On-Air Promotion
The easiest vehicle to use when promoting a channel is the channel itself.
On-air promos that promote schedule and the overall channel are essential.
On-air promos can also promote the availability of the program schedule by mail
or on the web. It roughly estimated that commercial stations devote about 15% of
their available commercial line-up. They employ full-time staff that works
seven days a week to create appropriate on-air promotions. You also see
commercial stations utilizing the end credits time of prime time shows to
promote other show. Channels also employ marketing campaigns with slogans and
logos to create a unified theme for the channel.
These on-air promotions can be accomplished by:
- Using the bulletin board system to display the program schedule or
highlight specials.
- Displaying a corner logo, or "bug," to make the channel easily
identifiable to viewers flipping through channels. If the channel can't afford an electronic
logo inserter, the "bug" can by keyed into the air copy of each
program as a one-time preparation step.
- Channel IDs that simply identify the channel are usually aired at the top
and bottom of each hour and/or between shows.
- A channel may also want to add a channel logo to the end of each original
production with an audio tag that says, "This has been a (name of
channel) production." If the channel has a slogan this is a good place
to insert it.
- And, in some cities, the government channel is able to submit promos to
air on unsold advertising on satellite channels. This is a great way to promote the channel on highly viewed cable
channels.