Guest Lecture by Mr. Amitesh Jasrotia, Manager- Ad Sales, Zee Business (ZNL) on 24th of September

Guest Lecture: Media Industry - An Overview

Speaker:  Mr. Amitesh Jasrotia, Manager - Ad Sales,  Zee Business

24^th Sep, 2011.

The enthusiasm and excitement of Mr. Amitesh Jasrotia was very evident in his presentation. And why not, it’s always great pleasure to visit your Alma matter. Mr. Amitesh Jasrotia, a 2004 batch pass out of DoMS IIT Roorkee conducted a highly informative and interactive session on Media Industry.  In very small time he beautifully described the entire picture of Media Industry starting from media history, TAM and media basics and the role of media agency to media planning. It was a complete knowledge session which made all the students conversant with almost all possible media jargons.

The discussion started with an overview of media industry starting with the history of media industry in 1991 and the changes occurred thereafter. The media industry today mainly constitutes of clients, media partners and media agencies. Previously the role of media agencies was to buy media, where the creative sector used to come up with the concept behind the advertisements. But in the 21^st century a lot of changes have taken place and now, creation of ads, media buying, media planning and research, all are done by the media agencies only. Thus they form an important part of media industry.

Following are the roles of media agencies:

1. Media Planning
2. Consumer Research Specialists
3.  Media Research
4.  Media Buyers
5.  Implementation Planners
6.  Interactive cell
7.  Out-of-Home(OOH)
8.  Operations
9.  Billing and Collection
10. Events/Retail/On-Ground

Then the discussion turned to the TV media and various methodologies used to measure television ratings. The only method being used till date is TAM (Television Audience Measurement) developed by A.C. Nielsen. It replaced the old Diary System. It has a remote and a monitoring device to record the frequency of channel being watched over 8000 sample homes across the country. The jargons commonly used in TV media were also explained such as Reach, SEC, TRPs, CPRP, Frequency, TG, GRPs, etc.

A business problem in media industry is addressed by a market analysis followed by a marketing plan. A media strategy in handling this situation is never conceived without a communication plan. A media strategy facilitates a certain target group (TG) in a SEC (Socio-Economic classification of TG) considering the ratings of GRPs, Frequency and Reach. It mainly serves the media mix consisting TV, Print, Radio etc on the basis of scheduling strategy which can be continuous, flighted or pulsing patterns. The main element of a media plan is the media budget which caps the activity level, media mix, scheduling, creative units for TV, print and planning objectives and deliveries.

The pros and cons of each component of media mix such as Print, TV, Radio, Magazines, Cinema, Outdoor and Internet was elucidated by the speaker providing the students with a clear picture of every media type. The marketing plan in media industry also decides the media objectives concerning major issues such as brand launch, sales promotion, educating potential consumers and brand reinforcement.

While answering our queries he stated that there is immense potential in media industry for MBA under marketing sector. He extended his help and guidance should anyone of us is keen to join this challenging sector.

Wriiten by: Priya Adhikary & Sachin Kabra.