After a hugely popular four-season run in Pakistan, Coca-Cola brought its music television series Coke Studio to India earlier this year. At the time, many had raised eyebrows on the feasibility of airing fusion music series in a country where Bollywood music has a field day. Now in its final lap, with over a half a million followers on social networking sites, with thousands swooning to its songs at mini concerts across the country, and with others scrambling to catch the shows on television, Coke Studio has made a huge statement.
Wasim Basir, director, Integrated Marketing Communication, Coca-Cola India says “Coke Studio was a much awaited musical property but the acceptance has been beyond our imagination. It is our philosophy that diversities can co-exist. We did not go after fusion music for the sake of it. We tried to create a unique blend, for instance, a medley of Marathi and Assamese songs. This struck a chord with our audience.” The association with the music property was meant to help the beverage brand gain better resonance with teenage audience.
Judging from the response received across new media platforms – be it on social networking sites or on mobile – the concept is off to a heady start. Coke Studio India has over 500,000 fans on Facebook. The videos available on YouTube have recorded two million views. The website cokestudioindia.com has drawn in over 100,000 unique visitors till now.
Coke Studio is aired on MTV every Friday and on Colors every Sunday. The show has reached out to 30 million viewers. Every episode features an established musician, an upcoming artist and a folk legend who create a sybthesis of the musical background they hail from.
The 50-odd songs which have been recorded at Coke Studio has already seen over seven million downloads on mobile. Basir declined to get into the financials but added, “We have just started monetizing the property, we are encouraging people to pay for music. We have registered over seven million downloads on mobile. The proceeds would be used to support and promote folk artists in the country.”
But how does this all help the cola giant grow in India? “It takes three to four months to gauge how a property adds to the brand equity for a company. We are into the second month of activation. But the initial indications have been very positive. We have been able to reach out to our target group”, says Basir.
There would be a second season, of course, but before that Sony Music would release for all music-lovers an album chronicling songs recorded by the 40-artists, including Shaan, Shafqat Aamant Ali, Shankar Mahadevan, Sunidhi Chauhan, Kailash Kher, Khogen Da, Wadali Brothers, Chinna Ponnu, Harshdeep kaur, in their maiden journey in Coke Studio India. Plans are also afoot to publish a coffee table book on the first season of Coke Studio here.
Coke Studio India has been produced by MTV in collaboration with Red Chillies Entertainment. The property has 17 partners either for content sharing or for promoting the concept – Kingfisher Airlines (for listening to Coke Studio on the go), Telibrahma, Dominos, Hardrock Café (where the mini concerts are being organized), DT Cinemas, Inox, Airtel (for mobile downloads), Tata Sky (which airs the making of the show) among others.