Branding Television

Catherine Johnson

• Publisher: Routledge
• Year: 2012
• ISBN:
  9781136618543
• Edition: 1
• Topic: Media & Performing Arts
• Subtopic: Film History & Criticism

Branding Television examines why and how the UK and US television industries have turned towards branding as a strategy in response to the rise of satellite, cable and digital television, and new media, such as the internet and mobile phone.

This is the first book to offer a sustained critical analysis of this new cultural development. Branding Television examines the industrial, regulatory and technological changes since the 1980s in the UK and the USA that have led to the adoption of branding as broadcasters have attempted to manage the behaviour of viewers and the values associated with their channels, services and programmes in a world of increased choice and interactivity. Wide-ranging case studies drawn from commercial, public service, network and cable/satellite television (from NBC and HBO to MTV, and from BBC and Channel 4 to UKTV and Sky) analyse the role of marketing and design in branding channels and corporations, and the development of programmes as brands.

Exploring both successful and controversial uses of branding, this book asks what problems there are in creating television brands and whether branding supports or undermines commercial and public service broadcasting.

Branding Television extends and complicates our understanding of the changes to television over the past 30 years and of the role of branding in contemporary Western culture. It will be of particular interest to students and researchers in television studies, but also in creative industries and media and cultural studies more generally.

Part I

Branding and the US Television Industry

1

Deregulation, Differentiation and Niche Targeting

The Emergence of Branding in the Cable/Satellite Era

On 1 April 1987 the famous Hollywood sign in Los Angeles, California was transformed into the logo for the first new television network in over 30 years. The giant letters for the Fox network were accompanied by the characteristic searchlights associated with its sister company, the Hollywood studio 20th Century Fox (Anon. 1987: 88). Footage of the transformation was transmitted in the bumpers between programmes during the first evenings that Fox was on air (Kallan 1987: 48). In staging this spectacle Fox was not only generating valuable publicity for its new network, it was also highlighting the network’s association with the glitz, glamour and history of Hollywood. More than just a publicity stunt then, the transformation of the Hollywood sign contributed to the construction of a brand identity for the Fox network that drew on the existing values and attributes of 20th Century Fox, in just one example of the ways in which the US television industry began to use branding over the 1980s.

This chapter will explore the reasons why the US television industry adopted branding over the 1980s and 1990s. It will examine the key changes that emerged over the cable/satellite era: not just the increased commercial success of cable television itself, but also the broader deregulatory policies of the 1980s, which had ramifications for the wider US media industries.¹ It will analyse how and why branding emerged within the particular industrial and economic context of cable television, looking at the examples of MTV and HBO, and the issues that arose when the national free-to-air networks attempted to adopt branding themselves in the 1980s and 1990s. In doing so, it will begin to draw out some of the characteristics of television branding and argue that it needs to be understood as much more than simply the increased use of marketing and publicity. Therefore, while the transformation of the Hollywood sign into the Fox logo is indicative of a shift towards branding, it is just one small part of a far larger picture of how and why branding was adopted in the US television industry.

Deregulation and Cable Television

Since 1955 US network television had been dominated by three broadcasters: NBC, CBS and ABC. The wavelength scarcity of analogue television, combined with regulation dating back to the 1950s, had protected this oligopoly and effectively prevented significant competition in television broadcasting. In the 1980s this was all to change. President Reagan’s neo-liberal Republican government aimed to deregulate the telecommunications industry. Mark Fowler, appointed chairman of the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) in 1981 (to 1987), was keen to increase competition, and the deregulatory philosophy that he advocated would extend well beyond the length of his appointment and change the face of the US television industry. The biggest impact of the deregulatory approach to telecommunications that began in the 1980s was the breaking of the network oligopoly. The first threat to the networks came from cable services. Cable television originally emerged primarily as a retransmission service in the 1940s and 1950s for homes that could not receive television broadcasts through a roof-top antenna, and so developed initially more as a local community, rather than as a national, service. It was only in the 1970s and 1980s that cable began to develop as a programming service, facilitated significantly by developments in satellite technology that allowed local cable stations to be linked together as national (or global) services (see Mullen 2008).² So cable television began to emerge as a significant industry within a broader deregulatory climate.

