iWorld
Using technology to help people connect to faith: Shemaroo’s Hiren Gada
MUMBAI: Despite the fast-paced lifestyle most Indians never get disconnected from their faith. Early mornings at many homes would mean turning on some devotional content on TV. But it isn't a category that attracts content creators. Shemaroo Entertainment found the need gap long ago and started exploring the opportunity. Now, devotional content from the house is gradually increasing with a presence across digital and television mediums.
With the aim to connect people to their faith, Shemaroo Entertainment has experimented with several kinds of content including live streaming from religious places. Moreover, to strengthen the presence across mediums, it has launched two apps and tied-up with major DTH platforms and telco operators. Shemaroo Entertainment CEO Hiren Gada in an interaction with Indiantelevision.com shared the reasons for focusing on the segment, marketing strategy and upcoming actions in 2019.
Excerpts:
Why have you started focusing on devotional category highly?
Many years ago when we looked at the audio-visual medium and the needs of the consumers that it can actually fulfill – films and entertainment and then news came immediately to mind. Then we saw there are many more needs audio-visual medium can fulfill and when we saw different kind of categories which have a wider mass consumption, devotion came as a very strong one. The need for devotion in India is strong in multiple pockets. That’s why we thought that if we have to look at the categories beyond films and entertainment genre, devotion is a very strong area to look at. When we were doing all of this we also saw how technology is making devotion more accessible to common man. Technology is helping them access devotional needs in an easier, better and faster way compared to what it was years back. Digital media is acting as an enabler for common mass. All these factors have given us thought that this is a category we should explore much deeper.
Does young India watch devotional content? What’s your strategy to attract them to this particular category?
I would answer it in two ways. If you look at the life journey of any Indian, there are so many exposures to devotional aspects right from childhood. In youth age, people may get a bit disconnected, they may be a bit rebellious also. Further, as they progress, the devotional journey continues. We as Indians are always seeking to reach the higher, deeper meaning of life. There is absolutely no denying that. In every religious festival, youth participates actively.
The second aspect is how we are making the content available and accessible. We are doing it through the gadgets of the youth that is the mobile. It’s about connecting people to their faith and using technology to make that connection happen.
We have recast a lot of traditional bhajans with a youthful flavour, in more modern music setting with more modern sounds. The fundamental character of bhajan is not being changed but is presented in a more youthful setting. For some of the bhajans, we have created very good videos. These are the ways to connect to the youth where they can find content suitable to their taste.
Do you have plans of launching any other app other than the existing ones (Bhakti, Ibaadat)?
We will expand to other faiths also. At this point, between these two we are covering more than 90 per cent of India’s population. Our focus is also to go deeper and add more and more new aspects, new features. If I have to look beyond apps, today whether it is on YouTube, DTH, we have worked with all the other faiths.
If you could share more details about DTH services…
Currently, we are running 24/7 services across four major DTH platforms which are Tata Sky, Dish TV, Airtel, d2h. One service is for Hindu, another for Islamic. Also, we just recently launched our service on InCable. These are all essentially premium paid ad-free services with different monthly payment ranging between Rs 40 to 60 per month. We do the entire programming curation, scheduling.
What are the plans for OTT consumers? Do you have a plan to strike a deal with any platform?
At this point, we are planning to put it on our upcoming Shemaroo Me platform. Exclusivity is one aspect, the other aspect is that you know devotion is a non-entertainment category. Most of these platforms are on the entertainment side. So it’s not a mandate of most of the platforms to take up devotion as content or services. In that sense, most of them are not looking at a devotional category.
What will be your marketing strategy?
We have two or three agencies working for us whereas Ogilvy is our main agency who created the basic template for the new Shemaroo visual identity. There is one more agency we worked with for some of the specific creative. We have very strong in-house teams too. The entire social media is handled by the in-house team. We have a very strong in-house promo creation team. They have done some very fantastic promo and tailors.
