Brand Identification CNN IBN

The entire exercise of brand building turns into a façade if the product is not identified with the attributes it set out to do so at the time of the launch. Keeping this in mind, the CNN-IBN team has put down a team of journalists that can easily turn into Brand Ambassadors of the channel.

Although Rajdeep Sardesai is the automatic and perceived choice as the Brand Ambassador for the channel, he believes that it is the young journalists who take active part in news-gathering the professionals that turn into brand ambassadors of the channel. He also states that “I have chosen people who would represent the brand in the long run. We are all brand ambassadors for the channel in different ways”.

The statement above also highlights the selection policy of the network. It has roped in some of the biggest and best journalists available in India, who are by far brands by themselves. Be it Karan Thapar, Sagorika Ghosh, Bhupendra Choubey, Rajeev Masand and the recent addition to the list, Cyrus Broacha. And the most striking feature is that they somewhere reflect the audience they cater to. Cyrus may be seen talking crap on television, but that is exactly what he is roped in for and to a majority viewership that is what they expect from him.

Karan Thapar’s inimitable style of interviewing has caught the eye of many, who perhaps felt newsy interviews were more about the interviewee than the interviewer. The variation in the content is visible when Anuradha Sengupta, rated as one of India’s best TV interviewers is on air with lighter and feature-based interviews in her programme “Being”.

The format of Being is in similar lines to Talk Asia, hosted by Lorraine Hahn, with the only difference being in the setting and the spontaneity of the host. It may not be as newsy as the Thapar version, but has certainly done enough to be listed as one of the top 4 most watched programmes on CNN-IBN in the weekends. Some of her interviews have made it to the CNN bureau and are aired in the US.

One of the key reasons that the channel has been doing well is these individuals channelising their brand powers to put together a equally powerful brand, the product CNN-IBN. Some of their ads contain these personalities – mainly Bhupendra Choubey, Rajdeep Sardesai, Sagorika Ghosh and Suhasini Haider giving a brief about the spirit of “Whatever it takes”.