Cricket viewership shapes how consumers look for auto content across the web in India: CarToq Survey

CarToq, India's fastest growing automobile platform, with its current reach of over 22 million unique audiences every month across its web and social media properties, today announced the findings of its first ever market mapping on the impact of cricket viewership on consumption of online auto content in India.

The survey analysed the online search patterns of the digital audience between February to June 2018 on the CarToq platform to understand what consumers looked for during the airtime of both domestic and international matches during the peak cricket season. CarToq survey derived insights based on consumer segments comprising of 85 per cent males and 15 per cent females, with 48 per cent of the audiences belonging to a high online spending age bracket of 25-34 years, followed by 23 per cent aged between 18-24 years.

The peak cricket season witnessed ODIs and T20 matches played across Ireland, England, West Indies, Afghanistan, Scotland and India between teams from these nations, in addition to national teams from Bangladesh, Australia and Sri Lanka.

CarToq's data insights revealed that consumption of auto content shot up by 15 per cent on an average with audience from Bengaluru leading the race with an increase of 22 per cent, followed by Mumbai and Delhi, which witnessed an increase in online searches by 14.68 per cent and 8.47 per cent, respectively.

"There is a rising number of discerning bike and car enthusiasts and potential buyers in not only metropolitan cities (45 per cent) but also smaller towns and cities in the country. This audience is extremely receptive to advertisements aired during cricket matches proven by the fact that their time spent on consuming auto content online increased by 13 per cent during the peak cricket season between February to June 2018. We observed that consumers on an average spent almost 110 seconds looking at car and bike from an otherwise time span of almost 65 seconds before the peak cricket season", said Nitin Srivastava, CEO, CarToq.

CarToq's report further highlights that at 27 per cent, Maruti Swift was the most popular and searched-for car followed by Tata Nexon and Hyundai Creta which were looked by 19 per cent and 17 per cent of the audience, respectively. Within the car categories, 35 per cent of the audience looked for SUVs, as compared to sedans (17 per cent) and hatchbacks (15 per cent).

Therefore, expectedly, majority of the digital audience (47 per cent), searched for advices related to buying and selling of cars. As a precursor to that, 27 per cent potential customers were also observed browsing through content and videos focusing on comparisons and reviews, while 16 per cent of the audience searched for information related to car maintenance.

Nitin further stated, "We will continue to strengthen our proposition as the leading engagement platform in auto. Leveraging this position, we are rolling out innovative audience engagement advertising solutions via digital and social media for automotive brands in India as brands are beginning to see CarToq as one of the most effective Top-of-the-Funnel media solutions to tap the growing audience base of existing and potential buyers".