TOP FM Is Targeting Youth With An Electric Mix Of Bollywood And Regional Music - Neeraj Attri

Neeraj Attri  COO & Group Revenue Head of TOP FM talks about its journey of 8 radio stations launched across rural cities in Gujarat,  channels content programming and growth plans, in an exiting conversation with Loudest.in

Attri began the conversation saying, “Rapid advancement in technology and better connectivity has significantly increased the scope of business in rural geographies and small towns.  Keeping this in mind we decided to capture certain small-town markets which are unexplored and have a huge potential. TOP FM currently is operational across 8 cities in Gujarat namely Junagarh 91.9: Jamnagar 91.9: Bhavnagar 93.1: Porbandar 93.5: Veraval 93.5: Bharuch 105.2: Godhra  93.1: Mehsana 92.7.”

Talking about the one-year-old channels journey, Attri said, “These 8 stations of Gujarat has completed 1 year and the journey so far has been very good in terms of market, listenership as well as consumer responses. Initially, we were not sure how tier 2 and tier 3 markets will respond since there was no radio in those markets and we were the first ones to bid for the stations for FM phase 3. Our strategy was clear that we wanted to cater to tier 2 and tier 3 cities because urban markets were already much cluttered in terms of having 5-6 radio players, so there was no point in coming up with another player in those markets.”

Highlighting on the content programming for TOP FM in Gujarat Attri said, “TOP FM with a tag line  JAB SUNO TOP SUNO is targeting youth with an electric mix of Bollywood and Regional Music. If we look at Gujarat it has accepted Hindi as a second language and comes under HSM (Hindi speaking market) so there is no language barrier in Gujarat, we run 98%Hindi Bollywood content and only 2% content in Gujarati which includes good numbers from Gujarati films and some regional music. We have created local studios in all 8 cities which has individual RJs from their respective cities, who indulge the audiences from morning to evening in a very interactive way. While our primetime shows in the morning and evening go from the respective studios which are dedicated to a particular city.”

“For the none-prime time, we have syndicate shows which are relayed from our central studio which is in Ahmedabad, which has a lot of interesting line up of shows from early morning, afternoon, evening, starting from Spiritual shows anchored by Tushar Joshi, who mixes it with a lot of philosophical subjects, while plays along with it devotional bhajans sung by Anup Jalota, Anuradha Paudwal and a lot of devotional content which we have licensed from T –series for this section. We have RJ Sid who’s absolutely humorous and is always up to tickle your funny bone, so our shows like ‘Total TP’ has a lot of light humor jokes, fun and loads of masti,” added Attri.

“While RJ Hazel who’s very cheerful and fun-loving talks about everything under the sun, related to women issues in the show ‘Gupshap gang’ and sometimes opens the line to interact with women to participate and give their views on a particular subject. The evening sees yet another interesting concept, ‘Dil No Daayro’  where our Love guru RJ Dipali answers Love queries and indulges in heart to heart conversations with the listeners guiding them on their love issues, rest we play Bollywood Top 10 and Top Gujarati songs from the hit films of the Gujarati cinema,”added Attri.

Talking about the expansion plans in J&K and differentiating the content programming Attri said, “We are planning to launch 5 stations in J & K in November 2019 namely Leh 91.1: Kargil 91.1: Kathua 91.1: Punch 94.3: Bhaderwah 94.3. We will have a different content strategy for J&K which will include more of genres Sufi, ghazal and regional folk along with a lot of integrated content as we will have local RJs who would know in and out about the cities culture, music, arts, food enabling them to interact with the local audience in a more effective way.”

Talking about the opportunities in unexplored cities, “Corporates and government bodies have made several efforts to bridge the gap between rural and urban India. Also, with the increase in the purchasing power of the consumers, the disparity between urban and rural India is reducing manifold. Moreover, these markets over the last few years have seen more awareness about brands due to the penetration of television, FM Radio stations and increased use of smartphones.”

Attri gives insights on key industry segments advertising in regional markets during the festive season, “In Gujarat Navratri, Janmashtami and Diwali are very big for advertising seasons. We will be doing activations in all 8 cities of Gujarat and are planning to rope in big Brands from Delhi and Mumbai for activations since it is difficult for a national client to reach out to these locations, which have a completely unexplored virgin market. Till date the advertisers here were only on print, outdoor or little in the digital space. Now Brands are aggressively focusing on Tier 2 & Tier 3 markets as mediums of advertisement are easily available at a much lower cost. So many big brands are on board with us in these towns.  Categories like – FMCG, AUTOMOBILE, HEALTH, EDUCATION are aggressively doing business with us in Tier 2 & 3 cities, during the festive season.”