Dainik Bhaskar rises online, led by ‘Bharat’

Tell us about the online growth of Dainik Bhaskar’s offerings online, across languages

We have around 9 million unique visitors today, with a majority (around 6.3 million) being for the Hindi site dainikbhaskar.com. We have a strong following for Divyabhaskar.com (Gujarati) also, and Divyamarathi.in which is relatively new is also picking up traction.

In September 2011, we crossed 100 million page views, which went up to 150 million in March 2012. And in June 2012, we crossed 200 million page views.

Where is this growth coming from?

Traffic growth is coming from all over, but in terms of share it is changing with people in our Hindi-speaking (Bhaskar) markets going online in a big way.

In 2009, we had around 45 per cent of the online traffic from metros (mainly Mumbai and Delhi), around 18 per cent from rest of India, and the rest (just less than 40 per cent) from abroad.

Today, we see over 40 per cent coming from metros, and over 30 per cent from rest of India. The share of traffic from abroad is just about 29 per cent today, though that has also grown significantly in absolute terms. And among readers from abroad, the maximum are from US, followed by markets like UK, Australia and New Zealand.

As internet penetration grows, across devices, access from non-metros in India should go up significantly.

Has advertising started to reflect the growth in online visitors and readership?

In the last 12 months, we have grown rapidly, and now have the scale that advertisers look for to account for significant audience and hence spend. Revenue would have grown 100 per cent in the last six to nine months though it is far from what it should be.

But it is growing, as advertisers are now realising that this is an affluent audience online, both in India and abroad. And more so, that this is a unique language media consuming audience that they can add to their online media plan. Advertisers are far more receptive today.

And are advertisers targeting ‘Bharat’ or the diaspora largely?

In terms of audience segments, the global segment accounts for 40 to 50 per cent of revenues today. For those audiences, absolute targeting is possible, as it is far more accurate than for Indian audiences, where targeting accuracy (across sites) is at 70 to 80 per cent. 

I safely believe that in the coming six to nine months, the share of revenues from ads targeting Indian readers would rise significantly and this ratio will change.

What devices are Bhaskar readers logging on from? How is mobile access growing?

Mobile still accounts for a small part of the access, but it is growing too. It accounts for around 10 per cent of all access today, and the rest is still from laptops and PCs.

I believe tablets will make a big difference and will change the game, given the better readability and mobility it provides.