ITV - research

ITV is the UK's largest terrestrial commercial network. It is made up of ITV, digital channels ITV2, ITV3, ITV4. CITV, and ITVBe.

ITV - Wide variety of the highest quality shows that have cross-generational appeal. Suitable for families.
ITV2 - Aimed at millennials 16-34; targeted at a "fun-loving" audience. Shows comedies and reality shows.
ITV3 - Targets an upmarket, 35+ audience; shows dramas, tells "great" stories
ITV4 - Made for men 25-44; shows sports and action shows, as well as US cult classics
CITV - Aimed at children, with cross-gender appeal; shows a variety of kid's shows
ITVBe - Aimed towards women 16-34, particularly millennial mothers; dedicated to reality TV

ITV invests ~£1bn annually in its programming and itv.com.

From their website: "ITV is the home of high quality, popular television from the biggest entertainment events, to original drama, soaps, sport, factual series and independent news, both national, and regional."

ITV does have a public service broadcasting remit, which costs them a lot of money to uphold. From their website: "Reflecting modern society through our programmes, workforce and services, ensuring we’re relevant and accessible to all" is an important part of their remit. "Inclusive programming" is another one of their aims: to "make sure our programmes accurately portray the diversity of modern society by the people on-screen and the editorial content."


Research from the ITV website in 2017 shows the following:

"ITV is the only commercial channel that regularly attracts big audiences

ITV accounts for 98% of commercial programmes attracting more than 5m viewers
Average weekly reach is 65%.

490 of the top 500 commercial programmes of 2017 were on ITV.

In an average week ITV reaches: 
  • 73% ABC1s
  • 70% ABC1 men 
  • 57% 16-34s
  • 66% 16-34 women
  • 81% housewives.
  • Liar was the most watched new drama series in the UK
  • I'm a Celebrity: Get me out of Here! was the most watched entertainment show
  • Diana Our Mother: Her Life and Legacy was the most watched documentary, with 5.8m viewers
  • Coronation Street was the most watched soap, averaging 7.6m viewers
  • Broadchurch was the most watched drama series, averaging 10.7m viewers."

It's worth noting that the above research comes directly from ITV itself, meaning that there is of course a bias in favour of ITV; the research in question has been selected with the intention of painting the network to be successful. As ITV is a commercial network, it needs to portray itself positively, as its funding is dependent on commercial shareholders, so the better it makes itself look, the more viewers it pulls in, the more funding it gets for the next season. However, these are statistics, and cannot technically be wrong, even if any statistics contrary to the network's desired self-image have almost certainly been purposefully omitted. 

I have decided that I will be making a show for ITV, as opposed to any of the other channels owned by the network. This is because I want to make some sort of fictional drama, most likely related to the crime sub-genre, and ITV is the channel that best fits these criteria. 

With regard to my production, the type of show ITV produces seems to differ slightly from my plans. However, it can be argued that, with regard to drama, it is the shows that offer something new that are the most successful. Broadchurch is a perfect example of this on ITV: the show was stylistically based on noir and Scandi-noir, which was something fairly unique within ITV at the time, and it was incredibly successful the most watched commercial drama series in 2017, according to ITV. 

With this in mind, I think that, while it may be true that the remit of ITV has the potential to restrict my options, and that much of ITV's drama is (subjectively of course) quite bland (see Morse, Doc Martin, The Bill, and countless more police procedurals), I think that I can still make something stylistically creative, so long as at least some elements of my production are "familiar" and conform directly to the remit. 









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