BARC News Ratings: Too early to interpret data?

The Hindi news channel genre has seen a major shake-up in the pecking order as the Broadcast Audience Research Council (BARC) India started reporting news ratings from Week 10. Under BARC India's new policy for Augmented Data Reporting Standards, viewership data has been released for Week 10, NCCS All 15+ years, Roll Average, 6-24 hours. However, experts say that it is too early to draw any conclusions from the data which came after a 17-month gap. They also argue that the industry needs to wait for the TV news ratings to settle down as it is too premature to take any call on the data that was released last week.

"It is indeed a positive step that the news data is finally out. This would support our decisions on media planning and buying in many ways. The only word of caution is that it is too early to take any drastic insight on the rankings, we must wait and watch for 8-13 weeks before we arrive at any inferences. Some of the outcomes in the HSM market may not have been as per what we anticipated, but that could be a reality too," said Sujata Dwibedy, Group Trading Director, Amplifi, dentsu India.

She further stated that the four-week data released by BARC included many high-profile events which lead to a spike in viewership, therefore, there is a need to evaluate the ratings for a stable period. "Considering that the data is a four-week rolling average, which would have included elections, Ukraine war, Lata Mangeshkar’s demise and many such news spikes and that too it is for 0600-2400 hrs, we must see a stable period for the ratings," Dwibedy averred.

According to Dwibedy, there is a need to combine the BARC ratings with the internal sales mechanism of marketers before arriving at any decision. "As marketers, we also understand the market dynamics because our clients have their sales and support teams in all markets, so we do get feedback on what works, so best to marry both the understanding before arriving at any solution and better to wait for a few more weeks to derive any conclusion," she stated.

Speaking about the resumption of news ratings, Dabur India Senior General Manager and Head of Media Rajiv Dubey had said that the company decides its media spends based on multiple factors including BARC ratings.

"BARC data is not the only thing that one goes by, but this is the primary currency as it is backed by all the stakeholders. Apart from BARC data, multiple factors go on to decide our media investments. We also rely on our internal feedback system which we have. We also look at alternate sources of data like Zapr, Return Path Data (RPD), etc. So all this information put together with help us decide on our media spends," Dubey had stated.

Apart from these factors, Dabur also decides its ad spending based on market-led factors including the intensity with which it expands in certain states or geographies, he added.

A senior official with a leading Hindi news channel said that the legacy news brands will only get impacted if this trend continues for at least a year. "Channels that have seen a spike in their viewership will get about 15-18% increase in ad rates if this trend continues for a year or so. It will also help them to improve their inventory fill rates," the official asserted.

He, however, cautioned that it is one thing to get good numbers and quite another to monetise that viewership data. "Ultimately, it's all about the art of selling because advertisers are not sitting there to increase ad rates. They want to buy inventory at the minimum possible rate. Therefore, monetising the growth in viewership share is a big challenge," the official added.

Another TV news executive said that a rate hike by news channels is on the anvil as the ratings are back. "The viewership share garnered by each channel will go a long way in deciding the kind of rate hike that each channel gets. The change is pecking order should come as a concern for legacy brands," he noted.