How All India Radio increased skill engagement by 19% by making radio listening a part of listeners’ daily routines

All India Radio (AIR) is the national public radio broadcaster of India. The radio station broadcasts in Hindi, Urdu and 25 other major regional languages, and is extremely popular with 99% coverage of India’s population. With 469 stations, AIR is also the largest radio network in the world. 

All India Radio is not just popular in India — expatriates across the world tune in to the station to listen to its programming. 

Previously, people could tune into their favorite local radio station across the world through the NewsOnAir website and mobile app.

“Now, you also have Alexa,” says Samir Kumar, head of Prasar Bharati News Services & Digital Platform, India’s public broadcaster that includes All India Radio and the Doordarshan television network. “All you have to do is say - Alexa play All India Radio Aizawl or Yercaud or Kolhapur- and Alexa will help you with your request.”

Kumar is an experienced digital media executive, and was roped in by Prasar Bharati Board to develop and expand the reach of the broadcaster globally. He views Alexa as being integral to accomplishing this mission of expanding global coverage. 

Earlier this year, Kumar spearheaded the adoption of Custom Tasks in Routines. Routines allow customers to group together multiple actions from different domains so that they don’t have to invoke each one separately. This helps them simplify their lives through ‘auto-pilot’ actions that are repetitive and predictable. 

Custom Tasks in Routines enables skill developers to surface specific functionalities from their skills as actions in Routines. In this case, AIR adopted Custom Tasks in Routines with a task that plays the Vividh Bharati station. 

The AIR team relied on listenership data to determine the ideal custom task for their Routine. They analyzed traffic patterns and noticed a surge in traffic to the skill every morning. They subsequently developed an ‘All India Radio Mornings’ featured Routine that wishes customers good morning, tells them the weather, and plays Vividh Bharati, every morning at 7 a.m. 

“By packaging our skill with other useful actions, we are able to present a more memorable experience,” says Kumar. "The scheduled trigger ensures the experience is a constant in customers’ lives, and provides us with a sustained stream of traffic.“

Since its launch, the Routine has driven an 18.8% total engagement lift for All India Radio. Customers of the Routine have 5x more monthly active days than those who use it solely with voice interactions. In addition, AIR routine customers have 91% three-month retention, which is 2.6x higher than customers using AIR through non-Routine voice interactions.