As a subscription service, cable has largely been treated as an industry best served by the market (Banet-Weiser et al. 2007: 5–6). Although the FCC has at times regulated the franchise arrangements and price structures (see Mullen 2008), on the whole cable television has not been tied to the same extent as the national networks by public interest and ownership requirements. Hence, cable offered the opportunity for established media companies that would be barred from owning national networks to enter broadcasting. For example, the Hearst Corporation, a major magazine and newspaper publisher, launched the cable channels Lifetime and A&E in 1984 (Banet-Weiser et al. 2007: 130)³ and Time Inc., another large magazine publisher, launched Home Box Office in 1972.

Even with the developments in satellite technology, these cable channels could not hope to compete with the reach of the free-to-air national networks. As a consequence, they focused on offering differentiated programme services to specialized niche audiences. This was important, as cable was funded by a combination of advertising and subscription, and so cable operators and networks had to persuade audiences that it was worth paying the extra subscription for their services and advertisers that they could offer valuable audience segments to justify the lower ratings that they gained than network television. As we shall go on to see, the characteristics of cable television as an industry made it particularly suited to the use of branding as a strategy.

‘I Want My MTV’: Launching a Channel Brand

A clear example of a cable network that functioned from its inception as a brand is MTV. MTV was launched on 1 August 1981 by Warner Amex Satellite Entertainment (WASE), a joint venture between American Express and Warner Communications (Tungate 2004). In 1983, Viacom formed a joint venture with WASE and Warner Communications and went on to buy a majority share in MTV Networks in 1985, which included the channels MTV, Nickelodeon, VH1 and Nick at Nite, purchasing the remaining interests the following year (Viacom 2008–9). MTV was characteristic of most cable ventures of the late 1970s and early 1980s in combining two key features that made branding particularly valuable: product differentiation and niche targeting. In terms of product differentiation, MTV was offering a service and a form of content not provided anywhere else on television – music videos transmitted in a form similar to music radio with VJs (video deejays) and playlists. In terms of niche targeting, MTV was specifically aimed at an up-market, youth audience of 15–34-year-olds, a demographic that did not include high viewers of network television and that was attractive to many of the companies that advertised on television. MTV’s business strategy, therefore, was concerned with delivering to advertisers an attractive audience that the networks (who still dominated the market share at this time) could not provide. MTV thus accorded with the standard economic model of television broadcasting as a ‘dual-product’ market, with the first product being the programme service that is sold to audiences and the second being access to audiences that is sold to advertisers (Doyle 2002: 60). However, there was a third element to the economics of MTV. As a cable channel, MTV was also a product for cable operators.⁴ In order to be successful MTV needed to persuade its audiences to pay the extra subscription to access its programmes, to persuade cable operators to carry its channel so as to be able to reach its audience and to persuade advertisers to buy airtime on its channel. From its launch, MTV used branding in order to achieve these aims.

To understand how MTV used branding in this context we need to think in a little more detail about what we are talking about when we use the term, ‘brand’. As discussed in the Introduction, both Celia Lury and Adam Arvidsson argue that the brand is more than simply a design or logo added onto the surface of a product. Rather, they both claim that the brand functions as a meeting point between consumer and producer, what Lury (2004) refers to as an ‘interface’ and Arvidsson (2006: 8) terms a ‘frame of action’. In both theorizations the brand as interface/frame manages the interactions between consumers, products and producers. Lury argues that the interface of the brand is not located in one place or time: ‘Rather, like the interface of the Internet, it is distributed across a number of surfaces (of, for example, products and packaging), screens (television, computers, cinemas) or sites (retail outlets, advertising hoardings, and so on)’ (2004: 50). In relation to the television channel, the brand is communicated to the viewer through programme production and acquisition, scheduling, on-screen advertising and promotion (including station IDs), off-screen advertising and promotion and ancillary products related to the channel and/or its programming. However, in order to offer a coherent frame of action, these different elements need to be unified and made visible to the viewer.

