Mobile operators splash out on TV commercials

The country's six telecom operators have spent around Tk 103 crore in the first three months of this calendar year on television commercials. Robi was the largest spender.
Such spending has increased to Tk 41.2 crore in March from Tk 35.4 crore in January, according to a report published by Ryans Archive, a media monitoring organisation.
However, the February spending was the lowest -- Tk 26 crore -- in these months.
Industry insiders attribute the rise in the spending to the re-branding move and re-structuring tariff patterns by major operators during January-March.
In March, Robi spent round Tk 5 crore on television ad with its new slogan Jole Uthun Apon Soktite. Robi replaces the earlier brand name of AKTEL. The company launched the branding campaign, Bangladesh Mela, at more than 70 spots across the country in March.
Grameenphone spent Tk 3.97 crore in the month and the most highlighted offer was its new tariff structure, followed by Banglalink and Citycell. The expenditure of Banglalink was Tk 3.37 crore, while Citycell spent Tk 82 lakh in March.
Teletalk, the lone state-owned operator, and Warid spent the lowest among all operators in March. They spent Tk 55 lakh and Tk 17 lakh respectively in the month.
At present, the local advertising industry is growing at 10 percent a year, mainly due to the intense battle for winning customers by the major mobile phone operators. And such battle has fuelled the growth in advertising spending, especially on television commercials, the report further pointed out.
Tk 1200 crore is the market size of the advertising industry.
The print media still remains the largest advertising vehicle, with around 43 percent of spending, TV commercials accounted for 36 percent of the total advertising spending.
Mohiuddin Babar, head of communication of Robi, said his company had to increase spending mainly for re-branding.
"We had to raise ad spending, as we re-branded our company. Initially, the main task was to make the new brand name familiar to our customers."
"And for that, we had to launch a massive campaign, which eventually increased the spending on TV ad. However, the spending also grew on other media, such as press, radio and outdoors (billboard) as well," Babar added.
At the same time, the company has launched some new products, including Tk 0.44 per minutes for calls made to the same operator.
Babar, however, said that the growth in advertising might not sustain, although the telecom operators' ad spending would not cease, as companies would keep offering newer products.