Friday, February 4, 2011

IPL & World Cup in a battle for ads

Even before the ICC Cricket World Cup 2011 and the Indian Premier League (IPL) season 4 are played out on the field, the two tourneys are pitched against each other in an advertising battle.

The two mega cricket events together have an estimated advertising spend of Rs 1,500 -1,700 crore. Of this, industry experts predict that IPL is expected to garner the bigger chunk. Average match ratings for previous editions of the IPL, as per television audience measurement (TAM), were twice that of World Cup. And with less than a fortnight to go for the World Cup, IPL, which kicks on April 8, has already managed to rope in 11 sponsors, compared to the World Cup’s eight. Apparently, the IPL’s history of strong viewership — particularly amongst the youth who seem to prefer IPL's shorter twenty over format over one-dayers – has found better traction with advertisers.
“From the total corpus of IPL and World Cup advertising expenditure, the IPL should definitely bag 60-65%,” says Rohit Gupta, president, Multi Screen Media (MSM), which owns the Sony Television Channels bouquet in India, including Max, the official broadcaster of the IPL. “Ad rates for the IPL touch Rs 5.5 lakh per ten seconds, which is 20-25% higher than previous editions. Spots have been virtually sold off by now, despite the World Cup happening first. IPL’s popularity is evident from the fact that its average match ratings are close to 5, compared to around 2.5 for the World Cup,” Gupta adds.

ESPN, which will be broadcasting the ICC World Cup 2011, says the company does not disclose financials as a policy. However, an industry source, who did not want to be named, told FE that of the Rs 1,700 crore combined ad spend, the World Cup kitty would be close to Rs 750 crore. “You must take into account that the World Cup has 49 matches, compared to around 74 matches in the IPL. Also, the amount of airtime available in the World Cup is determined by the ICC, which is not the case for the IPL,” he adds.

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