When MTV launched, the first image transmitted was doctored footage from the Apollo 11 moon landing. The sequence began with a close-up of the Apollo 11 rocket as a voice-over counted down to take-off, with the MTV logo overlaid in the bottom left-hand corner of the screen until the rocket took off. A rapidly edited montage then depicted Neil Armstrong jumping out of Apollo 11 onto the surface of the moon and planting a flag displaying the MTV logo as a voice-over proclaimed, ‘Ladies and gentlemen. Rock and roll!’ and a rock score faded up. The sequence ended with a close-up of the MTV logo with multiple colours and patterns fading and wiping across its surface, before cutting to the video for the Buggles track, Video Killed the Radio Star. From its very opening, therefore, MTV used design to communicate its identity to its audience. It took an irreverent swipe at the history and culture of the ‘adult’ generation. In doing so, it ironically equated the launch of MTV with man’s first landing on the moon and marked out (literally by placing a flag) the space of MTV as other-worldy and distinctly different to network television. The MTV logo itself was created by a small company called Manhattan Design for only US$1,000 and was deliberately designed with its graffiti ‘TV’ to look primitive and cartoonlike, in contrast to the slick logos of larger corporations (Tungate 2004). This hip, irreverent attitude was carried over into the choice of the first song, which literalizes MTV’s aim – to make music video, rather than radio, the destination for young viewers’ consumption of music.

While the MTV logo communicated the identity and personality of MTV, this was reinforced through the opening promo and programme scheduling. This integration of content (the music videos) and promotional material (such as logos, idents and trailers) was reinforced through MTV’s broadcast flow.⁵ In addition to the seamless move from the opening promo to the MTV logo and into the first song (without any continuity announcement or other break between content and promotional material), the style and theme of the song and the promotional material are consistent, giving the whole channel a clear overall identity. For example, after the Buggles’ song there is another promo that situates MTV as part of an evolution in human entertainment, literally combining the ‘power of sight’ and the ‘power of sound’. This promo takes the theme of Video Killed the Radio Star and expands upon it, suggesting that MTV is part of a naturally evolving progression from the gramophone and radio to television and cable. This blurring of content (the music videos) and promotion was facilitated by the fact that MTV’s programming was essentially a form of promotion for the records themselves.

McDowell and Batten (2005) argue that all television branding strategies have two facets, one that is audience-based and one that is advertiser-based. However, when it first launched, MTV also needed to be able to persuade cable operators to carry it as a channel if it was to reach a large enough audience to be attractive to advertisers. MTV could not just depend on constructing its brand on screen when it was only available to a small number of viewers in a restricted geographical area. To overcome this, MTV developed an innovative promotional campaign that it ran on free-to-air networks which was designed to mobilize viewers as advocates on behalf of the channel. The adverts included key pop stars of the time (from David Bowie to Mick Jagger, to Cyndi Lauper, to The Police) shouting directly out to the viewer, ‘America … Call your cable company and say “I want my MTV!”’. The campaign’s noisy, brash style complemented the irreverence of the channel’s brand identity and reinforced the idea of MTV as a completely new form of television. But, more importantly, it attempted to instil in the viewer a sense of ownership and loyalty towards the channel. The advert proclaimed that MTV belonged to the youth of America and drew on the suggestion that US television was failing to provide them with their culture.

