Abstract:

The paper outlines the background to the launch of M-Net in South Africa as a Pay TV channel in opposition to the government controlled channels, and explains the initial launch strategy. It outlines the growth of the channel to date, the current status being that M-Net is probably the third largest Pay TV channel outside of the USA (after Canal Plus in France and BSkyB in the UK). M-Net currently has 720 subscriber households. The paper outlines the key research projects and types of research conducted in order to demonstrate the use of research in planning and development, such as: - On-going programme evaluation (subscriber panel) -Use of Peoplemeter data in conjunction with programme evaluation data (i.e. audience size versus enjoyment) -Strategic tracking (including such aspects as image and positioning) -Monitoring of customer profiles (demographic/psychographic/lifestyle) -Monitoring of individual programme types, e.g. movies, mini-series, sport, children's programmes (K-TV), and so on -Customer service monitoring (service quality). The paper indicates how the results are used by both Marketing and Programming in terms of strategic planning and ongoing programme development. Finally, a brief description is given of the major types of competitive threats that M-Net will face in the very near future.