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ESPN Software India Pvt Ltd vice president sales and marketing
Sricharan Iyengar said, "We soft launched Hindi with the telecast
of the UEFA Euro 2004 championship last year. Hindi commentary helped
us in further increasing penetration in traditional soccer markets.
Hindi telecast also enabled us to open up several non-traditional
markets for soccer, like UP, Gujarat, Punjab and so on, as testified
by the viewership numbers of UEFA Euro 2004. We are clear that localisation
adds a lot of value to our telecasts especially for viewers who
find it difficult to understand the heavily accented English or
for viewers who are not familiar with English at all."
"As a company we are ready to explore further localisation
including multi-lingual commentary, including Bengali, for our telecast
of the FIFA World Cup 2006. We will review our programming initiatives
with the Confederations Cup very meticulously. The review will form
the basis of our programming initiatives for the FIFA World Cup
2006," he added.
ESPN Software India Pvt LTD director corporate communications and
event management group Himanshu Verma said, "Our marketing
and localisation efforts have borne fruit. In EPL, we have been
able to improve the acceptance of EPL teams. The number of markets,
which have started recording 1+ rating for EPL, has increased. Key
markets such as Mumbai, Kolkata have shown steady growth in viewership.
Mumbai has recorded some very high numbers like 4.03 for a Liverpool
vs Arsenal match and such examples are on a rise. Localisation through
Hindi commentary during Euro 2004 paid dividends in the Hindi belt
with average ratings of 2.20 in Orissa, 1.50 in Maharashtra, 0.86
in Punjab, 0.72 in MP, 0.71 in Gujarat and 0.52 in UP."
ESS launched a focused marketing campaign on 1 June to promote
the FIFA Confederations Cup. Fifteen trams have donned the colors
of Confederations Cup, across the length and breadth of Kolkata.
Around 20 hoardings have been taken across the major towns of West
Bengal like Siliguri, Burdwan, Baharampur, Krishnanagar and Asansol
to spread the tournament fever. In addition the publicity campaign
will be supported with print advertising, radio spots and consumer
contests.
With all the concerted efforts of ESS, soccer viewership is seeing
a steady growth in India. The telecast of The UEFA Euro 2004 championship
last year on ESS has yielded great viewership numbers, said an official
communiqué from the company.
Kolkata averaged 6.77 for all matches in the given period while
the 9:30 pm matches averaged 10.56 in the city. Various marketing
initiatives by ESS like painting the metros and trams with Euro
images, posters, movie halls etc have definitely helped in pushing
the numbers. The Portugal Greece Final did an astounding 16.7 in
Kolkata, which is higher than the IFA Shield match between Mohun
Bagan and East Bengal last year, making it the highest rated non-cricket
program for ESS in this market, added the communiqué
ESS has recently signed an agreement with Infront Sports and Media
(FIFA's exclusive television partner for the event), under which
ESS will provide full and exclusive coverage of the 2006 FIFA World
Cup including all 64 matches, in addition to the telecast of the
FIFA Confederation Cup 2005, on its two channels ESPN and Star Sports.
The FIFA Confederation Cup 2005 kicks off on 15 June and will showcase
a bonanza of 16 matches including 12 round robin matches and two
semifinal matches on 26 June. The final will be played in Frankfurt
on 30 June, 2005.
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