Though STAR TV senior vice-president (advertising sales) LS Nayak refused to commit on a figure, he admitted massive investments were being pumped in to establish STAR News as a brand and drive its penetration. "For the next six months, our focus is to build the channel as a brand," he said.

STAR News sees the general elections as an opportunity for brand, revenue and audience growth. The focal point of the strategy: To reach out to a wider audience while retaining its `class' identity.

While Prannoy Roy and his expert team are promoted as personalities of the channel, STAR News is adopting a two-pronged strategy to drive penetration. The first is to put the election coverage exclusively on STAR News. Earlier, the network ran a simulcast on its other channel. The second step is to bring in viewers by appointment to popularprogrammes. Such shows are being packaged, promoted and sold as individual brands. The purpose: To sustain viewership interest and advertising revenue.

By introducing and promoting programmes, STAR News is moving away from a back-to-back news format. The benefit: It can sell programmes rather than the channel. And it will still have viewers who surf in and out. There will be two types of advertisers: Those who buy across the channel and those who take to programmes. "The format helped us sell news throughout the day. It worked as it sustained the channel. But we could have only limited penetration," said Nayak.

The channel is getting out of simulcast shows on STAR Plus to give it an exclusive viewership base. It recently launched STAR News Ravivar, the Hindi version of STAR News Sunday. STAR Plus will continue to air STAR News Sunday.To keep in line with this strategy, STAR News is launching STAR Samachar, a half-hour daily Hindi news slot at 9 pm, on October 25. The simulcast of the English news will,thus, stop. STAR Plus will continue to air the English news. Said Nayak, "Doordarshan gets a large chunk of the news viewership at 9 pm. By having two products, we intend to own the 9 pm news slot across our network. Besides, the Hindi news will help our news channel to improve its penetration."

The channel is developing segment-specific shows. While it has started an afternoon show for women called Your Call, Small Talk (a politician visits a school) is for the younger audience. On October 25, STAR News will start a daily half-hour business programme from Monday to Friday at 9.30 pm. Said Nayak, "we are getting new viewers and a new category of advertisers. We are hooking women into the channel in our afternoon show through appointment. A multinational detergent brand will sponsor it."

The channel's flagship show, however, will be News Hour at 10 p.m. STAR News has already increased the price of the show: From Rs 15,000 to Rs 1.20 lakh. The other strong band is the morning news show, said Nayak. OnAugust 16, STAR News launched Breakfast News and pulled out Good Morning India which continues to run on STAR Plus. While Good Morning India combines news with leisure, Breakfast News is hard core news. "We have two different products for two different channels. We are now able to draw in audiences which used to go to BBC or CNN for hard news in the morning," said Nayak.

And to keep the channel ticking after elections, STAR News is developing brand properties in shows like Assignment and Nationwide.