Branded content growth will be faster but on a smaller base, Viacom18's Ferzad Palia

Youth entertainment brand MTV’s branded content division MTV Brand Studio that offers branded content solutions to brand across Viacom18’s youth, music and English entertainment channels has scaled up significantly in the past year. 

Satisfied with the growth of branded content, Ferzad Palia, Head, Youth, Music and English Entertainment, Viacom18, told BuzzInContent.com that the last 12 months have been a true revelation for them because of the number of projects that they picked up.

About a year ago, Palia had estimated that branded content could contribute about 20-25% of its total revenue in the next 24-36 months.

However, after about a year, Palia told BuzzInContent.com that the percentage of growth is smaller as branded content is a smaller base for them. “Thankfully, we are seeing growth across revenue streams — branded content, advertising, sales, sponsorships. Branded content growth will be faster but on a smaller base,” he said.

Being one of the early adopters of branded content, the branded content division of Viacom18 executed several key platform-agnostic projects for top brands in the country. Recently, Allied Blenders & Distillers’ whisky brand Sterling Reserve has partnered Viacom18’s English entertainment channel Comedy Central India to launch a stand-up comedy reality show, which is an initiative of the brand’s Sterling Reserve Comedy Project (SRCP). 

The network is exploiting both television and digital reach to help brands target youth audiences across markets.

Palia said MTV witnessed a growth of about 20% to 25% in H1 2019 over last year. In the first half of the year (January to June), the channel recorded 700 million views and 3.67 billion minutes of watch-time, cumulatively on TV and digital platform Voot. 

Eying 30% growth amounting to 5 bn minutes of watch-time in the second half of 2019, MTV is offering a massive reach to the brands for their content initiatives.

“There is a certain base level of reach and frequency that is required and then there is a certain amount of impact and salience that one needs to build. Every brand wants to stand out of the crowd and to do that it needs to move beyond the regular TVC, which is why there is growth in the programmatic and branded content,” Palia said.

Talking about the role of social media in MTV’s branded content journey, Palia said it played a big part in spreading the message across demographics. “Each platform contributed to the growth of the whole genre and that is where the growth of content marketing came in. This is something we kicked off in 2010 and we are one of the early adopters and creators of what is today called branded content,” Palia said.