Sample some figures: Cartoon Network and Pogo's ad sales growth in 2005 versus 2004 has been 22 per cent; CNN registered an impressive growth of 70 per cent over 2004 with most existing clients upping their spend between 20 and 40 per cent and HBO, despite a slide in viewership in the overall movie genre, saw almost 20 per cent growth in both revenues and client base in 2005 as compared to previous year.

What this means is that Pogo ad rates --- classified under Pogo Premium, Tiny TV and Pogo Classic--- will be different depending on the shows. "The (ad rates of) key prime time between 4-8 p.m. is now defined by more shows, including some original productions," Tata added.

And, both kids genre leader Cartoon Network and sibling Pogo, designed especially for Indian audiences, are riding the retail ad sales wave, which, Tata pointed out, has proved to be a huge success last year.

"In 2005, we aggressively expanded into retail sales and pursued the retail segment to achieve an enthusiastic response to both Cartoon Network and Pogo from regional clients like Vivek Sales (a dealer of white goods), Lilliput, the Pune-based HDFC home loans and Chennai Sarees," Tata said.

In fact, Turner now not only has a special team that focuses on this growing segment of the business, but is set to increase the headcount to target smaller towns and cities of India.

Retail clients to drive ad sales in 2006

What's a retail client? Turner India describes it as traditionally a non-national client who always wanted to advertise on television, but didn't have the wherewithal to do so in terms of creative and approach.

Tata feels that retail clients (40 new advertisers were added in 2005) would contribute more than 15 per cent of Cartoon Network and Pogo's ad sales revenues in financial year 2006 ending December.

The client base of Pogo grew nearly by 50 per cent from 2004 to 2005 with 56 new clients added in 2005. These include TVS Motors, ICICI Bank, HDFC Standard Life (Insurance), McFills, to name a few.

The client profile too is diversified including the likes of schools and training academies (Euro Kids, Patashala CD's, Abacus Maths Education); stationery brands (Bluebird, Markline Pencil); aluminum foil (Clean Wrap, Home foils); white goods dealerships (Vivek's AC Sale, Kitchen Appliances & Air Conditioner); apparel/saree shops (Lilliput, Chennai Silk, Pothys) and children's magazines (Magic Pot, Gokulam).

On Turner's part, Tata says, the effort has been to offer most clients, especially retail ones, off-beat solutions that address their specific needs and provides value for money.

The deals include the traditional spot buys and sponsorships of programmes to on-air stunts, large Network and retail events, marketing tie-ups and promotional licenses.

Some of the new clients on HBO for 2005 included Accenture, Berger, Bennett & Coleman (publishers of Times of India and 74 per cent owners of Times Now news channel), British Airways, Cadila, Canon, D Damas, Deutsche Bank, Elder Pharma, Gini & Jony, Forbes Gokak, Kerala Tourism, Hindustan Times, IDBI, and SBI.

As per claims by Turner, of the top 100 programme episodes aired on kids' channels in January 2006, over 90 per cent were on Cartoon Network or Pogo with about a quarter of these on the latter alone.

Leadership maintained in the kids' genre

Kids channels shares went up from 6.4 per cent in January-December 2004 to 10.1 per cent in 2005.

According to data provided by Turner International, ad spend on kids' channels and programmes went up by 23 per cent from about Rs. 1.3 billion in Jan-Dec 2004 to about Rs 1.6 billion in 2005.

Though Tata hedged on the exact figures, she admitted that Cartoon Network and Pogo were responsible for 22 per cent of the overall growth of the kids' channels in 2005 and claimed that over 97 per cent of all transmissions that delivered 1.0 TVR or more in the whole of 2005 on all kids channels, were aired on Cartoon Network or Pogo.

(Rs 44=1US$)