New Delhi: Headlines Today, the fastest growing English news channel is changing the landscape of the English News Genre in India. The Channel has been growing steadily over the weeks and the latest ratings are a sign to the Channel?s promising growth with the channel steadily moving towards the leadership position.

In the core news TG of CS 24-44 AB Male, Headlines Today, leads as the leader of the pack with relative channel share of 26.7% (All India), 28.9% (All India 1 Mn +) and 30% (6 Metros) as per the latest Ratings (Source: TAM, TG: CS 25-44 AB MALE, Period: Wk 33‘12, Share%). The trend is quite promising even in the broad News TG of CS 25+M AB, the channel enjoys a channel share of 21.2% (6 Metros) and 22% (All India 1 Mn+) which is substantially ahead of NDTV 24x7 with 19.2% and 19.5% share respectively (Source: TAM, TG: CS 25+ AB MALE, Period: Wk 33‘12, Share%). The channel has also been maintaining a minimum of 2 programmes in top 5 programmes of the genre for the past few weeks.

The change in the content strategy backed by a focussed on air promotional plan has started yielding results for the channel and this trend is all set to change the complete dynamics of the English News space.

Commenting on the latest ratings, Mr. Ashish Bagga, CEO, India Today Group, said, ?We are elated that our continuous effort has been appreciated by viewers across the country. Our endeavor to put across viewer centric content will be carried on with renewed creativity. This is just the beginning and Headlines Today is all set to become a strong leader in the space.?

Headlines Today team has been at the forefront in reaching out to viewers. Driven by strong content, Headlines Today has been crossing new boundaries in news journalism. Recent news coverage around the London Olympics, Team Anna and Baba Ramdev?s campaigns against corruption, presidential elections, the communal violence and threat to people from north east India, India ? Sri Lanka ODI Series, shooting at the US Gurdwara, Geetika Sharma suicide case besides other significant coverage have helped the channel to become a force to reckon with.

MUMBAI: HISTORY TV18 and CNN IBN‘s hunt for The Greatest Indian which started in April, 2012 created history on Independence Day this year when an impressive 20 Million viewers across the country tuned into the show‘s grand finale on 15th August, 2012, garnering a commendable 4.83 NGRPs across all channels, thereby making it one of the most participated and highly watched show in recent times. The unprecedented reach and viewership are a first for an initiative led by a factual entertainment or English news channel.

The three month campaign finally culminated with the announcement of Dr. B R Ambedkar as The Greatest Indian post independence. In another first, 13 channels across Network18, Viacom18 & E TV (Colors, MTV, ETV, IBN7, IBN Lokmat, CNBC TV18, CNBC AWAAZ, ETV Urdu, ETV Uttar Pradesh, ETV Rajasthan, ETV Bihar and ETV Madhya Pradesh.) telecast the glittering and high octane excitement grand finale.

The Greatest Indian amassed tremendous buzz over the three month period with over 2 crore votes coming through missed calls and online.The campaign also sustained a healthy engagement on Social Media platforms reaching over 20 lac Facebook users through viral content. A large number of interesting comparisons and discussions followed on Twitter with hashtags related to the initiative trending consistently and reaching over 2 lac users daily.

The grand finale, featuring some of the best known names, was attended by eminent personalities like Amitabh Bachchan, Madhuri Dixit Nene, Shabana Azmi and Harsha Bhogle amongst the others. The show which was replete with interesting anecdotes and incidents related to the ‘Greats‘, was also an occasion of celebration, with Kailash Kher mesmerising audiences with this performance.

The initiative is based on the path-breaking series featured on BBC called ‘The Greatest Briton‘. Launched in 2002 in the UK, the initiative reached out to millions of viewers and broke significant viewership records there. An astounding 21 countries have successfully
adopted this format since then including Germany (Konrad Adenauer-Greatest German), South Africa (Nelson Mandela ? Greatest South African) and the US (Ronald Reagan ? Greatest American).

(Source: TAM, Market All India, TG CS 4+, 15th August, 24 Hrs & TG CS AB 15+, week 33‘12, 24 Hrs, (NGRPs 30 min)