After all, how many times have marketers been lobbied by media owners, trade bodies such as Thinkbox and, more particularly, the IPA, into accepting the mantra that companies that maintain, - or, even better, increase - marketing spend during a recession are also those that will maintain or improve performance when the good times return?
Channel 4 is not the only broadcaster to cut its marketing spend. In fact most, except pay-TV platforms Sky and Virgin Media, appear to have done the same. So is this a case of advertisers, in time-honoured fashion, being fed the line 'Do as I say, not as I do'?
The broadcasters and Thinkbox were largely, some may think suspiciously, unwilling to talk about the rationale of apparently doing the opposite of what they are telling their customers to do. Yet, while figures from Nielsen Media Research indicate a wide variation in year-on-year spend (see box, right), there are other factors at play, not least the ability to use more of their own media space to promote themselves.
Polly Cochrane, marketing director at Channel 4, is on-message, however. 'The benefits of spending through a recession are well-documented and I stand by this, but we are not a regularly funded organisation, so we are adversely affected,' she says.
A cynic might argue that it is very much in Channel 4's interest to make a public demonstration of its poverty - the news that marketing spend had been cut coincided with an announcement that it was also scaling back its programme budget - as it makes the case for public funding.
Nonetheless, Cochrane mounts a strong defence of how the broadcaster is committed to promoting its fare. 'Our marketing budget hasn't been set, although it will be cut,' she adds. 'However, our portfolio share is higher than it has ever been, and we have more promotional ratings than before.'
Significantly, Channel 4 also plans to advertise on rival channels next year, a rarity for terrestrial channels as they are usually charged a hefty premium.
'TV advertising will take a higher proportion of our budget as it is effective. We stand by the benefits of spending through a recession - there is no contradiction', says Cochrane.
Being publicly owned, Channel 4 is not in a position where it can ask shareholders for more money to spend on advertising; ITV, on the other hand, can. Yet the headline figures show that it, too, has cut its spend, by 27% - although a spokeswoman says that, in real terms, this reduction equates only to about 5%, because a significant proportion of the budget has been diverted into trade advertising, which, along with online advertising, is not measured by NMR.
ITV also claims that a like-for-like comparison is not accurate because it fails to take into account the seasonality of programme launches.
Five, meanwhile, is increasing its spend as it gears up for its first core brand refresh since its rebrand from Channel 5 in 2002.
Although it is tempting to decry the broadcasters as hypocritical, it is hard to compare the marketing strategy of media brands with non-media ones, because they operate in a very different way. It may be reassuring to the latter, though, that media brands are still forced to wrestle with the question of how to overcome declining budgets.
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