Content Providers Have No Systems, No Processes, No Strategies In Place

Much spleen related to the mobile VAS space, this time, directed at the content providers, and not the operators.
Rajan K Arya of Oxigen Infovision, in a guest article for agencyfaqs, says that the problem with VAS is that techies are driving the business, not MBAs and not “hard-core marketing folks”. For this, he blames the content providers for having a working environment that has “no systems, no processes, no strategies in place”.
Some problems: reporting systems are fudged, one operator discounts download figures by 30-50 percent every month, while another provides unaudited soft-copy of downloads to the content provider. The space is hot, but is losing out on talent because of the unprofessional environment, he says. The industry attracts only those who come with the baggage of the other industries that they have worked in, an not fresh, novel ideas.

So it seems that he puts the blame for letting operators get away with everything on the content provider and the people they hire. This might hold true for the large content providers who could wield greater power. But lets not forget that a large number of players (for example game creators or application developers) have small and lean operations, and do not have the wherewithal to hire top-notch MBA talent. The operator, if pushed, could have different policies for the smaller players, and different for large content providers. A regulation is needed to enforce transparency and accountability. We covered the content providers’ point of view here. Some issues:
1. Bureacratic functioning of the service operator – delays in testing, deployment and offering clarifications and/or technical guidance
2. Business model inordinately skewed in favour of the operator, and a short term, revenue focused approach
3. Delays in processing payment which hinders innovation and creates a barrier to the entry of relatively smaller players.
Another issue that came to light was that service operators do not authenticate the number of downloads that mobile content receives, thus hampering further business development, especially in the branded content space.

Comments have been disabled for this post