Binoy Prabhakar | Moneycontrol

Season 2, Episode 6,   Jun 02, 2022, 09:48 PM

Today, I am joined by Binoy Prabhakar. He is the executive editor at Moneycontrol, one of India's largest business news platform. Binoy is also a former Senior Editor at the The Economic Times and was a fellow at the Tow-Knight Center for Entrepreneurial Journalism in New York. Currently, he runs an efficient newsroom, working with interdisciplinary teams, building successful journalism products for the Indian market and finding innovative business solutions. 
I met Binoy during our fellowship at CUNY and it was so good to catch up. We discussed monetization plans for media platforms, how to build a great work environment and the myth of work-life-balance.

Some key takeaways:
  • Moneycontrol is the flagship but there are other products Binoy is working on
  • he is working on a live streaming service which is highly challenging,
  • Binoy leads a team of 100 journalist and is planning on hiring more journalists
  • editorial team works very closely with the tech and product team (how to monetize products and how to do events) as well as the audience engagement team (they do so to understand consumer complaints)
  • very agile understanding of a continuous innovation process, always looking for ways to develop new products
  • diversifying revenue streams is key. you can monetize e.g. through
    • ads
    • branded content
    • subscription
  • newsletter is a lucrative product - new experiments with what time to send it out is very helpful
  • the collaboration process is very transparent and structured - easy to use tools (Slack, Zoom etc.), 
  • journalists should be good human beings
  • Binoy tries to always create a lot of warmth in the newsroom (focusing on little things, helping each other out)
  • empathy is very important
  • leaders should be hands-on and obsessed about their product
  • while building the team, Binoy started with people having financial skills and then included skilled journalists

More links:

Welcome to the international edition of my podcast Rath Up. I am your host Linda Rath and I interview entrepreneurs who I admire and look up to. I want to know more about their business AND .... What drives them? What inspires them? I believe you need so much more than just talent and skills to be successful in business. So, let's find out what secrets our entrepreneurs will reveal to us. 

If you have any questions or want to share some thoughts, feel free to contact me via Twitter @Lynda420. I am your host Linda Rath and I am looking forward to connecting with you in my next episode.

This episode is brought to you by Media Tech Hub Potsdam. It is one of 12 digital hubs in Germany, initiated by the Federal Ministry of Economics and Energy – and the only one with a focus on MediaTech. it encompasses a working space, an accelerator and an annual conference and i highly recommend you check it out if you want to start a business and look for networking opportunities. I am an entrepreneur myself and our startup Vragments used to be located at the media tech lab in Potsdam.

Credits:

  • Produced by Linda Rath
  • Photo by Binoy Prabhakar
  • Photo Linda Rath by Stefan Walter for Causalux Fotos 
  • Podcast Cover by Nicole Koppe
  • Episode Cover Art by Stephan Gensch
  • Music/Jingles by Mara Niese