41.29% Drop In Ad Revenue In 2020: INS Members

The Indian Newspaper Society (INS) has revealed that its members have reported a 41.29% drop in ad revenue at Rs 10,458.28 crore in 2020 from Rs 17,815.88 crore in 2019 due to the pandemic. For the fiscal ended 31st March, the society’s membership stood at 716. Its members include all the top print media houses like the Times of India Group, HT Media, DB Corp, Jagran Prakashan, Lokmat, ABP Group, and Malayala Manorama.

"For the calendar year 2020, INS members reported a total advertising business of Rs 10,458.28 crore, as against Rs.17,815.88 crore in 2019," INS said in its annual report for FY21. Amongst the various sources of advertising revenue, accredited advertising agencies continued to dominate the advertising business of INS members.

It further stated that the distribution of business from accredited agencies was dominated by Indian language dailies which accounted for 58.04% of the total business with English dailies accounting for 40.94%.

Ad business from accredited advertising agencies nosedived by 46% to Rs 4919.13 crore from Rs 9059.60 crore. In the case of non-accredited agencies, the ad business was down by 43.48% to Rs 2063.7 from Rs 3651.41 crore. Direct ad revenue of INS-affiliated publishers was down 42% to Rs 1744.07 crore from Rs 3008.94 crore.

Government ad revenue from the Bureau of Outreach and Communication (BOC) shrank 57% to Rs 83.46 crore from Rs 194.10 crore. Ad revenue from state governments was down 9% to Rs 795.04 crore from Rs 869.80 crore. State Public Sector Undertakings spent Rs 144.17 crore on INS affiliated publishers which is a 31% drop from Rs 207.72 crore in 2019. Tender Advertisement fell by 16% to Rs 665.99 crore from Rs 729.99 crore.

The English dailies saw a 48% decline in business from accredited agencies at Rs 2013.70 crore from Rs 3836.23 crore. Indian language dailies witnessed 44.18% drop in business from accredited agencies to Rs 2854.95 crore from Rs 5114.98 crore.

During the period under review, English and language periodicals experienced 46% and 64% reduction in business from accredited agencies at Rs 34.05 crore and Rs 16.43 crore respectively.

One of the key functions performed by the INS is to provide assistance to member publications with regard to monitoring the recovery of their dues from advertising agencies and advertisers. Advertisements are the major source of revenue for the newspapers and periodicals and, therefore, critical in terms of the business plans for most publications. INS is the only industry association in India that actually manages a critical part of its member’s business – the management of its receivables on advertising sales,

"The efficiency of the INS credit monitoring system is also reflected in the extent of debts written off over the past five years which remained well below 1%. Over the five years period, the aggregate write-off in relation to the volume of business, at 0.17% is considered a creditable performance in the Indian market. The write-offs represent the excess of outstanding dues from advertising agencies over the collateral (Bank guarantees/security deposits) encashed prior to the cancellation of an agency’s accreditation on the grounds of unsatisfactory payment record," the society said.

The INS said that while it insists that agencies are obliged to pay their dues to members notwithstanding non-recoveries from their advertisers, it does assist the agencies, in deserving cases, by suspending the advertisements of the defaulting advertisers in the publications of the members, in terms of the provisions of its Accreditation Rules, when the bona fides of the agency concerned have been established, and it has cleared the dues of the publications.

It added that the implementation of this measure has helped many agencies in the recovery of dues from recalcitrant clients. During the year, the Society had issued two advisories against the advertisers.

During the financial year ending 31st March 2021, 65 publications ceased to be members.