TO DEVELOP THE MARKET OF BUSINESS STANDARD NEWS PAPER

IN LUCKNOW CITY.

SUBMITTED TO SUBMITTED BY
Prof. Nilesh Patil SHASHANK DEV SHUKLA

TABLE OF CONTENTS
1 Acknowledgement……………………………………………………….3
2 Introduction……………………………………………………………………4-16
3 Objective………………………………………………………………………17
4 Limitations……………………………………………………………………18
5 Research Methodology…………………………………………………19-25
6 Review Literature…………………………………………………………26-30
7 Findings & Suggestions…………………………………………………31
8 Conclusion……………………………………………………………………32
9 Recommendations………………………………………………………33
10 References………………………………………………………………….34

1. ACKNOWLED
GEMENT
“Vital to every operation is co-operation”. This wonderful quotation put forth by M
r. Frank Tigre. This project was successful due to the co-operation extended by
people who have truly contributed towards it.
Many People contribute to the successful development of this project, would like
to take the opportunity to acknowledgement their assistance. Their suggestion c
onstructive criticism and expert guidance helped invaluably in the successful co
mpletion of the project.
I gratefully acknowledge Mr. Trinath Shukla, Mr. Alok Dev (Market developme
nt officers) and Mr. Sunil Kumar Singh, who is our industrial guide from BS to t
he company, who’s deep sharing and synergy have moved me many levels beyond my o
wn thinking.
I would also like to thank Mr. Nilesh Patil ,the college coordinator, who also
guide me to overcome from different problems which came across during the proj
ect.
And finally I would like to thank my friends and to those whose lives and writin
gs have come the Wisdom of ages.

2. INTROD
UCTION
2.1 Company Profile
Business Standard is a financial daily from Business Standard Ltd (BSL). It is p
ublished in two languages (English and Hindi) from 14 centres in India. The main
English edition comes out from 12 centres - Mumbai, New Delhi, Kolkata, Bangalo
re, Chennai, Ahmedabad, Hyderabad, Chandigarh, Pune, Lucknow, Bhubaneswar, and K
ochi - and reaches readers in over 1,000 towns and cities across the country.
Started in 1975 by the Ananda Bazar group in what was then Calcutta, the paper w
as hived off as a separate company in 1996, and then bought by Mumbai-based fina
ncial investors led by the Kotak Mahindra Bank, after which it began a phase of
rapid expansion with the launch of new editions.
T.N. Ninan was the editor from 1993 to 2009, after he moved over from the editor
ship of The Economic Times. In January 2010, he was succeeded as the editor by S
anjaya Baru. Ninan became the chairman and editorial director of the company.
Business Standard sells 144,000 copies daily in English, mostly to the business
and policy-making elite. Its Hindi edition sells 53,000 copies. AC Nielsen s sur
vey of the upper middle and rich market in India places Business Standard next t
o The Economic Times in total readership.
The paper has a reputation for reliable reporting and responsible journalism, as
well as for its stimulating page of analysis and editorial comment. It has pion
eered the ranking of the wealthiest Indians (in the Billionaire Club), and offer
s along with the paper a free monthly magazine on motoring. In 2006, the paper s
tarted its Sunday edition, which is now published from four centres.
The Hindi paper was first launched in February 2008, it comes out from seven cen
tres, stretching from Mumbai in the west, and running across the Hindi heartland
, to Kolkata in the east.
The newspaper s website is business-standard.com, through which visitors can als
o access the Business Standard e-paper, with a choice of editions. BSL also publ
ishes periodicals, including BS Motoring, Indian Management and the Asian Manage
ment Review.
But now a days business standard news paper is owned by Mr. Uday Kotak, Executiv
e Vice Chairman and Managing Director, Kotak Mahindra Bank Limited.
The recently news are floating around that: “Business Standard’s owner Uday Kotak is
in talks with prospective buyers to buy the troubled newspaper. Speculations ar
e rife that Uday Kotak might be willing to sell the paper given the impact of th
e economic downturn and stiff competition from HT Media’s Mint.
Kotak, who over the past year has bought back Business Standard Ltd shares from
erstwhile partners such as Great Eastern Shipping and Pearson Plc., held meeting
s as recently as last month with Raghav Bahl-promoted Network18 to discuss a pot
ential sale.
The talks did not achieve much progress because of a gulf between the two sides
on price.
Kotak also held talks with NDTV to explore a potential merger of the paper and t
he latter’s business news channel NDTV Profit several months ago, but nothing came
out of those meetings either, another person familiar with those discussions sa
id.
NDTV Profit and Business Standard previously had a brief content-sharing relatio
nship.
Kotak, vice-chairman and managing director of Kotak Mahindra Bank, one of India’s
largest private-sector banks, bought Business Standard in 1997 from Kolkata-base
d Anandabazar Patrika Group.
During 2008, Kotak bought back shares from partners, consolidating BS Ltd under
his various companies. The paper’s well-regarded editor, T.N. Ninan, also holds a
stake in the company. By all accounts, Kotak has remained a non-interfering owne
r, committed to the paper but letting Ninan run both it and the company.

