Can there be a standard market price for content marketing

For brands that spend hefty amounts on content marketing, navigating through the right prices is trickier and tougher than finding the right platform or creator for content collaboration.

BuzzInContent reached out to a few platforms, agencies and brands to understand why and how the rates vary and who decides the prices for branded content.

Apart from discussing the parameters that decide the right rates, they explained how the charges differ, depending whether it is a sponsored post of an influencer or a branded web series. They pointed out why having specific market rates is need of the hour.

Karthik Nagarajan

Karthik Nagarajan, Chief Content Officer, Wavemaker India and Head, Branded Content, GroupM India, doesn’t believe there is such a thing as a perfect price point. It is usually a cost plus approach, but through the lens of supply-demand economics, he said.

Kartik Johari

Kartik Johari, Vice-President, Nobel Hygiene, had similar views, saying there's an entire range of prices across content. “There's no rate card. Most marketers in the country would love it if there was a rate,” he said.

A standard market price, he said, is a multi-million dollar question on everyone's minds but unfortunately, right now, it is almost entirely subjective.

“We use proxies such as reach, view counts and engagement counts. We expect and justify the cost based on CPM and CPV,” Johari said.

The brand had in the past collaborated with the movie 102 Not Out, which helped the brand push the needle with consumers on trade.

Shrenik Gandhi

Shrenik Gandhi, Co-founder and CEO, White Rivers Media, said pricing for branded content is mostly about what the involved parties are going to gain from a campaign.

“Associating with a star face or having access to a very niche audience or talent helps pitch a sizable figure against each. In technical digital language, CTR goes up, which essentially makes the campaign more effective. People are more likely to trust the product and buy, and hence the premium charged by the stars,” he said.

However, in the absence of standard qualitative metrics, disparate pricing for the same quantitative metrics within the fragmented creative community may come across as unfair at times, he said.

“Yes, it is unregulated right now, but sooner or later, this bubble will burst, and people will start charging based on the qualitative reach and impact received. This makes room for advertisers, publishers and creators to sit across each other and determine a price that justifies the time, skill, labour and the thought that goes into each campaign,” Gandhi said.

Till then, the amount of premium charged is a pure game of demand and supply, he said.

For instance, if a star puts out 10 videos every quarter, he or she would want to make sure they make the maximum impact and depending on the demand and supply, the pricing is determined.

Aadheeraj Krishna

According to Aadheeraj Krishna, Creative Director, Gozoop, the rates range from Rs 15 lakh to Rs 15 crore for a branded web series.

“Years ago, when TVF made branded content for CommonFloor.com they charged Rs 4 lakh per episode. Now that amount has gone up to Rs 1 crore per episode because the viewership and quality has multiplied,” he said.

Krishna said a quality content creator with a history of hit shows will charge a premium. There are no two ways about that, he said.

“The brand should check if the content goes with your brand image, if the content is made for the audience you want to target, if your product an important part of the story, how much brand awareness and recall is expected, etc. The content creators should make sure they are charging enough to ensure quality content and not so much that the projected returns are impossible to meet. TVF has had many success stories with branded content with big players such as CommonFloor.com, Ola, Kingfisher, Unacademy, because they were able to craft a storyline that seamlessly weaves in the product and put out an entertaining show for the target audience,” he added.

Ramya Ramachandran

Ramya Ramachandran, CEO and Founder, Whoppl, said the cost of branded content entirely depends on the size of the campaign as well as various collaterals. It is also in accordance with the campaign's timelines.

“In terms of branded web series, it primarily depends on the longevity of the show and the branded integration in it. Brand integrated content is completely dependent on the scope of work and the integration minutes through the series. It can cost anywhere from Rs 15 lakh and upwards,” she added.

Whoppl creates a lot of branded content with influencers via two approaches. The first component is where it collaborates with influencers to curate content and provides it to the brand. Although the influencer may or may not publish it, the brand owns all digital rights that can be leveraged. The second part is when it works with influencers on campaigns where it has to post about the brand, talk about the benefits, and so on.

“Influencers have rack rates, which vary by industry. Prices range from barter to as little as Rs 5,000 for a branded post to over Rs 4-5 lakh for a branded content piece, depending on reach, conversion and engagement. It also depends on the niche you have,” Ramachandran said.

Rajeesh Rajagopalan

Rajeesh Rajagopalan, National Business Head, Grapes Digital, agreed that there are no specific market rates for such deals.

Branded content, like any other content deal, is a short partnership. The publisher and the brand need to come to the common ground so that it's a win-win situation for both. The price point usually depends on several factors, including production quality and impact and also reach and the engagement. It also depends on the cost of producing the content and the qualitative impact it will have on the audience.

But since there is no fixed rate in the market and it depends on multiple factors, should there be any particular priority for a platform, publisher or brand while fixing prices to receive favourable ROI?

How to strategise the right, favourable price for branded content

According to Johari, this is rather a complex affair as compared to traditional mediums.

“It's the same for any other proposals or any other businesses you have. Bennett Coleman must have mastered selling Times of India proposals over a couple of decades. So subjectivities of production of branded video content and added subjectivity of celebrity and influencer time make this more confusing because at least in the old times, we had a very clear perspective saying, okay, this is how much I am going to pay for my coverage in the newspaper. I know what it's actually going to cost me to get a print ad made. Now you have an added layer of complexity to go ahead and make it,” he said.

However, he said price points are necessarily tied to what kind of results one wants on the campaign and what size of media will be used to assist the brand campaign as well.

Media value of the property is a very measurable variable. It can be applied to celebrities, influencers as well as platforms.

Nagarajan said that historical pricing is a critical factor as well in terms of justification.

“When we help clients to evaluate pricing, we also look at other engagement metrics such as the buzz it is likely to create or performance metrics. Sometimes it is also a function of the opportunity cost of not investing,” he said.

Krishna said brands must look at the history of the makers, the viewership their shows enjoy, their target audience, the ideas and values the show is promoting, production quality and how directly yet smoothly can they integrate the product in the story.

“Once all of this is sorted, they should invest a part of their marketing budget proportional to the returns they expect. The perfect price is the one that ensures quality content for the audience, a healthy profit for the content makers and a high brand recall for the sponsor company,” he said.