ITV News: Big Ben out, Twitter in
ITV News presenters, including News at Ten anchor Julie Etchingham (right), have started tweeting as part of a 'brand-alignment' (Photo: ITV)
The new-look ITV News is using Twitter and Facebook as part of its attempt to put 'human experiences at the heart of their news coverage'. ITV News revealed new titles and a new set yesterday alongside a promotional campaign using the tag-line 'Bringing the facts to life.'
ITV News editor Deborah Turness wrote: "Putting real, human experience at the heart of what we do helps connect the viewer to otherwise seemingly distant national and international news events. It has been a long, proud tradition over decades to deliver stories that reach out and touch people, news that has the power to make them stop, watch and think. Now we have a set and a title sequence that reflects and embodies our USP."
The most talked about change has been the removal of Big Ben from the News at Ten titles after ITV executives decided the imagery was too London-centric. However, another interesting development has been ITV News' jump into the world of social media. Correspondents now have individual twitter accounts, alongside an overall ITV News account and a Facebook page.
Several members of the ITV News team were already using Twitter - Angus Walker started tweeting in July 2008 - but now at least 10 correspondents, including News at Ten presenter Julie Etchingham, have accounts with co-ordinated ITV News branded backgrounds. Unlike other news organisations, the tweeting seems a very top-down initiative - despite now having accounts, James Mates and Tim Ewart are still yet to tweet at all. However, News at Ten's editor yesterday afternoon tweeted, "getting inundated with the number of itv correspondents now wanting to twitter!"
So far the team's tweets have largely been teasers trailing reports to be screened on TV, although yesterday we did learn that strangely ITV News had bought the Rooney's newborn baby an adult-size Liverpool shirt with his name on. The new Twitter users are yet to build up large numbers of followers - News at Ten anchor Etchingham only has 21 - but their tweets are being regularly re-tweeted by colleagues and the overall ITV News account, as well as being aggregated using the new Lists feature.
On Facebook, ITV News launched a fan page on Monday. It has been a slow start with no comments as yet on the discussion topic about childhood obesity, but to their credit when the changes to News at Ten were criticised on the fan page, ITV News did respond.
UPDATE 04/11/09: ITV News editor Deborah Turness this morning sent an all staff e-mail to highlight this blog post