2.3 EDITORIALS

Business Standard has a 200-person editorial team that is led by Sanjaya Baru, a
nd includes well-known journalists like AK Bhattacharya, Sunil Jain and Shyamal
Majumdar.
Business Standard’s stable of specialist contributors includes some of the sharpes
t minds writing on economics and business. Among them: Bimal Jalan, former gover
nor of the Reserve Bank of India; Shankar Acharya, former chief economic advisor
, Government of India; Deepak Lal, professor of economics, UCLA; Suman Bery, dir
ector-general, National Council of Applied Economic Research; Abheek Barua, chie
f economist of HDFC Bank; Nitin Desai, former chief economic advisor and former
under-secretary general at the United Nations; Surjit Bhalla, chairman of Oxus;
Arvind Subramanian, professor at the Peterson Institute of International Economi
cs; M. Govinda Rao, director of National Institute of Public Finance and Policy;
AV Rajwade, well-known foreign exchange consultant; and Arvind Singhal, chairma
n, Technopak.
It offers syndicated columns from Martin Feldstein and Dani Rodrick, and content
from Breakingviews.com–with exclusivity in the Indian market.
BSL is majority-owned by the Kotak Mahindra Group, but is run independently thro
ugh a board of directors, with TN Ninan (a former editor of the newspaper and pe
rhaps India’s best known business journalist) as chairman and editorial director.
2.4 MAGAZINES
There are following Magazines provided by Business Standard to their customer in
every 3 months:
• The Fund Manager
• The Billionaire Club
• Banking Annual
• BS 1000

2.5 SECTIONS IN BS
• Companies
• Commodities
• Economic Policy
• Money & Markets
• Mutual Funds
• Editorial
• Stocks
• Regional
• Politics
The BS edition comes in three languages –English, Hindi, Gujarati. But recently Gu
jarati edition come to the end.
According to the BS sources -
“We will be closing down the Gujarati editions in Mumbai and Ahmadabad in the next
couple of days. The overall market environment and inflation in newsprint cost
are the main reasons behind shutting down these editions. Moreover, the Gujarati
edition hasn’t done so well, so it doesn’t make any sense to continue with the same
.”
2.6 ROLE OF ADS IN NEWS PAPERS
Advertisements are the revenue generator for all news papers. In BS, advertiseme
nts rates can be categorized in following two types
• Commercial rates
• DAVP(Directorate of Audio and Visual Publicity)
The commercial rates vary company to company and can be negotiated in between co
mpany and BS. But in other hand DAVP is government body, and it itself decide th
e rates of ads in news papers according to the circulation of the news paper in
the state.
BS production cast is approximately Rs.14, its sale price is Rs.3 just because o
f the ads booking, also the ads position in news paper matters. Charges vary fro
m pages to pages and the ads in front page costs high rates.
There are certain advantages to company on ad in news papers: Almost every home
in the United States receives a newspapers either by newsstand or home delivery.
Reading the newspaper is a
habit for most families. And, there is something for everybody--sports, comics,
crosswords, news, classifieds, etc. You can reach certain types of people by pla
cing your ad in different sections of the paper. People expect advertising in th
e newspaper. In fact, many people buy the paper just to read the ads from the su
permarket, movies or department stores.
Unlike advertising on TV and radio, advertising in the newspaper can be examined
at your leisure. A newspaper ad can contain details, such as prices and telepho
ne numbers or coupons.
There are many advantages to advertising in the newspaper. From the advertiser s
point-of-view, newspaper advertising can be convenient because production chang
es can be made quickly, if necessary, and you can often insert a new advertiseme
nt on short notice. Another advantage is the large variety of ad sizes newspaper
advertising offers. Even though you may not have a lot of money in your budget,
you can still place a series of small ads, without making a sacrifice.
Also there is some disadvantages of ads to the company that is:
1. Newspapers usually are read once and stay in the house for just a day.
2. The print quality of newspapers isn t always the best, especially for photogr
aphs. So use simple artwork and line drawings for best results.
3. The page size of a newspaper is fairly large and small ads can look minuscule
.
4. Your ad has to compete with other ads for the reader s attention.
5. You re not assured that every person who gets the newspaper will read your ad
. They may not read the section you advertised in, or they may simply have skipp
ed the page because there wasn t any interesting news on it.

