Opinion

Buzzfeed India lead editor Rega Jha on content strategy, copycat competition, and whether traditionally taboo stories are shareable in India

Rega JhaBuzzfeed officially launched in India just over a week ago, offering the country’s 240+ million internet users a mixture of quirky lists, social justice stories and Bollywood celebrity tittle-tattle. Leading the editorial team is Rega Jha, a former Vogue, Rolling Stone and Times of India journalist who moved from Buzzfeed HQ in New York to Mumbai to set up Buzzfeed India.

Mumbrella was in Mumbai to ask Jha about her plans for the year ahead, the challenges Buzzfeed faces to get up and running, whether stories about rape cases are shareable in India, and whether traditional players feel threatened by the producers of top ten lists and celebrity wedding pictures.

What’s been the biggest challenge about setting up Buzzfeed India so far?

Well, I spend my time running around Mumbai from Starbucks to Starbucks chasing a reliable internet connection. From that perspective, things are more difficult than in New York.

Do you think the established players are worried by Buzzfeed coming on to the scene?

Buzzfeed-like story on Storypick

Buzzfeed-like story on Storypick

We’re not big enough to be worrying anyone yet. But they’re [established publishers] already adapting to be relevant to our audience. I joined Buzzfeed last June in New York. Having grown up here and lived here [India], I started writing Indian themed content, and we started to see a surge of traffic from South Asia. In the months since, local players such as Storypick and ScoopWhoop have emerged. They’re the biggest and they publish Buzzfeed-like content and they’ve had incredible success in terms of engagement. And now when I go on to the Times of India website there are lists and Buzzfeed-style content [one story on TOI is headlined OMG: Arjun Kapoor dated Malaika Arora Khan?]. They’re not worried. They know they can do the same thing. And I’m not worried, it just means there’s a giant audience for us to have fun with.

So are you the reason that Buzzfeed India launched – because the stories you were writing about Indian stuff while in New York got such traction here?

Buzzfeed has been expanding for a while, and India was an obvious place to go – somewhere there’s a large English-speaking, web-savvy audience. I just might have expedited the launch here.

India is not famous for its internet penetration, even though it’s growing quickly. Presumably that’s a big issue for Buzzfeed?

Those who do have internet access are obsessed by the internet, and don’t feel removed from global web culture. All my friends are clued into that sensibility, as are Buzzfeed readers in this country. But of course we’re barely scratching the surface. What is the most exciting challenge is trying to figure out what the Indian internet wants to read.

What’s the content strategy for India?

To give people what Buzzfeed is known for, and what we’re really good at, the reason we’re known for humorous lists is because we’re good at writing them. I would be putting us at a disadvantage if I said I wouldn’t take this approach for this market. But, for example, instead of Game of Thrones, we’ll be writing about Bollywood. We’ll also be tackling social justice issues which are gaining traction in India; feminism, women’s safety and LGBT rights. I wouldn’t say there’s a dearth of media companies covering these issues, but certainly there’s certainly a dearth of socially progressive voices and I’d love Buzzfeed to be known for championing these issues.

Buzzfeed post on gay rights posters

Buzzfeed post on gay rights posters

For instance, we ran a post on posters that people hold up at gay rights demonstrations [called 19 Hilarious, Moving, And Memorable Posters From India’s Fight For Gay Rights]. It was funny and poignant, but also feeding into a larger and heavier conversation. That’s the space that has a lot of potential. Our content will be a venn diagram of goofy, serious and entertaining stuff.

So who’s the target audience for Buzzfeed India?

That’s something we’re thinking carefully about, and will continue to keep thinking about. One of the greatest traits of Buzzfeed in the US is that it’s mainstream. It’s not inaccessible to any member of US society who has internet access. In India, language is a barrier. but the easiest audience to start with urban, english speaking smartphone owning.

What about a Hindi language version?

It’s too early to even think about a Hindi version, even for some of the simpler lists, as we’re still in the very basic stages of setting up. It’s only a week since we officially launched. But that’s absolutely something that we’ll look at in the future. I’d love for Buzzfeed to be available in 200 languages in India, but let’s see how it goes.

How many staff do you have here?

At the moment, it’s just me and two other writers. A few others are starting in the first few weeks. I want to keep us to five to six people in the first year.

Buzzfeed has made a lot of noise about its native advertising offering, and is setting up a creative team of 60 writers in New York to service brands. Will that service be available in India too?