In view of this, when MTV launched, programming, scheduling, on-screen promotion and off-screen advertising all combined to present a coherent image, or brand personalization, of the channel. This brand image not only communicated a set of values to the viewer, but also explicitly acted as a frame of action, inciting the viewer to call their cable operator and demand their MTV. MTV fostered this sense of ownership and belonging in its viewers through the development of events, such as the MTV Video Music Awards that launched in 1984, where viewers voted for each award, and competitions, where the prizes were often personal meetings with key pop stars of the period. The intention of these different facets of MTV’s brand was to position MTV as a destination for its target audience and a central part of their everyday lives. This was important, not only to attract viewers to the channel, but also to attract advertisers. Before the channel launched, researchers interviewed 600 14–34-year-olds and studied the lifestyle of this demographic in order to ascertain ‘how the network should “feel”’(Robinson 1984: S6). While some mainstream advertisers were anxious about the negative impact of associating their products with the sex, drugs and rock and roll of MTV’s output, MTV’s sales literature emphasized that it could deliver that ‘Elusive [audience of ] … young upscale males and females’ (cited in Billard 1983: 51). MTV’s ability to attract advertiser revenue depended on being able to persuade advertisers that it ‘got’ this audience and could place their products seamlessly into an environment that spoke to them.⁶ Paul Temporal argues that advertisers believe that MTV knows its audience: ‘Young people connect with and feel part of MTV, to the point that they are identified as the “MTV Generation” or “MTV Nation”’ (2008: 26).

Temporal’s comments point to the way in which the interface of the brand is not simply constructed through the creative activities of brand managers, marketers, designers and executives, but also through other forms of communication that are more or less under the control of the broadcaster, such as employees, press and viewer activity. For MTV, the brand functions as an interface not just between MTV and its viewers and advertisers, but also between MTV and its employees. John Thornton Caldwell demonstrates how employees increasingly have to brand themselves in relation to potential employers in order to gain work and how corporations use trade stories and production gossip as a form of marketing (2008: 58–59). If we look at interviews with MTV personnel in trade magazines, we can see how the MTV brand functions as an interface for the ways in which the corporation’s employees talk about their work. For example, in an article in the trade magazine Brandweek Brian Graden (President of Entertainment at MTV and VH1) asserted the importance of research into the youth audience in the development of the MTV brand while simultaneously arguing that the brand imbues the very DNA of MTV staff: ‘We’re very engrossed in research here and what our audience likes and how they view the world. … Then, at a point, you walk into the other world and forget about it because it’s in your DNA and you do your work’ (cited in Ebenkamp 2003). This balance between insisting that the brand is based on solid research and that its values are also embodied by its staff is reiterated by Brent Hansen (President of Creative and Editor-in-Chief at MTV Networks International 2003–6) in discussing the age gap between MTV’s employees and its audience in an article in Brandchannel. He states, ‘We don’t want a bunch of people my age who are programming channels. … We want people who are actively participating in those worlds. If you don’t have that relevant point of view, you end up being more like a broadcaster, than like a niche channel’ (cited in Rusch 2004). Similarly, an article in Advertising Age on MTV’s digital strategy is keen to assert that the network’s head of digital media, Jason Hirschhorn, not only has the right qualifications for the job, but also ‘gets’ the brand. He is described as a ‘self-professed fan of everything from Oprah to Arctic Monkeys – “you can’t pigeon-hole me,” he says’ (cited in Klaassen 2006b). Later in the same article, Trevor Kaufman, CEO of interactive firm Schematic, describes Hirschhorn as part of a generation of executives who ‘live the digital-media lifestyle – Jason goes home and plays video games. And they’re saying “here are all the places I like to spend my time; why isn’t MTV there and how can we get it there?”’ (ibid.). These articles profess that the best executives embody the values of their employer’s brand in their work and personal lives. And the brand here is not simply positioned as the corporation’s, but also as the viewer’s, so that the emphasis is on asserting not only that the executive gets the audience, just like the MTV brand does, but also on proclaiming that there is no boundary between the executive, the brand and the audience – they all embody the same values and experiences. Branding becomes, then, a frame through which industry discourse about its own working practices and values is articulated. It imbues all elements of production – not just product development, launch a...