Exclusive Interview: Dogan TV’s Irfan Sahin

PREMIUM: Irfan Sahin, the CEO of Dogan TV, tells World Screen Newsflash about his plans for keeping Kanal D at the forefront of the Turkish media business.

WS: In addition to the nationwide free-to-air channel Kanal D, you operate TV2 as a general-entertainment service on pay-TV platforms. How are you serving Turkish audiences with these two assets? Do they target different demographics and interests?
SAHIN: Our main targeting strategy for Kanal D is based on covering a wide range of the total population in Turkey. Turkish society does not consist of a single group; rather, we see many different and fragmented subgroups. It is not incorrect to say that we have a heterogeneous societal structure. Considering this, Kanal D, as a mainstream channel, constructs its audience-targeting approach to build a close connection and attachment between every member of an average Turkish family and our TV content. What I mean by “average Turkish family” is that we think of a Turkish family as having five members: a mother, a father, two children and a grandparent. This point of view lies at the core of our targeting strategy—our ultimate goal is to cover the entire population of Turkey.

The majority of TV2’s audience comes from the AB socioeconomic segment. Most of these viewers can be characterized as having urban lifestyles. Thanks to a programming structure that includes quality local and foreign content, [TV2 mainly targets] this niche audience segment, whose tastes, perceptions and expectations differ from the mainstream.

WS: What’s driving the continued success of Kanal D in the competitive Turkish market?
SAHIN: Kanal D has very strong and well-appreciated brand equity in the eyes of both Turkish [viewers] and advertisers. Due to the power of the Kanal D brand and its [reputation], we are always ahead of the others. In addition to its brand equity, Kanal D also brings different and diversified social groups together with content that appeals to a broad range of audiences. According to research figures by Ipsos KMG, Kanal D is over and over the [leading] brand by far in the TV category. More importantly, in 2012, among all brands from 22 categories, including very powerful and multinational ones, Kanal D was ranked eighth. This shows the power of the Kanal D brand not only in the TV category, but among all brands.

WS: How is the Turkish ad market performing? How are you maintaining your share of the ad pie?
SAHIN: Taking ad spend budgetary parameters into account, the Turkish ad market could be seen as having the lowest ad spend budget per person in comparison to other markets. Also, there are almost no barriers to entry into the Turkish TV market. This has resulted in there being too many TV channels. [Even though] this is the general outlook for the medium, the Turkish ad market promises a flourishing future for the TV business. TV takes more than half of the ad spend budget in Turkey and it never takes below 50 percent of the total share of the market. Considering these figures, we can see Turkey as one of the countries where TV ad spend has the biggest portion of the total advertising market budget. Another point: according to the PwC Global Entertainment and Media Outlook 2014–2018 report, Turkey is among nine high-growth markets powering global entertainment and media revenue. This also shows the capacity of the Turkish market waiting to be utilized. To talk about Kanal D in this context, we have maintained our success as the number one TV channel in Turkey for the last ten years.

WS: How are you encouraging creativity and innovation in your original programming department?
SAHIN: Our philosophy takes its roots from understanding the emotional world of a common Turkish man or woman on the street who is 30 years old, has an average of seven years of education and also has many hopes, expectations, fears, loves, hates and sorrows. Our stories are a combination of this knowledge with traditional Turkish values.

WS: How is Kanal D’s international content sales division doing, and what are your goals for this segment in 2015?
SAHIN: Up until now, we have sold our TV series into more than 90 countries. Last year we successfully accomplished our goal of creating new markets for our content in Latin America, including Chile and Uruguay; European countries like France, Estonia and Latvia; and countries in Asia. For the coming year, we are planning to go one step further—North America, Africa and the Far East will be in our scope for 2015.

WS: What are the major challenges facing Turkey’s media sector in 2015?
SAHIN: Digitalization has started to penetrate the market—the visible [signs] increase day by day, especially in a country like Turkey where young age groups make up a significant proportion of the total population and the median age is around 30. To understand the effects of digital convergence clearly, we should look at the changing habits and behavior patterns in a society like Turkey, which quickly adapts to the global standards of technology use and has rapidly become digitalized. This can be counted as one of the major challenges. But, thanks to the Turkish audience, the average time a person spends watching TV in Turkey is about 4 hours per day—this is still above the European average and is not declining. Another challenge to be mentioned is that co-production strategies with other parties will be required to maintain the sustainability [of the production sector]. Lastly, new and emerging markets for the TV industry should definitely be found or created somehow.

WS: What growth opportunities do you see for Dogan TV in the next 12 to 18 months?
SAHIN: Our major goal is to grow in the content business, where we have much potential waiting to be utilized. We are heading toward being both a content producer and distributor at the same time, having all rights to the content.