Branding channels in a multi-platform age

UK broadcaster ITV ushered in the New Year with a raft of new idents as part of a refresh of its on-screen identity – the first in nearly six years.

The idents will change every week, with a different artist creating a piece of work based on the ITV logo in a bid to demonstrate the broadcaster’s creativity and, as ITV Creative executive creative director Tony Pipes, explains, “reflect ITV as a 21st century broadcaster”.

It follows BBC2 and Channel 4’s major rebrands in the autumn, motivated by the aim of sharpening up their image in the face of increasing competition, particularly the growing market share of OTT streaming services.

With the average BBC2 viewer now over 60, the BBC admits that the rebrand was all part of an urgent need to appeal to younger audiences.

In what was the channel’s first major rebrand since the 90s, in-house agency BBC Creative worked with brand agency Superunion to develop a rebrand based around a series of idents which offered a diverse selection of vibrant colours and moods.

Out went the literal physical representations of the figure 2 and in came a series of simple, eye-catching curves.

Superunion executive creative director Stuart Radford explains: “Collectively we’ve developed a new approach that reflects the breadth of emotions evoked by BBC2’s content. Our diverse idents are all unified by the iconic curve of the numeral two.”

Channel 4’s rebranding exercise faced a much wider challenge – to unify the entire digital channel portfolio consisting of More4, Film4, 4Music, 4Seven and E4 whilst maintaining their strong individual brand personalities. The new logos all incorporate the iconic 4 more prominently, emphasising they are all part of the Channel 4 family

So what do the BBC2 and Channel 4 rebrands tell us about branding linear channels in a multi-platform age?

Sharpest tool
4Creative Group Business Director Matt Berry declares: “As the C4 rebrand shows, linear channels have had to…