GECs see 40% drop in ad volume over last 4 weeks
The drop in FCT has been the least for the news genre, although this category has seen a fall of 16% in the same time span
Advertising on television has been hit hard due to the Coronavirus outbreak. In order to tide through this phase, brands have either stopped coming up with new advertisements or simply reduced the ad spends on television.
While the drop in advertising volume has been witnessed across the genres of television — categories like GEC, movies and kids have seen the highest fall over four weeks (Week 12-15).
A detailed study of ad volumes over these four weeks throws up some interesting insights.
For instance, the Free Commercial Time (FCT) on GEC has dropped by almost 40% in four weeks. In week 15, the total FCT for the category was at 49 lakh seconds as compared to 82 lakh seconds in Week 12. These figures are as per the BARC-Nielsen report ‘Crisis Consumption on TV and Smartphones’.
Similarly, the movie genre witnessed a drop of 41% in the same time period. While the total FCT for the genre in Week 15 stands at 42 lakh seconds, it was at 72 lakh seconds in Week 12.
In the music genre, there has been a drop of 56% in FCT over the four weeks - from 37 lakh seconds it has gone down to 16 lakh seconds in four weeks. Meanwhile, the kids' genre has too seen a fall of 38% to 6 lakh seconds as compared to 9.8 lakh seconds in Week 12.
The drop in FCT has been the least for the news genre, although this category has seen a fall of 16% in the same time span. The genre recorded 86 lakh seconds FCT in week 15 while it was at 102 lakh seconds four weeks ago.
It must be noted that in this COVID-19 period, total TV consumption has been breaking all records with week 15 registering a 40% growth when compared to the pre-COVID period. According to industry experts, the consumption is expected to grow further in the coming weeks but ad volumes are likely to remain low. It now remains to be seen where the figures stand over the next fortnight.
