I am looking forward to the IPL finals – Thanks to Tata Sky!

I just can’t get cricket out of me these days. That’s the reason for these back to back posts on cricket!

This time there’s a different perspective though. Here I would like to elaborate on a classic case of change in consumer behaviour, fuelled by Tata Sky!

I used to be an ardent Mumbai Indians (MI) fan, used to watch only those IPL matches which MI played until last year. This year, with Tata Sky Plus around, I ended up seeing almost all the matches that I realistically could. And I am not talking about the “record feature” here. I mean the record feature is ofcourse very powerful. But I am talking about here an even fundamental proposition of Tata Sky, and that’s their DVD quality picture and sound. I mean it just grows on you and you really feel yourself just enjoying almost anything you watch on TV. Cricket with all its charm of-course augurs that much better with it. What this has led to is a phenomenal change in my Cricket consumption behaviour. IPL, when MI doesn’t play used to be as good as any other content option on TV to me. I mean it wouldn’t make me plan my day around it. I’ll watch it if there’s isn’t anything great to do.

But with Tata Sky, I have observed a dramatic shift in my cricket consumption. Every T20 match seems as appealing to me as an MI match. I mean the “Cricket experience” on TS is just so powerful that you actually become neutral to who’s playing and who’s winning. You just tend to appreciate the game and more precisely the experience on Tata Sky. I mean with MI out of this years IPL, I still find myself gravitating towards t20 on Tata sky and am super anxious about the final, independent of whoever makes it to it, and whoever wins it!

I am sure there would be many more beings with Tata Sky like me whose TV behaviour would have changed and they would be getting more out of their TV than what they earlier could.
The proof of the pudding is in eating it, try experiencing cricket on TS and you’ll resonate with what I am saying here.

Go for it, get a TS connection now and you can still catch up with the IPL T20 Finals on the 24th!

Cricket on Tata Sky!!!

Most of you must have seen Tata Sky’s advertising campaign where it is aggressively positioning itself as THE brand to watch cricket on. What they stress on is Tata Sky’s picture quality and sound which brings the stadium like ambience right into your home. Anyone who has been to a cricket match in a large stadium can vouch for the fact as to how mesmerizing it is. The sound of drums, people shouting, the waves, the excitement! It is all about the “experience” than the actual match. I think Tata sky provides an experience that is as close a TV can get to a real life stadium experience. In fact I would go to the extent of saying that if you’re a real cricket aficionado, watching it on TS is better than stuffing yourself in the stadium stands to watch the game!

Let me analyse it objectively here, if you compare it with what you see on your cable connections, it’s actually a no brainer, on cable with the monotonous sound with hazy picture, you would rather hear the cricket commentary on a transistor and imagine the rest! However, I must point out that all DTH have a few seconds time lag as compared to cable. This is because of the fact that cable uses single encryption-decryption but DTH use dual encryption-decryption, i.e. once at the beaming station and once at the STB at home. This applies to all DTH including Big TV, Dish TV, ADTV as well as Tata Sky. However, I realized that Tata Sky has the least time lag which is around half a second. This is one big point in its favour! So you see TS is more live!

The picture and sound quality too is absolutely great. As far as the picture is concerned, I would say “can’t be better”. You can see every last detail that you can possibly see, including the cheese in the sandwiches eaten by people in the audience. On the sound, I would say I haven’t heard a crisper rattle of the stumps and the deeper bass octave (thump) of wood hitting leather (bat hitting the ball, for the uninitiated) on television than on TS!

Believe me it’s been absolute fun watching IPL this year on my Tata Sky! I am sure all you Tata Skyers would agree!

Tata Sky Ads: Tata Sky DTH - New Ads for South India!

There are these three interesting ads that TS has released in South India. All centering around the “Tata Sky makes Cricket Jingalala” proposition.

All these ads have another common element, the TS south brand ambassador, the erstwhile likable-girl-next-door – now a-superstar-in-the-making, yes you’ve guessed it right, Asin.

The ads are shot with three different contexts, “Iron”, “Doorbell” and “Telephone”. These contexts basically work on impressing upon the audience the fact that watching cricket on Tata Sky is such a magnetic experience (because of TS’s life like picture quality), that when we’re at it, some of the other general stimuli of day to day life fail to elicit response from us. For e.g. As highlighted in these ads, a contemporary south Indian couple (played by Asin & her costar), who is glued to cricket on their Tata Sky so much that a “burning Iron” or a “continuous door bell” and “a constantly ringing telephone” fail to get their response!

The strength of the attachment to Cricket on Tatasky is beautifully reflected through the “conscious negligence” of day to day events which generally get attended to rather quickly (you pick up the phone when it rings, you jump out to look at the “Iron” when you smell it burning or you are fairly prompt in opening the door when the bell rings), But the magnetism of cricket on TS is so strong, the life like picture clarity engrosses the viewers so much, that they quite surprisingly become immune to other day to day, significant stimuli around them.

These ads are short, effective and spot on with the messaging (that cricket is best watched only on Tata Sky's because of its life like picture clarity). Quite nicely filmed too. Asin as usual is very real life in her portrayal of the character and overall ads deliver the message quite effectively.

Take a look at the "Iron" ad below.



The other 2 ads could be seen on the links below:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PZ-KWlTweg8
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JDJC57y57Ks