The AV Club: One Magic Pop Culture Wish
This GREAT article in The AV Club got me thinking about what my pop-culture wish would be.
I think it would be: For advertisers to recognize the power of non-traditional media.
Towards the end of it’s life The Daily Habit (the TV that I used to work for) was RIFE with product placement and ad buy content. Big brands like Jeep, M+M’s, Playstation, etc. etc. etc. Sometimes there would be three segments per show that had some sort of brand integration. I don’t know the specific dollar amounts of these ad buys, but I heard the number $50K thrown around a few times.
It had it’s good days, but most of the time the show would only get like 7,000 viewers per airing. The podcast I do, on the other hand, regularly gets more than 10x that.
I do make some money from JJGO, but it’s mostly from donors (thank you, btw). We have had some amazing sponsors over the years, but it’s mostly smaller companies without huge ad budgets and I’m assuming the founders are paying out of pocket because they like the show. If only these big brands would put a FRACTION of that ad budget into podcasts. A few thousand dollars a month isn’t significant to a TV network with it’s operation costs, but it would make HUGE difference to most podcasters out there.
I’m guessing the reason you don’t see more ad dollars put into podcasting, blogs, etc. is that most people who are allotting the money are older people that don’t even know what they are. I’m sure this will change in a couple of years when the assistants of those people are the ones signing the checks, people who’s media diet includes equal parts TV, podcasts, blogs, movies, video games etc, but for now, most advertisers don’t seem to know the medium exists.
I mean, the fact that we make ANY money doing what we do is incredible. Honestly, I’d do it for free. I have so much fun doing it that I’d chip in for expenses if we weren’t making anything… I guess I’m just saying… more money please!!!
