opened up more avenues for radio stations?
Definitely. The slowdown got us opportunities in disguise and we started to look at our network in a different way. We concentrated on categories we hadn’t thought of earlier like pesticides, tractors, seed clients etc. The advertising moved from organised large retail chains, FMCG, corporate ones to diverse client list, SMEs (Small and medium enterprises) across different client categories.
We, as a radio company, shifted our mindset from being just a radio platform to providing integrated solutions to clients. There was a strategic shift in our sales prospects where we invested in people, trained professionals, built databases just to build more and more integrated solutions for clients. Our synergy of different business verticals- Big Reach, Big Live, Big Street, has also come
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http://www.radioandmusic.com/content/editorial/interviews/big-fm-coo-tarun-katial-ram-has-been-inconsistent-last-few-months
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