Being perceived as a premium offering comes with the risk of being perceived as expensive. And Tata Sky is fighting that challenge today with its current communication campaign.

The DTH service provider, which claims a subscriber base of over 75 lakh users (as of August), has been addressing such consumer perceptions with promotions and value additions over the last 10 months, according to Mr Vikram Mehra, Chief Marketing Officer, Tata Sky Ltd. A campaign to communicate these propositions kicked off with a television commercial last week, created by Ogilvy, and a sequel started airing on Wednesday. A third film is due next week.

Speaking to Business Line , Mr Mehra said, “We have always believed in setting the house in order before going to town with our claims. The overall perception was that Tata Sky was expensive and inflexible — when we were not. We have introduced several value additions over and above the offerings we had, and the perception is being addressed now with this campaign.”

Consumers, because of the premium perception of Tata Sky, did not seek options on key aspects such as its channel packages, explained the spokesperson. The new campaign under the umbrella Poochne mein kya jaata hain urges consumers to ask, while underlining the range of offerings.

The first commercial of the series speaks of subscription packages offering two to 12 months free, while the second communicates that Tata Sky has plans for less than Rs 200.

“There was a perception that DTH itself being expensive, there would be no plan for under Rs 200 per month. The truth is that there are packages starting at Rs 150 on Tata Sky,” added Mr Mehra.

The issues that came to the fore in feedback received at the call centres, usage patterns and other channels, included perceptions on pricing in multiple television households (now at Rs 160 for the second, third and fourth televisions in the house), vacation time charges (which has been addressed with an annual subscription holiday), and relocation charges. “We initially thought that relocation was a Mumbai phenomenon. With a number of requests coming in from all over, we introduced a system where subscribers can carry the dish and we handle the transfer at Rs 125 or we handle the relocation at Rs 250. This may not have been communicated to subscribers accurately across touch points — like other details such as channel packages — but that is being addressed now,” said the CMO.

>gokul.k@thehindu.co.in

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