MUMBAI: Now you can actually get a DTH service and also get paid to flaunt it. Dish TV is all set to unveil a promotional scheme on these lines with an eye on significantly increasing the pace of ramp up of its subscriber base.
With the festive season around the corner, Dish TV, 20 per cent owned by Zee Telefilms, will offer new customers its services for Rs 3,990 and a gift voucher worth Rs 4,000 as an additional sweetener.
This new scheme, which becomes effective from 3 October, follows the marketing initiative launched a few months ago called 'har chaat per dish' (a dish on every rooftop) wherein Dish TV had dropped its service charges by 50 per cent to Rs 3,990 inclusive of one year subscription.
The company's new offering will run for 45 days till 15 November, Sunil Khanna, CEO of New Era Entertainment Network Limited (NEENL), which manages Dish TV, said.
Under this scheme, new customers can redeem the gift vouchers at 46 select holiday destinations in India or choose amongst four foreign destinations that include Singapore and Bangkok.
Under the scheme, a two-night and three-day stay at any hotel with which Dish TV has a tie-up is what is on offer.
Khanna said the company will conduct lucky draws for Diwali in early November for the first prize (an Elantra car), second prize (10 Santro cars), third prize (100 Honda motorbikes) and the fourth prize (500 Samsung mobile phones).
Khanna adds, "We are looking at targeting 300,000 subscribers during this period." At present, Dish TV has a subscriber base of 450,000 and aims to touch the one million mark by the end of this financial year ending 31 March 2006.
Additionally, Dish TV is planning to unveil value added services like movies on demand and personal video recorder (PVR) between October and November. The movie on demand service will come at a price of Rs 40 per film.
The PVR hardware, which would cost Rs 16,000, will enable time-shifted viewing through a separate set-top box enabling subscribers to watch what they want, when they want.
Dish TV will be marketing the scheme employing various media like press, television and outdoor.
Apart from Dish TV, the other DTH service in the country, which is subscription free and run by pubcaster Doordarshan, is branded DD Direct Plus.