2.8 BS CHANNELS IN LUCKNOW

There are 12 distribution points of the BS in the city Lucknow, these are as fol
lows:
• Charbagh
• Kaiserbagh
• Alambagh
• Janpath
• Nishatganj
• Jankipuram
• IT
• Chowk
• Telibagh
• Sec.18,Indira nagar
• Polytechnic
• Patrakarpuram
These are the points from where the distribution of BS take place and circulated
the whole city Lucknow.
BS news papers printing take place in Indian Express news paper printing press,
and from there it circulated to the 12 different points for further distribution
.
Lucknow edition BS covers approximately 55 cities and towns of Eastern U.P eg Ka
npur, Varanasi, Gorakhpur, Sitapur, Lakhimpur, Banda, Bahraich, Gonda, Allahabad
, Raebareli etc.

3. OBECTIVE
• To increase the sale of business standard news paper.
• To make businessmen aware of business standard news paper.
• To increase the circulation of business standard in lucknow city.
• To enhance the brand awareness of business standard.

4. LIMITATIONS
• The study have been completed in 60 days. This is not sufficient to do a survey
in the city Lucknow.
• The response met approximately 100; the study may not be applicable to the total
market.
• The facts and figures may not be accurate.
• As the market being very huge it was not possible to cover each and every area.
 5. RESEARCH METHODOLOGY
A structured questionnaire was used to collect the primary data. The questionnai
re consist of dichotomous response format questions(Yes/No questions) .The sampl
e unit includes Management Student & Professors, Corporate professionals, Charte
red Accountant and Investors (Stock brokers).
Secondary data has been collected from journals, magazines, internet. The primar
y data was analyzed using simple percentages, and inferences were drawn.

5.1 QUESTIONNAIRE
Que1. Do you buy any daily news paper?
Yes No
Que2.Do you buy any business news paper?
Yes No
Que3. Which business newspaper do you buy?
A) Economic Times
B) Business Standard
C) Financial Express
D) Others.
Que4. Do you subscribe the current news paper?
Yes No
Que5. Do you get any discount on subscription?
Yes No
Que6. Do you get all information about the market from your current business new
s paper?
Yes No
Que7. Do you get any additional supplements/magazines with the current news pap
er? Yes No
Que8. Do you think there is need to improve any section in your current news pap
er?
Yes No
……………………………………… Thanking for your valuable suggestions and time.
5.2 DATA ANALYSIS
These given below facts and figures are based on the survey done, ie. on the ba
sis of questions asked to the respondents.
Business News paper % of readers
Economic Times 55
Business Standard 30
Business Line 6
Financial Express 5
Others 4

Also the facts and figures about the number of copies sell in the city Lucknow o
f different business news paper along with Business Standard news paper can be i
llustrated as given below
Business News paper No. of copies
Economic Times 4600
Business Standard 5300*
Business Line 500
Financial Express 600
Other 200
(*-Eng+Hindi)

(*Eng+Hindi)
Here we can also analyze the business news papers on basis of print edition. Thi
s can be also given by following data
Business News Paper No. of copies(printed in Lucknow)
Economic Times 13200
Business Standard 17800*
Business Line 1900 (printed from Delhi)
Financial Express 1800
Others 100
(*Eng+Hindi)

(note:*-Eng+Hindi)
 5.3 INTERPRETATION
As given data shows that the respondents show their liking towards the Economic
Times, followed by Business Standard, Business Line and then finally by Financia
l Express.
But also the next data to it shows that number of copies circulated in city Luck
now, Business Standard occupies first place followed by Economic Times, Business
Line and then finally by Financial Express.
Also it is clear from the other data sheet which showing the print edition from
the city Lucknow topped by again Business Standard which followed by Economic Ti
mes, but here the Business Line ranked 3rd, followed by Financial Express.
Here if we consider the response of respondents to our questionnaires, we easily
find that Economic Times is the most preferable to readers.

