Brands in Journalism

I can see it now, I’m sitting around the table playing the fiftieth anniversary edition of Trivial Pursuit and a question will come up asking me what journalistic brand best described the British economic turn down in 2008?

O god..., it on the tip of my tongue, any guesses people? Well I got to tell you it’s a name most people who turn on the news or are in the industry today can’t escape from easily these days. The answer of course is Robert Peston. But can he really be described as a Brand?

Today’s lecture intrigued me, I couldn’t agree with all the areas and topics discussed but he did have a point about the branding of journalist’s or journalism.

When you go shopping at a supermarket, many will go to the brand they know delivers the best service or most convenience. When we buy the produce we know what we are getting from brands like Pepsi, Walkers and Birds Eye (Just for the lawyers who read blogs, other produce and brands are available)

The point is if these brands let us down we would not purchase what is behind them. Take Woolworths as another example, can anyone tell me what this brand of store was primarily on the high street to sell. Please note pick and mix is not a sufficient answer. Woolworths lost the focus and point of their brand and are now suffering financial peril because of it. I come back round to the point, if a newspaper, magazine, TV or radio channel didn’t deliver what was expected from the brand, you would lose interest and not subscribe to what it’s delivering.

Journalists are just as susceptible to becoming brands. Man of the moment Robert Peston has been created into a brand because of his coverage of the economic turndown and how it’s affected businesses in the UK. Peston’s speed and skill at reporting this area means that it will be very hard for him to escape a future job away from business journalism, should he want to. At the moment it’s the Peston’s brand that draws him attention, therefore should he move away from this the likelihood is that he would have to rebuild his brand and contact book.

Soccer Saturday football pundit Jeff Stelling is about to learn what re-branding in the business feels like. Having built a famous following for himself behind the Sky Sports visage, anyone and everyone remotely interested in football knows where to find this man on a Saturday afternoon between the hours of 12pm and 5:30pm. We sit in awe of his jokes and quips related to football teams and players and his extensive knowledge and statistics that stretches across nine divisions. However it broke last week that as well as continuing the job that inspired the birth of a Soccer Saturday drinking game regularly played by students he was to build a new brand for himself as presenter on Channel Four’s Countdown. I can’t see all his fans flocking over to Channel Four for some weekday tea time TV nor can I see a Countdown drinking game being inspired. So is it a smart or foolish move?

My personal opinion, a shrewd and clever move to create a second brand for himself in front of a new audience that could potentially keep him in broadcasting for a further two decades before collecting a pension from BSKYB.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/entertainment/7675710.stm