BT dot.com: Content Conundrum

With zillions of portals spewing out gigabytes of information every moment, what really drives content these days?

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This might sound a bit off, but I don't really care if you read this article or not. ok, ok, let me rephrase this: I would be happy to know that readers are zipping through these 1,500 words or so. But the fact remains that I have no way of figuring out how many actually follow this piece, word for word. For all I know, you could be using these pages to line the cupboards. This, then, is the standard disclaimer: we too are in the content business.

Well, that's neither here nor there. But then, that's the feeling one gets while trying to grasp the definition-and the implications-of this one-word juggernaut: content. There's public, private, and pure content. Then there's dynamic, active, massive, syndicated, contextual, enabling...content. It's a commodity, but it's also king. It's a brand, marketing channel, revenue-generation tool, attention-seeking formula, all rolled into one. Adds Sundeep Khanna, Director of the content services shop, Netaphase, helpfully: ''We're dealing with a new kind of content that no one has experienced before.''

No one really knows the magic formula to keep users on a site. Thanks to the mushrooming of horizontal and vertical portals, there's millions of pages being served up in the form of channels. From news and information to special interest channels and applications, much of it looks and reads the same. That's a problem, considering the aim is to keep the user on the site for as long as possible (according to Alexa Research, Indian surfers spent an average of 4.02 minutes per visit in the top 10 sites surfed in September, 2000). If the surfer comes back for more, is prompted to pay-or make purchases-you've got a winner.

That, then, is the essence of the content business. Tough call, as the Indian surfer's profile is evolving. The Indian surfer was always interested in information. Now, he or she is much clearer on where to find it-and wants differentiated content. Attention spans are low. Says Keya Sarkar, CEO of content accumulator, Matrix: ''The surfing days are over. Now, the search is on to find out what exactly is relevant.'' Matrix, and a clutch of firms-like Netaphase, Friday Corporation, Net Scribes-are pioneers in the content business, one that is estimated to be worth around Rs 100 crore.

There are models and models. ''We are content aggregators,'' says Dhruv Sharma, 40, CEO, 123India. ''Our competencies lie not in development of content, but in its management, utilisation, and dissemination for profits. Progressively, dotcoms are realising that they can't create content in-house.'' Disagrees R. Satyanarayanan, Chairman, Career Launcher, an on-line education site that generates its content in-house: ''The value of proprietary content is much higher than public content.''

So who's right? A Yahoo.com!, with 1,400 content providers worldwide, and over 45 in India? Or a rediff.com, which generates its content in-house? Well, given the netizen's appetite for information, generating content has turned out to be harder than many had expected. It's not surprising then that most have gone in for a hybrid model that marries supervision with outsourcing. Fabmart, for instance, develops most of its content in-house, but has begun outsourcing music reviews.

Says Fabmart's Veep K. Vaiteeshwaran: ''Finally, there will be not more than two quality content providers in each area. As most sites will source from them, everyone's content can start looking similar. To counter this, it is a good idea to mix both and achieve a good balance.'' Agrees Vishal Dhar of Friday Corporation, which has developed content for ties2family.com and mysticalstyles.com: ''A site's USP content should remain in-house till it is fully comfortable with the capabilities of the content-solution provider.''

There's differentiation between the content providers too. Matrix, for one, does not generate any content; it aggregates it from 175 content partners and syndicates it to clients. Says Sarkar: ''There are wonderful generators of content in the country. Our job is to be the enabling play. To drive commerce.'' Matrix, which feeds 123india.com's movie channel, is also active on the cricket content front. Other providers like Netaphase and Friday Corporation generate some of the content. Says Netaphase's Khanna: ''The basic data is not good enough. A great deal of primary research has to be done. It's an entry barrier.'' Netaphase has, for instance, churned out its own database of restaurants and discounts; they will come in handy while working on the content for Sify's city portals.