6. REVIEW OF THE LITERATURE

Many surveys have been done previously time to time, to know the preference and
requirements of the business news paper readers. Here there is a article on the
battle between of two strongest contenders i.e. Business Standard news paper and
Economic Times on the basis of their content of paper- “ The Times group publicat
ion Economic times is enjoying almost monopoly in the Business related news pap
ers since the other paper in that field –Business Line is heavily priced at Rs4 wh
ile ET is priced at Rs2. When Business Standard priced Rs3 entered in the market
, it never seemed like posing threat to ET’s market space.
The readers got accustomed to the first two pages of ET where in politics; specu
lations about economic decisions of government and business news were appropriat
ely mixed into an interesting mixture. Slowly readers started trying BS but foun
d ET more interesting. It may be probably because no economic front as ET does.
ET seemed to have mastered the knack of making news interesting while the busine
ss news by its very nature is dry and less exciting most of the times.
Slowly readers interest has turned from news of corporates, SEBI, RBI etc to sto
ck prices. It is here BS seemed to have gone miles ahead of ET.ET reports stock
price daily along volumes, 52 week low and high.
As reader struggle a lot and run from pillar to post to know more about stock pr
ices. But what a feat BS has made, it started giving a whole lot of information
on stocks-their book values, P/E ratio, profits earned day high, day low and wha
t not. It had made life simpler for readers.
Hence here BS providing better information, facts, figures than ET which is the
strongest contender of BS”.
Also here given below, is the survey done by the BS itself on the affluent r
eaders of BS

This chart showing the people who read the Business Standard news paper in elite
class.
There is a survey done called “Let’s Rate the Media” by INDIA PR BLOG on state basis i
n UP. The results are interesting, though not very different to what many of us
already know but might help in putting a number and validating what we think, es
pecially as the votes were from PR professionals who deal with these newspapers
day in and out .
That survey is based on the questioners to whom the respondent replied. These qu
estions are given below along with the results calculated.
Que1. Which newspaper do you think comes out with the best predictions of econom
ic trends/ business houses?
Winner: The Economic Times
It is interesting to note how The Economic Times has swallowed up a majority of
the pie on this question and the above. No wonder this is India’s largest circulat
ed financial daily.

Que2. . Which newspaper do you think has the maximum number of journalists who a
re very professional in their approach?
Winner: The Hindu Business Line
The Hindu Business Line, as we know, is one of those newspapers that puts journa
lism ethics above anything else. The staff there are also superb, based on perso
nal experiences- knowledgeable, intelligent, helpful, modest.

These above studies/survey shows that there is still pending work to do for the
Business Standard on their editorial section and news coverage, if they want to
compete with the India’s largest selling business news paper.
 7. FINDINGS & SUGGESTIONS
1. Majority of the respondents use Economic Times because it costs very low pric
e along with the Times Of India, scheme called Combo pack.
2. Economic Times has the benefit of Times of India’s distribution channel because
of which it is able to save more distribution expenses.
3. Business Standard’s daily supplements “Money and Market” influence most to Individu
al investors/ Stock Brokers to purchase it.
4. Individual Investors and stock brokers are the majority users of Economic Tim
es among all the respondents
5. The inadequate promotional activities in city Lucknow by Business Standard.

8. CONCLUSION
From the reports, surveys done, articles, from which I gone through and from the
study I have carried it is very obvious that Business Standard news paper is th
e leading news paper not only of Lucknow but across India too.
Despite having some short comings, it is the second largest business news paper
of the country, after Economic Times. Having number of competitors in the field,
also it have to face challenges from new emerging business news papers eg. Mint
, which is from Hindustan Times, but it still maintain its position and presti
ge among the business news readers.
If some short comings will be corrected from the Business Standard ltd. Definite
ly Business Standard will be the most successful business news paper in the coun
try. And a success full step has been taken from the BS in the same direction, i
t started its e-news paper in the market in three different languages- English,
Hindi, Gujarati.
BS also has world class editorial faculty which is its strength, news quality, s
ervices to customer are up to the mark. If BS is regularly, improving in such a
way, the days are not far, when BS will be the best business news paper of the c
ountry.
 9. RECOMMENDATIONS
1. Business Standard Ltd. should conduct a series of programs like business
quiz etc. among management student and Institution in city Lucknow.
2. The company should focus on retention of customers because getting a new
customer is more costly.
3. Business Standard should start its Sunday edition with some better strat
egies than its competitors who is charging more on the Sunday edition.
4. The company should improve quality of service and the marketing strategi
es in terms of advertising, so that the awareness of brand level can be increase
d in market.
\

10. REFERENCES

Research Methodology By C.R Kothari

www.business-standard.com Business Standard official site
www.economictimes.indiatimes.com Economic Times official site
www.wan-press.org World Association of Newspaper
www.google.com
www.historicpages.com/nprhist.htm
www.wikipedia.com