We don’t have an ad team here. But we’ve already had a lot of interest from brands who want to reach Indian audiences online. My response has been to pass them straight on to our guys in New York.

What sort of writer do you need to be to get a job at Buzzfeed?

What makes a great breaking news reporter is the same for traditional media, but with conventional Buzzfeed content we want people with an understanding of the internet, and how it works. Faking internet authenticity is impossible. We also look for versatility. If there’s a story our writer does on gang rape, I want that same person to write about the funniest bloopers in Bollywood, and have an instinct for packaging both.

I work with local editors. We place an emphasis on hiring from within the local culture, people who are plugged into the big local interests such as Bollywood and cricket. But really, relatively young and obsessed with the internet are the only requirements.

What sort of editorial direction and influence do you get from HQ?

Usually for international teams, the model has been to hire locally someone you trust with a local audience. With me, it’s a convenient set up, as I worked in the New York office. I have carried that experience with me. There isn’t a lot of oversight from HQ, but there is a lot of support. Someone is always online somewhere at whatever time. When I need help I’m able to get it.

Will US-produced stories run on the India site too?

Yes. English-language stuff published on the global site will run on the India site too. When you look at the live stats, the stuff that does best here is not always about India. Our audience is clued up and wants to be in the know about stuff that’s happening globally. They want to know about things ranging from the ice bucket challenge to LGBT rights in India; they are people who care about that struggle on a micro and macro level.

What sort of traffic numbers are you seeing?

We’re still very small and the numbers are not public yet. The home page has only officially existed for a week. The running joke with my New York colleagues is that they say, ‘Oh my God we’re going to have 1.2 billion new readers’. And I joke that those who have internet in India, and speak English, amounts to about five people, so let’s manage our expectations.

Of Buzzfeed’s global audience, where does India feature in terms of reader numbers?

In a ranking of the countries where Buzzfeed is read the most, India is in the seven to ten range.

Buzzfeed wants to be known as a serious news site, and has hired investigative reporters to build its news-gathering capabilities. Will Buzzfeed India be getting into serious news too?

Absolutely. My goal is to build an audience using the stuff Buzzfeed is known for, then when have the audience go for news reporters and long-form journalists. There are so many stories waiting to be written about India. I would love to have the manpower to begin telling them.

I noticed in the Time of India today that the rape of a 9 year-old girl in a hospital in Uttar Pradesh was written up as a 60-word news in brief on page 10. In the UK that would be front page news. Are rapes still being underreported in India, and so could this be an opportunity for Buzzfeed to highlight the issue, which the prime minister recently said was a shame on the country?

No. Not at all. India just happens to have so many stories. The tragic thing is that if every rape case was front page news, there would be nothing else to put on the cover every day. But that’s a whole other conversation. We were raised not to talk about it, but for the last two years there’s been a surge of coverage, and we want to be part of that. Buzzfeed’s strength is the size of the platform. I’d love nothing more to feed as many social justice conversations as we can. But I’m not alone in covering the issue. There are huge stories on India written by the London team. India is globally relevant and interesting.

But if you go down that route, will your content be as shareable as a list of the 14 Things That Would’ve Gone Very Differently If “Friends” Had Been Set In India? Do Indians want to share stories about rape, particularly in India where the issue has, as Modi suggested, become a point of national shame?

Mumbai-based snapper Raj Shetye 'Wrong turn'

Raj Shetye’s controversial ‘Wrong turn’

Some rape case stories might not prove to be shareable, but some advice I was given before we started Buzzfeed here was that the only stories that go viral in India are about Bollywood, cricket and politics, but that’s traditional thinking. Bollywood and cricket are popular, and that will always be the case, but there’s so much beyond that. We did think that with some stories they would be read but not shared. But I think our audience holds in high regard being part of conversations that are important, and anything important will be shared. One of our most shared stories to date is about a photographer who depicted a scene of gang rape in a fashion photo shoot. It’s a dark story, but one worth talking about.

What are your goals for the first year of Buzzfeed India?

My first priority is to build a team of people who are geniuses and hilarious, and who I can trust to capture the global Buzzfeed voice and make it endearing to this audience. The other thing is to gain credibility with our audience. Buzzfeed is seen as an American brand, a voice sometimes commenting on India but from the outside. I need to reframe it using our language and a voice coming from inside of India.

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