Business Marketing Tip - Beware Pay to Play Television
Posted on October 04, 2010 by Elaine Lockard, One of Thousands of Executive Coaches on Noomii.
Ever dream of being interviewed on a national TV program? What would you say if you had to pay them to appear to the tune of thousands of dollars?
On Friday, July 16, my day was going along as any other day until I got a voicemail from a senior associate producer at O2 Media, which produces the Lifetime Television Network show, The Balancing Act. He wanted to talk with me about my book and my work.
Wow! A national television show, large cable company, senior producer wants to talk to me about my work! Oh my gosh!
So I got on the phone, gave him a call, and had a wonderful conversation. He had checked me out fully, visited my website, and had some very pointed questions. He then told me they were very interested in my work and felt it would be of great benefit to their demographic. He definitely wanted to have me on their show in 3-5 minute editorial slot that would represent me as an expert in my type of coaching.
So he proceeded to give me all the details about what would happen, what wouldn’t happen, how it would be styled, but then the big shoe dropped.
For me to be on the show, I had to pay them! I had to pay them to the tune of $5900! Wow!
This totally floored me! You don’t pay to be on a show that’s asking to interview you, that’s not the norm. So why were they asking me to pay a $5900 scheduling fee?
The producer told me they have a 2 million opt-in email list they email to weekly and they claim to have approximately 400,000 women watching on a daily basis. So why would I be paying them to be on the show?
Bottom line, it’s advertising. They want to have me because they believe I have a worthwhile service which will make a good show and be of benefit to their demographic, but at the same time they are doing me a favor and creating an advertisement.
What bothered me is why didn’t he just say that? He never called it a paid advertisement. I don’t know if there are any FCC or FTC guidelines which he must adhere to in his representation of their proposal but it felt sort of like bending the truth a bit.
And to top it off, I never heard an absolute guarantee that it would air. Just think, I would pay $5900 for an advertisement that yes, I would get a copy and could use on my own site, but may not air on their show and introduce me to their huge audience.
I did some online research and found this type of programming is called Pay to Play. I also found there are many different opinions on the web ranging from this being a scam to it being a legitimate business endeavor.
So I wonder if this is what the business of interviews on television are becoming? Is this going to be the norm? I don’t know but I hope not.
If you are contacted by a company that wants to interview you, but you have to pay for it, I suggest you need to consider several things to protect yourself and get the most from your investment should you decide to proceed with the offer:
- check out the company
- check out their claims
- get a guarantee in writing that your spot will air
- find out if their guarantee can be overturned by the parent company or the network
- ask for a list of references you can contact about how their spot affected their business
You need to be very, very careful and do your homework before making your decision as to whether or not this is appropriate for you and your business. You want to spend your advertising budget wisely.
Since, before this, I had never heard about Pay to Play, I would welcome your comments on this ‘Pay to Play’ television and whether paying to be interviewed is what you would consider a scam or just another form of advertising. Have you ever been offered this type of interview? What are your views? Should this become the norm for interviews?
