TV game shows boost PLDT and Globe income

May 4, 2013

Television game shows have boosted the Philippine Long Distance Telephone Company (PLDT), a national direct distance (NDD) service, generating over 20 million minutes with a corresponding gross revenue of P500 million a year while the game show boosted with Globe Telecom, in the cell phone mobile, generating over 15 million minutes with a gross revenue of P300 million a year.

PLDT vice-president for national retail marketing Joaquin San Agustin said that the introduction of usage-based services augmented traditional NDD service last year as well as Globe prepaid and postpaid for cell phones.

Game shows such as Who Wants To Be A Millionaire and The Weakest Link on IBC, Minute to Win It and Kapamilya, Deal or No Deal on ABS-CBN and Celebrity Bluff on GMA, make use of PLDT and Globe for the network extensively when the prospective contestants call up designated phone numbers to join the show or want to avail themselves of the certain services. PLDT, Smart, Talk N' Text, Sun Cellular, Cebuana Lhuillier and Globe commercials in the advertisements aired the three big networks ABS-CBN, IBC and GMA as well as TV5 will doing to the advertisers are PLDT, Talk N' Text, Cebuana Lhuillier and Smart commercial, and PTV using the commercials like PLDT, Smart, Cebuana Lhuillier and Globe.

The most popular game show in the country, is Who Wants To Be A Millionaire hosted by Christopher de Leon, The Weakest Link hosted by Edu Manzano, Luis Manzano of Minute to Win It and Kapamilya, Deal or No Deal and Eugine Domingo of Celebrity Bluff each charged P10 per minute per call with each call lasting around the five minutes as well as its Globe cellphones text 8888 will surely profit.

It is said that a contestant of Who Wants To Be A Millionaire has to call at least 30 to 50 times for a single day in order to be chosen a contestant. "The 20 million minutes would not have been possible if we relied on normal long distance calls," San Agustin said.

PLDT also noted an increase in the number of subscribers who have activated their basic NDD feature. To date, around 84 percent of total number of subscribers had their NDD feature activated. Meanwhile, the company also saw an increased activation of basic international direct distance (IDD) phone features with around 58 percent of total base having IDD services. PLDT's uniform 40-cents-a-minute IDD rate implemented last February 2000 also helped arrest declining IDD outbound minutes.

It also introduced the first destination specific discounted calling service  the PLDT budget card  which carries a uniform rate of 24 cents per minute for calls to the US, Canada, and Hawaii. The company aims to protect its revenue base this year by coming up with usage-based customer retention programs and implementing a more direct marketing to retain high value customers.

PLDT also intends to increase long distance services, both NDD and IDD, through the introduction of more premium phone services, more budget card variants, continued usage of direct distance dialing activation programs, as well as customer education on product benefits.

It estimates a 2.1 million subscriber base for the year that ended, with a 68-percent market share in the fixed line business. The number represents an increased of over 100,000 subscribers, 95 percent of which is prepaid.

Meanwhile, the PBA has the single game on Tuesdays, Thursdays and Thursdays starting at 6:30 p.m. and Saturdays at 7 p.m. and the double headers on Sundays 4 p.m. as well as the NBA with the total of two games every Saturdays at 5 p.m. and Sundays at 12 noon. In the same meeting, the board approved Viva Sports’ proposal to change the format of PBA playdates to five-times-a-week at the same time. PBA will hold a game each every Tuesday, Thursday, Friday ans Saturday and a regular double-header Sunday.