Southern Cross Austereo has reasserted the national strategy for its Hit Network and hit back at claims that it is rolling back the messaging, with the network's director of metropolitan operations Guy Dobson calling reports “fallacious nonsense”.
Dobson was speaking to AdNews regarding reports in The Australian today that the network's flagship metro stations in Sydney and Melbourne have dropped the Hit branding on air, in favour of original monikers 2Day FM and FoxFM.
The paper suggested the Sydney station has seldom used the “Hit” branding on air or online in recent weeks, with claims both Sydney and Melbourne would revert back to original branding in the new year.
However Dobson confirmed to AdNews that this is not the case, calling the report a “fallacious piece of nonsense.”
Dobson said the current network branding will be shifted from Today's Hit Network simply to The Hit Network, as part of a plan that saw the amalgamation of the network's original Today branding and new Hit branding as a “transition phase”.
But he said the 2DayFM name and FoxFM names of its Sydney and Melbourne metro stations were never changed to begin with.
“SCA is not moving away from the Hit Network strategy,” Dobson said.
“Proven by the recent Survey 5 results, the strategy has seen success across the board with every one of the metro hit stations up.
“Our original plan to retain the heritage in 2Day FM and Fox FM remains for Sydney and Melbourne.”
The new network name was unveiled in December of last year with Dobson asserting at the time that keeping the original station names was a deliberate decision.
“If you're wondering why we kept the Fox, B105 and 2Day names I'll tell you,” Dobson said.
“There's life in the brands. Even through 2Day FM's darkest years, it's still reigned supreme. As Thomas Edison once said, 'our greatest weakness lies in giving up' and I for one am not prepared to give up on these brands. You shouldn't either.”
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