How would you want your child to react to an injured dog, asked Mumbai’s Sourabh Kumar. “Would you want your kid to harass it, or leave it alone, or seek out help for the dog,” he questioned. Obviously seeking out help would be the answer that most parents would give.
Through his YouTube channel PunToon Kids, Kumar endeavours to make children sensitive, empathetic and responsible by the way of the topics he picks for his videos, like helping injured animals and taking care of someone who is hurt. This channel is his way of breaking from the clutter of the kids content space in India. In the market which offers mostly slapstick, chase and superhero stories, Kumar has based his content on three pillars – culture, curiosity and curriculum.
His channel PunToon Kids is targeted at children in the age group of three to 10 years. It has short videos on classroom learning, moral values, Indian culture and the daily lives of kids, told through its two main characters Gattu and Chinki.
“When I started PunToon Kids in 2019, not a lot of original content was being created for children,” Kumar, who is the founder and CEO of PunToon Kids, told us. “There were stories on Panchatantra and magic which we have already heard during our childhood. So I felt the need to create content that not only introduced our culture to the kids, but also benefited them at the same time.”
“I wanted my characters to represent a middle-class household of India. We do not want them to look like superheroes. They should look like someone’s son or daughter.” This kind of brief to the team has helped the brand have relatable characters in terms of how they look. A lot of thought also went into naming the lead boy and the girl. “I asked my writer what her parents called her when she was a little girl. She said Chinki, and we went with that name for our lead girl,” Kumar shared. Similarly, the team brainstormed various names that parents give their kids, and that’s how they named their lead boy Gattu.
Kumar had two very valid reasons to start PunToon Kids. One – he saw scope in creating an Indian IP which was close to the country’s culture and values; two – his extensive work experience in managing YouTube channels.
Kumar is the founder of VidUnit, a company which manages the digital space of brands, content creators and influencers. Since this included handling their YouTube and other short video platforms, he comes with a vast experience, which eventually translated to building PunToon. In fact, he had realised that the kids category was the most performing on YouTube in terms of CPM (Cost per thousand impressions). CPM is the cost an advertiser pays for 1,000 ad impressions on a video, with “impressions” counted every time an ad is displayed. “At that time, the revenue per thousand impressions was highest on kids content on YouTube,” Kumar explained. “I knew the power of this platform to reach out to the audience and generate recurring revenue, month on month.”
So why did he choose animation? The answer is simple. “I have produced web series and videos before, and one needs to depend on multiple factors to do a shoot. So I chose animation, because this medium would enable me to be in control of the production environment,” he replied. “Another reason to pick animation was that the content could be dubbed in various languages.”
PunToon currently has channels in English, Hindi, Marathi, Gujarati, Bengali, Tamil and Telugu. The content made in these languages is customised as per the region’s culture. For instance, the Marathi channel has a video on Gudi Padwa and the Bengali channel has a video on Durga Puja. This kind of customisation for the channels has helped boost their performance. Tapping on this strategy, Kumar now has plans to launch Spanish and French channels, with custom-made content for the audience in these languages.
“One more advantage of animation is that the assets and backgrounds used in English videos can be tweaked to suit the content made specifically for various regions, all within the budget that we have in mind,” Kumar revealed.
YouTube Optimisation: A Key to PunToon Kids’ Success
His knowledge of YouTube helps Kumar in picking the right topic for his videos. “We follow tentpole programming across all our channels,” explained Kumar. It means that the search for a topic is high on a given day and less on other days. For instance, the search using keywords around “Raksha Bandhan” will rise leading up to the day of the festival, reach a peak on the day, and then fall a couple of days after the festival. “We have identified such days throughout the year, and have created videos around them.”
Other topics picked for making videos are based on the team’s observation of their surroundings. “When I bought a cycle for my son who is six and a half years old, he went out to show it to his friends. We made a story on this, and it worked.” So the knack is to pick topics from the everyday lives of children: first day at school, eating ice-cream in summer, healthy food vs junk food, school picnic, a day at the beach and more.
So it is no wonder that many of PunToon’s videos have views ranging from 10 to 60 million. Its Hindi channel has two million subscribers, English channel has 177K subscribers while Marathi and Bengali channels have 467K and 441K subscribers respectively. His team of 25 full time employees roll out seven to eight videos every month, and his channels collectively clock at least 100 million views each month. The brand has plans to launch a channel with American English, specifically catering to the kids in the West. Kumar believes that such curation in Spanish, French and American English will help the brand get a global footprint and widen their sources of revenue.
Diversifying Revenue Streams: From YouTube to Fun-Learning Toys
But in terms of revenue, the kids’ content creators globally are facing a major challenge after YouTube implemented COPPA (Children’s Online Privacy Protection Act) guidelines. “With that, a lot of features have been disabled on the platform, reducing the CPM by 70-80 per cent, plummeting the revenue of the channels.” This very reason prompted Kumar to look at other revenue streams. In June this year, PunToon Kids launched its fun-learning toys’ collection, venturing into the D2C ecommerce space. “We have created content, we have built a community, we are now moving to commerce. Content to commerce is a successfully proven model globally,” Kumar highlighted.
Collaborating for a Positive Impact: Campaigns on Environment and Civic Awareness
On the marketing front, PunToon is reaching out to celebrities and government stakeholders for collaborations on campaigns around environment, values and civic awareness. Kumar believes that children must not be glued to their phones all day. “I want kids to engage in some activity. We must encourage them to implement the tasks they watch in the videos,” Kumar mentioned.
Apart from their flagship videos, PunToon has plans to create shows and features around its IP, Gattu and Chinki, and to expand the brand’s reach to platforms other than YouTube. “We want to increase our production by three times in the next one year, and clock 250 million views per month. We have plans to launch new categories and formats,” Kumar shared. And with its programming as its USP, Kumar is confident of achieving the organisation’s long-term goals.
