Identity Crisis

Can TV channels really create a strong identity of any form?
It seems to be lost on most people - ie. those who don't trawl here
The majority of people I know only think of Channel One, Channel Two, Channel Three, Channel Four and Channel Five. And Sky (as in Sky one)
It makes me tremble what they call ITV2 then

So - do these 'THE ONE' promotions etc. really have any impact?

The identity and brand of individule tv stations is something that is vastly overstated.

Most people I know indeed, call channels in the way you have listed... I think very few people really care about the technical quality of the idents and presentation (many don't even notice them) and see them as mere annoyances inbetween the programmes they want to watch.

The more I watch TV nowadays, the more I agree with this view.

The key to branding is the corporate logo type which the package is based around. And the key problem with UK branding is that there is no strong underlying corporate brand of the company on which to build the channel branding on.

Every company feels the need to spend millions on brand new corporate logos every few years in order to refresh it's image. That also means that they never get established. And when 99% of new logos are text based rather than being iconic, they have a harder time being tied to a particular product. The company has no image which people identify with.

Aswell as that, branding has become so obsessive that with various takeovers that go on, the new owners always want to stamp their own identity on it - even to the point of removing the name alltogether.

Ironicaly, the UK obsession with branding is actually the single biggest reason why it's so weak.

In countries like America, branding is so much stronger because it's left alone. There is usually a decent, iconic corporate logo, but one which is decades old (the Paramount mountain dates back 90 years for instance). Such logos have the benefit of being both decent to start with, and their continued use makes them instantly recognisable. The NBC peacock for instance is so well known that it often appears without the lettering, yet still everyone knows it's NBC. An underlying law of pretty much all US branding is that the logo is a given. It can be spun around, made 3D, appear in different colours, whatever. But the logo itself is a given. That attitude guarantees that every branding package is strong - in that the brand will be recognised.

Lets take a case in point looking at a certain UK TV channel (pictures from TV Ark). This channel has undergone 3 rebrands in that time, each one supposedly to make it stronger, each one actually making it weaker.

5 years ago (a few months more than 5 years ago now actually), they were about to stop using this:
http://www.users.totalise.co.uk/~rob.frowen/itvmidlands/idents/central1994i.jpg
It's a strong, instantly recognisable logo attrituble to Central - and with it ITV. At the time it had well over 10 years of history behind it, and was a development of something which dated back to 1982; IT WAS A STRONG BRAND.

Nevertheless, in the interests of associating more closely with it's owner, it was ditched in favour of this:
http://www.users.totalise.co.uk/~rob.frowen/itvmidlands/idents/central1999a.jpg
Never mind the ident shot that it's taken from, look at the logo. It's just a word, written in a font used by god knows how many people. There is nothing recognisable about it, nothing distinctive about it. IT IS A WEAK BRAND.

Not much long after, it was replaced with this:
http://www.users.totalise.co.uk/~rob.frowen/itvmidlands/idents/carlton1999.jpg
Through nothing more than corporate willy waving from enterprising owners, the latest rebrand didn't even see the survival of the name. This was 1999. Central had been established since 1982. Yet overnight it was ditched in the name of progress.

Of course things then changed again a few short years later, with it being replaced with this:
http://www.lloydmiles.plus.com/itv1idents2001/itv1promo01.jpg
No regional brand at all. Again, done in the name of progress and strengthening, but it just amounts to yet more weakening and messing around with what was a strong, servicable, perfectly fine brand.

If this was America, even if the centralised ITV had gone ahead, on a local level that multicoloured cake would still be appearing in the Midlands. And a good deal stronger branding in general would be too.

I think 'normal' people care more about the quality of programmes on offer. They identify with their favourite programmes, that's why progs. such as EastEnders and The Bill get regularly high viewing figures. It wouldn't matter if they swopped channels tomorrow.

P.S. brands like Central are mostly recognised by the over 50's. Ask any 21 year-old on the street about that and they're more likely to consider the channel either Channel 3 or ITV (rather than ITV1). Similarly they will be aware of 'Sky' or the BBC.

I disagree! I'm certainly not over 50 and I still appreciate Central for what it was!!! It was a hell of a lot better than the current ITV1 with its idents and various jingles, informing people of what was on the channel later in the week or in terms of drama, sport etc etc., with some of the country's top continuity presenters

Lets face it..Central's idents in 1997-1998 were the best the station had produced and it was such a shame when we were just presented with the word C E N T R A L on the screen and nothing else in May 1998.

I've asked before so I'll ask again...DOES ANYONE KNOW OF ANY WEBSITES WITH REALPLAYER CAPTURES OF CENTRAL'S IDENTITIES FROM 1997-1998 (with the flashing sparks, fire, water etc) or mp3 files of recent Central jingles becuase I haven't seen any at all!

TV-Ark has been mentioned in the past, but it has no details from this era.

Any help would be appreciated.

Just to make it clear, the Central-Carlton-ITV1 case study was not presented as a regional ITV vs national ITV debate. It was presented as an example of how a company's branding in the UK constantly has to mutate into something else in order to 'strengthen' itself rather than just staying still and building a strong brand. It was intended to highlight how UK broadcasters (and UK companies in general) are so obsessed by branding that it actually causes a weakness in branding through their constant rethinking on it.

not sure whether your "central is the name mainly used by the over 50s" assertion comes from. i, personally, find that "central" is the name, still, most often used by most people to describe channel 3, followed by "itv" and sometimes "3". the only notable pattern i have noticed is that at uni, people from outside the region tend to call it "channel 3"

A good example of a brand that stood, and still does, stand the test of time is ITN.
"She's the ITN Newscaster..." they still say, and not "She's the ITV News Newscaster".
The brand was instantly recognisable, people knew they were watching ITV when ITN came on. It was also as respected, worldwide, as the BBC.
Also, the logo has been in place since the seventies, if not before, and still doesn't look dated.
Yet what do they do...? They abolish all mention of it, as if it needed to be swept under the carpet after a terrible misdemeanor.
The BBC logo (the three boxes) has been tweaked over the years, but is basically the same as when TV started. If it ain't broke, don't fix it. And, along with Coca Cola, is the world's most recognised brand.

I completely agree - I'm sure the introduction of the centralised ITV1 brand was much more about presenting 'one corporate image' in the lead-up to the merger decision than anything else.

Unlike the US, much of Europe and Australia, the UK now has no regionally branded TV networks.

What are your Australian examples? Most of 7 Network carries the 7 brand, apart from Southern Cross The situation is simular with the other networks. I can't think of any network whereby each affiliate is branded differently.

There are currently 4 regional brands on ITV. ITV1Wales, UTV, Scottish & Grampian. Does that make it a regionally branded network?

The only channel from recent times that I can think of as having a strong brand that would have stood the test of time was Sky Premier - and that lasted about a year or two. They had the ultimate in strong brands - a consistent image, breathtaking idents (not just random clips of people doing stuff), memorable music and a striking logo.

Yes and no. There are still people around who would be less likely to watch a programme if it was on BBC2 or C4, as these are seen as 'alternative' channels (in spiteof the fact that this is much less the cases than in the channels' earlier days). This is why successful BBC2 programmes are sometimes moved over to BBC1 - and see their audience figures go up (and then down again in the case of The X-Files). It's also why news programmes get shunted to BBC2 if a Wimbledon match over-runs - the controllers know that fewer people would watch the rest of the match if it continued on BBC2.
It might not make sense, but, while logos come and go, people's perceptions of channels tend to stay quite fixed (you only have to look at the BBC Brigade or ITV Itinerants on here )