Indya.com looks beyond banner ads for revenues

Vandana Gombar

New Delhi, July 15: There was a time when most dotcoms managed to get huge revenues from banner ads. Not any more. Which is why these firms are exploring innovative ways of garnering not just advertising revenue but revenue from services delivered online, which were hitherto free. That is also the strategy being followed by Indya.com, a dotcom promoted by Pradeep Kar’s Microland group.

Indya launched its “integrated marketing solutions” (IMS) suite about six months back which saw revenues increase by 100 per cent quarter on quarter, according to Neeti Chopra, vice-president, ad sales and business development at Indya.com Portal Private Ltd. She however declined to detail the revenues in terms of rupees. These solutions involve an interesting mix of on-line contests and competitions reinforced by off-line advertising in the print media and in its 900-odd cyber cafes spread across the country.

Indya has done such integrated campaigns for the likes of Foster’s (no ban yet on on-line liquor advertising), Hyundai Santro, TI Cycles, Maruti Udyog, Ericsson, Electrolux, Domino’s and jobsahead.com.

The objective of all these campaigns have been different. Some like Foster’s have been for brand reinforcement. The jobsahead campaign was to ensure a larger submission of resumes. This was done through a gift scheme for the smartest resume posted. 2,500 resumes were received in three weeks and the total number of resumes increased by 120 per cent as a result.

While advertising and marketing solutions are the dominant source of revenue for Indya currently, the company is looking at tapping the on-line paid services opportunity. “In the next few months, we will be implementing an online transaction-based charging model in five segments — travel, personal finance, yellow pages, entertainment services and shopping,” Ms Verma said. Paid services would include online tax-advisory, mutual funds, property listings and yellow pages on the site, she added.