MUMBAI: Hitherto ruled mostly by Bollywood and cricket, mobile video searches and views saw a radical shift in preferences with news content gaining traction among Indian mobile viewers, according to the findings of recent Global Video Insights Report for April 2012, released by Vuclip, the world’s largest independent mobile video service. With waves of the U.S. presidential elections being felt here too, President Barack Obama emerged as the most searched celebrity on Indian mobiles, ahead of star cricketer, Yuvraj Singh and tinsel town queen, Katrina Kaif. The keyword ‘Obama’ was third most-searched term after ‘Bollywood Photoshoot’ and ‘Bollywood Trailers’.
Another interesting trend on mobile videos this month is the comeback of sequels. Being part of the Hollywood filmmaking industry for decades, now Bollywood filmmakers are also following the trend and have planned sequel-mania for 2012 with more than a dozen sequels slated to release this year. Even before movie releases, Aashiqui2 and Jannat2 kept mobile viewers glued to their screens and grabbed #6 and #10 spot respectively this month, indicating the trend of ‘Part-2’ films is here to stay in Bollywood. Even as IPL fever slowly begins to catch up among Indian mobile viewers, it was actually Bollywood yet again that seized more than half of the top searches.
Among most watched mobile videos, topping the charts was news of Chris Gayle, the hard hitting batsman from West Indies, who visited a young girl at the hospital who was accidentally injured by his boundary shot during an IPL match. The video reveals softer side of the fiery cricketer and also epitomizes that emotions traverse all boundaries and touch audiences universally.
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Commenting on report results, Salman Hussain, Vuclip’s Vice President – Business Development and Managing Director, India & Middle East, said, “We are happy to see news content videos gaining ground among mobile viewer choices in the country. With the mass adoption of basic mobile phones and the continued proliferation of smart phones, mobile video consumption is undergoing a shift in dynamics. Technology has empowered the consumers and they are leveraging that power in novel ways to keep themselves abreast of latest developments. There is a rising trend among mobile users of watching video on the go and at the same time they are increasingly engaged in the content they watch. More and more people are using their mobile devices to get real-time local news and information. This calls for new strategies in real-time marketing”.