In terms of overall marketing, we do it in two or three ways. On social media, we have a very strong presence itself on Facebook, YouTube. There are YouTube channels which have more than 2 million subscribers. Apart from that, DTH is where consumer is also present and we also promote services. Then there is b2b which is through sending a lot of newsletters, PR to various b2b constituencies whether on corporate, regular media, digital media side, telcos. We also have a very strong presence through the telco platforms and are working very closely with them.
How does this category contribute to overall revenue?
It’s till now relatively nascent and small. In terms of overall monetisation, film is a very large category. Film is overall 80 per cent of our business. Devotion as a category contributor would be single digit per cent, less than 10 per cent.
Which are the new initiatives you are planning to take up this year?
There are very exciting plans. The whole Kumbh Mela is starting this month, there are lot of activities we have planned for Kumbh Mela in multiple ways. More importantly, we are focusing on giving the audience a fantastic experience both on television and digital medium.
We will have Shemaroo Me OTT launch where devotional will be a part of the content categories and then there are 3-4 other different activities planned out. Plans for the second half is yet to be chalked out.
iWorld
Meta introduces new AI tools to boost discovery-to-purchase journey
From shoppable Reels to generative video, platforms get smarter at turning attention into sales.
MUMBAI: Meta is turning “scroll and stop” into “scroll, stop, and shop” and it’s using AI to make the whole journey feel almost effortless. The company has announced several new tools and enhancements designed to help brands guide people from discovery to purchase more effectively, while delivering more relevant and personalised experiences across its platforms.
Creators can now add product links more broadly on Instagram Reels, turning their content into shoppable moments. Businesses in 22 countries, including India, will soon be able to share their product catalogues with creators, opening up a new sales channel for brands and fresh monetisation opportunities for creators.
The Creator Marketplace has also been upgraded with enhanced target audience filtering, integrated with Ads Manager. This helps businesses quickly find creators who are a strong match for their goals. Campaigns using Partnership Ads deliver, on average, 19 per cent lower CPAs, 13 per cent higher click-through rates, and 71 per cent higher median brand lift.
Meta is expanding Reels Trending Ads inventory with new content categories including TV & Movies, Travel, Business, Finance & Investments. According to Meta’s analysis of 59 studies, Reels Trending Ads delivered an incremental 6.6 percentage point Ad Recall lift compared to control groups.
AI-Powered Shopping Enhancements
- Product Set Optimisation is now in testing, allowing retail media networks to promote specific products with detailed reporting. Early results show 17 per cent lower median seller cost per purchase.
- Product Showcase is being expanded so marketers can upload one image or video and let Meta’s AI automatically add relevant products as a carousel when it improves performance.
Meta is expanding its generative AI capabilities with:
- UGC-style videos featuring avatars and voiceovers
- Easier voiceover translation and text overlay translation in a single streamlined flow
- New tools to automatically turn product catalogues into dynamic video ads for Reels
Early testing of the Advantage+ creative video generation tool showed a 10 per cent increase in CTR and 8 per cent increase in CVR on average. Campaigns using catalog product video saw 20 per cent more conversions per dollar, while Reels placements with catalog product video delivered 33 per cent higher incremental conversions.
Industry voices welcomed the updates. Vikas Chawla of Social Beat called Partnership Ads a “flywheel” for authentic content that converts. Niti Kumar of Spark Foundry and Sadhvi Dhawan of Blink Digital highlighted the power of Reels Trending Ads for cultural relevance and guaranteed share of voice. Ramasish Bhowmik of Adbuffs noted that Meta’s GenAI tools are giving teams a clear competitive edge.
In a world where attention is fleeting but shopping intent can spark in seconds, Meta is betting that smarter AI will help brands turn discovery into decisions faster than ever. The message is clear: the future of advertising isn’t just about reaching people, it’s about reaching them at exactly the right moment, with exactly the right product.
