Ektaa Kapoor is the entertainment industry icon of the year. In a survey of 100 decision makers in the media industry she beats Man Jit Singh, CEO, Multi Screen Media, Ronnie Screwvala, CEO, UTV Group and Uday Shankar, CEO, Star India to hit the top spot.
Bade Acche Lagte Hain, a show from Balaji Telefilms, the firm where she is a creative director and shareholder has put Sony, firmly back in the reckoning among the top entertainment channels in India. A Balaji film, The Dirty Picture, has been among the most profitable, awarded and discussed films of 2011. Little wonder then that the lady with a reputation for being 'difficult' is popular again (see chart).
These, among others, are some of the more interesting findings of Front Page 2011, a round up of the entertainment and media industry trends in 2011 from Ormax Media. The Mumbai-based media research firm has used a combination of things to arrive at rankings of popular stars, films, shows, newsmakers, icons and so on. One is the results of the consumer data collected throughout the year from its research products. To this it adds year-end research, conducted in the first half of January 2012.
For instance the data for best films comes from round-the-year exit interviews with audiences. This data gives the firm a WOM (Word-of-Mouth) score. This is a percentage of the audience that liked the film enough to recommend it strongly to their friends. The WOM score is then used to shortlist films for the second round. This research was conducted across 16 cities in India in January 2012. Only the films that scored over 30 per cent on WOM went onto stage two. That explains why Singham and not Ra.One make the shortlist, despite a huge opening at the box office (see chart). The big one missing in this list is Tanu Weds Manu, the sleeper hit of 2011. An Ormax spokesperson says that the film is among the top 50 but not the top ten films of 2011.
The listing of popular stars shows some interesting quirks, like Anushka Sharma has grown by over 500 per cent in popularity. Clearly, Band Baaja Baraat, her last hit has had a big impact on people. The rankings of popular stars are based on Stars India Loves (SIL), a popularity tracking product from Ormax. The data for SIL is collected everyday of the year, with a total annual sample of 30,000 cinema goers across India.
The data from Hindi general entertainment channels is a mixed bag. Sony’s Bade Acche.. is expectedly the most popular show. Star Plus has four shows on the list. Funnily enough, three of its top shows (Diya Aur Baati Hum, Ek Hazaron Mein Meri Behna Hai and Iss Pyaar Ko Kya Naam Doon) don't feature in this list, as their popularity has been relatively recent. This means, infers the report, that Star Plus can potentially have five-six programs in this list next year.
The decision makers survey, which ranked, Kapoor, Singh and Screwvala as icons had one strange problem, says the report. Apparently many of the media experts interviewed had very little knowledge about ‘Bollywood’ professionals, and many did not know some of the senior leaders of film companies by name. Not surprisingly therefore, many of the icons selected by the media experts are people who have a strong broadcast connect and who are covered fairly frequently by both the popular and business media.