Given the poor level of basic data-even the best yellow pages are sub-standard, and there is no one list of all schools in the country-there is an opportunity to provide basic information at this level. Something like what an InfoSpace does-profitably-for 4,000 internet companies worldwide. But given the poor state of data collection in the country, that's an uphill-but not impossible-task. In the interim, most content providers will use existing data. It's clear, however, that a little amount of data generation can go a long way in providing differentiated content.

It's the only way to reach the big bucks. But how? Continuous updating of data is a necessary footnote today. Sites have to work much harder - as expectations are higher. Says Anurag Chandra Gupta, Chairman, yatraindia.com: ''Universality, quality, and authenticity of content are very important. Authenticity plays the biggest role.'' Yatraindia.com feels its bank of excellent photographs enables differentiation. On the back of content-sharing arrangements with Indiat-imes.com and MapsofIndia.com, Gupta expects 40 per cent of his revenues through content in 2001. Adds Sanjeev Bikhchandani of naukri.com: ''Content must be 'need to know' and not 'nice to know'. There has to be massive aggregation of content, it should be unique, dynamic, and actionable.'' Bikhchandani says that 70 per cent of the jobs on his site are not found anywhere else.

All content providers without exception put forward technology-enabled solutions as their USP. In other words, the ability to spit out content in a form that meshes seamlessly with the client's site, so text and multimedia clips can flow easily. Needless to say, these partnerships require close monitoring. Says Sukaran Singh, CEO, broadcastindia.com, a 'rich-media' content site: ''We can create content products with our partners so that it can climb the value chain in a scalable way. That's our differentiation.''

Or there's a new product. On-line education portal Career Launcher, for instance, will soon launch something it calls Future Map. Developed inhouse over a period of 12 months and at a cost of Rs 25 lakh, Future Map profiles students, based on a series of tests. The paid-for subscription service will recommend career options for students. Adds Career Launcher's R. Satyanarayanan: ''Content can be a commodity, but it can also be the most premium part of the business. It's how you leverage the technology here that can make the difference.''

The question is, can content be a stable source of revenue generation? Warns Rohit Verma, Veep (Brand Marketing), Rediff: ''Just relying on content is not a proven business model with the exception perhaps of the Wall Street Journal.'' Rediff has traditionally managed its content in-house; in fact, in a recent interview with BT, CEO Ajit Balakrishnan said that users come to rediff for communication-and not for content. Ironically, he's got a point: the US markets' disenchantment with content sites is that they still rely heavily on banner ad sales, which aren't generating enough revenues.

Some content aggregators disagree on the efficacy of pure content. For instance, there's the Hyderabad-based talent management company TMI Networks, which launched the managementor.com in August this year. ''Modelled as a professional club, it is aimed at building competency through knowledge updates, peer group networking and off-line activities such as competency seminars,'' says T. Muralidharan, 42, the managementor.com's CEO. By tweaking a huge database of 1,265 international journals and Indian sources of data, the site's main source of revenue remains sale of content and subscription fees.

Pure content is dead,'' shoots back Mohanbir Sawhney. The young professor at Kellogg Graduate School of Management is blunt: ''Content is a means to an end. Not an end in itself. People will not pay for it unless it is totally unique-or pornographic.'' Indeed, the markets feel that content has to work in a contextual scene by enabling e-commerce. Agrees 123india.com's Dhruv Sharma: ''In the long run, e-commerce would become a significant contributor. The game here is not about width and depth of content, but management of relevant content for meeting the business objective.''

To meet these requirements, content shops are hard at work creating content, databases, and building libraries for the future. Gaming and entertainment are the two sunrise areas, and content providers are accumulating databases of music labels and video clips. Then there's so much work to do in wireless applications, in languages. ''Stock prices and news are just not enough in the Indian WAP context,'' professes Khanna. Of course, there are new channels to be discovered, happily married to commerce. The search for the Holy Grail of content is well underway.