"We sacrifice short-term revenues for long-term increase in listenership"

Amit Mathew is Resident Editor and Director of the Malayala Manorama Group. He is also the Deputy Chairman of the Council of Management for Audit Bureau of Circulation (ABC) for the period 2013-14.

Mathew has earlier worked with Austereo, the largest radio network in Australia, before moving on to The Herald and Weekly Times and Channel Nine. He has also served as Executive Board Member of the International Press Institute (IPI), Vienna.

In conversation with exchange4media, Mathew speaks about Radio Mango’s journey, challenges that the radio industry faces, the importance of digital media and more...

Initially, when FM was introduced in Kerala, people needed to be educated about tuning in to FM frequencies. Now with many FM players in the state, how difficult is it to keep the listeners tuned in to your station?
If you have good content, then listeners are bound to listen to your station, no matter how much you shout about yourself. Logically, the station should be successful and you have to make sure that you are in the top two positions. We sacrifice short-term revenues for long-term increase in listenership.

According to a report, urbanised areas will have more population, especially in Kerala. How has this impacted the radio ecosystem?
There has not been any dramatic change in this area so far. The impact can only be truly assessed in the years to come. But Kerala has never had a clear urban-rural divide.

You have worked across media – radio, print and television. How is the experience of handling radio different from that of print and television?
There isn’t much difference in all the three media, because at the end of the day, it’s about offering strong content to the audience, and Manorama believes in just that. The listener is king, and hopefully the advertisers have got value for their product on Radio Mango. We are not advertiser driven. The best way of giving value to the advertisers is through the listener, which again links back to good content. Advertisers have come to value our product over a period of time. We spend a lot on content, training and music. We try not to oversell ourselves and be as realistic as possible.

How has the journey been for Radio Mango since its inception?
There’s not much that we can do as the industry is very regulated by the Government. The journey is basically how to keep improving day by day, while keeping our feet planted to the ground. It’s not organic, because being so tightly regulated you can’t grow beyond a point. That said, it has been better than expected and enjoyable as well.

Please elaborate on the music and programming line up at Radio Mango.
We started off with a playlist of about 3,000 songs and later we came down to 1,000-odd songs. The research done by our team suggested that we decrease the quantum of music and focus on quality and innovation. We try and learn from our mistakes and our achievement.

What are the kinds of innovations that Radio Mango has been doing in the recent past?
Innovation (in the larger sense) is a very big word. It can mean transformation, metamorphoses, etc. I think we are constantly improving and try to do things that we think will work in our environment.

What are some of the new online and offline initiatives planned for this year?
For a network that operates 24x7, there is a lot that we are planning. We are also getting more active on social media.

How much importance have you given to digital media? How do you integrate digital with your terrestrial radio station?
Facebook, Twitter and other social media platforms are useful to build a connect, but only good content will create more listenership for any station.

What are the five things that marketers should keep in mind while investing on radio in the South?
Radio works, radio works, radio works, radio works, radio works.