Mumbai: Fourth Dimension Media Solutions, one of the fastest growing Media Outsource specialists in the country, which is part of the Chennai based SRM Group with a 30 Member strong team spread across markets, has completed five years of successful operations as on 7th February 2016, and stepped in to sixth year with an aggressive vision and growth target.
Five years before Fourth Dimension started off with the job of selling Puthiya Thalaimurai Magazine. Later on, the Company marched ahead with a steady growth and today they own properties from different formats of media such as Television, Print, Radio, Cable, Events, Live Action and Digital that are spread across the nation.
Presently, the Company owns eight properties which includes No. 1 Tamil News & Infotainment Channel Puthiya Thalaimurai TV, Tamil GEC Puthuyugam, No. 1 Telugu News Channel V6 News, Most happening Marathi News Channel Maharashtra 1, Countries first Kids HD Learning Channel DaVinci, Leading FM Radio station Chennai Live 104.8, Marathi News paper Saamna, Business India Magazine, Countries largest Cable aggregater Infinite Media, beside this they also handle multiple sponsorship deals for many offline properties and events throughout the year.
The core team of Fourth Dimension Media comprises Shankar – the CEO, Bharath Viswanathan – the COO, Thyagaraj – Regional Head for West, Jayatha Sarkar – Regional Head for North, R. Balakrishnan – Regional Head for South.
Speaking on the occasion to tvnews4u.com, Bharath Viswanathan – COO, Fourth Dimension Media said, “We started off in a Modest way, today we are one of the largest outsourcing agency in India. It is a big achievement, we are also one of the very few agencies in India that managed to post profits in the very first year of operation. At this moment I wish to thank all our partners for supporting us and wish the association to continue forever. Whatever we did in the past 5 years is just a beginning and there are lot more exciting things to come from Fourth Dimension in the future”
Balakrishnan – Regional Head for South said, “It’s been tremendous journey during last five years and happy to be part of this fastest growing media sales outfit”. commenting on sales he added that 45% of sales comes from regional clients.
The CEO of Fourth Dimension Media Solutions, Mr Shankar had an exclusive chat with tvnews4u.com on the occasion of completing half a decade and shared his memories of Journey so far and his future plans:
1) You have been spear heading Fourth Dimension Media from the inception… Could you tell us how this organisation originated..?
I met Dr P Satyanarayana, the founder of Fourth Dimension Media and his team towards the end of 2010 and proposed the idea of floating a Media Outsourcing Company. It took three months for us to think over the idea of Media Outsourcing and finally the Brand Fourth Dimension was born on 7th February 2011.
Initially, we had only one product, which is Puthiya Thalaimurai Magazine and then we added Chennai Live 104.8 FM Radio station. Later on we started adding more brands and products in to our kitty and rest was the history.
2) How did the whole idea of floating a Media Outsourcing Company came in to you..?
After spending more than two decades in different facets of Media such as Print, Television, Digital Media marketing and advertising. I basically wanted to get in to a space where I could dabble with all products. It was always my dream to establish a Media Outsourcing business, That way SRM Group was extremely co-operative, very kind and courageous enough to give us this platform.
Once Fourth Dimension was established, we wanted to put up a very strong team to drive this organisation and that is how Bharath, Bala and Thyagaraj came in picture. Today, we have been rated as countries biggest Media Outsourcing Company.
3)What is the Strong USP of the Company..?
If you look at other companies with similar nature of business, they would be either focusing more on Print or too much time in Television or Radio. There are very few professionals in the Industry who had spent significant time in each of the verticals like Print, Television, Radio and Digital. Myself and Fourth Dimension Media is one such organisation that is having expertise to make its presence in all formats of Media.
Secondly, We being based out of Chennai, Strategically we wanted to remove the myth from the minds of advertisers that underestimates the knowledge and expertise of South Indian Media entities. Today, we have completed proved them wrong time and again for the last five years.
Despite being based out of Chennai, the kind of connections, the kind of Brands and the kind of advertises that we have today, I can proudly thump my chest and say that me and my team have done a commendable and phenomenal job.
We have the National brands, the National agencies and clients from Kashmir to Kanyakumari to advertise on all my products. We have a remotest agency in Punjab who spends 18 to 20 Lacs every year. Similarly, we have agencies doing business with us from Jammu, Bihar, Haridwar, Tirunelveli etc…
We have a 30 member strong team in Fourth Dimension Media who are spread length and breadth across the country. If you look at the expertise of the core team, I myself have 22 years of experience, Bharath has 15 year, Bala has 15 years and the core team put together has a 106 years of Media experience… all put together. I can proudly say that it is a very rare combination that you can’t find in anywhere else.
4) While you have successfully completed five years…. What are the changes that you underwent in the last five years..?
I can say that lot of things have changed. During the initial days we were too much dependant on Television. For the first two years we were not wanting to take too much risks and we only focused on consolidating Puthiya Thalaimurai TV and Chennai Live.
But, today we have V6 News Channel from Andhra Pradesh market which is No. 1, we recently acquired Marathi News Channel Maharashtra1, which is already making huge impact among the audience. Today we are the biggest and largest aggregator of Cable business that we do through a company called Infinite Media.
Today, we are taking the risk of acquiring properties from various markets more than anyone else. If you look at the history of Telugu News Channel V6 News, Initially, it was at No. 12 and we stood with the brand and over a period of time they became No. 1 in the Telugu News Space and we are extremely thankful to the management for partnering with us.
If you look at the history of countries first Kids HD Learning channel DaVinci, we got in to an arrangement with them two years before and they launched the channel very recently, with this we entered National domain through an International Channel.
Moreover, I can also proudly say that nobody understands South the way we do. we started evangelising Tamil Nadu and Andhra Pradesh. Today, we give advice to many brands and clients all over the country for any problem related to the performance of their brands. They reach out to us for solutions and we even advise them on brand strategy at very specific town level with a report of ground reality in that area with our own metrics.
Finally, What are your future plans..?
We have been approached by many International brands in various verticals and we are examining the possibilities of exploring the same. On the other side, we have acquired many brands in the recent past like Maharashtra1 and we are planning to consolidate with our recent acquisitions and maximize the revenue and profitability from these brands by adding more value.. we look forward to add many offline properties to these brands and increase the quantity of offerings.
In the last few years we have emerged as a strong force in News and Infotainment segment by acquiring top performing channels in various markets. we look to expand the same in many other markets too.
we have chalked out plans to acquire more properties in GEC, Radio, Digital and events segment.
