How To Get Paid For Watching TV

How To Get Paid For Watching TV

Earning money while viewing your favorite shows!

BEING SELF-MOTIVATED!

This booklet is intended to introduce you to a

variety of ideas that can give you the opportunity to earn

money while sitting in front of your television. While it

may sound like a gimmick, there are very real possibilities

to generate dollars--if you are willing to give it a try!

It's not necessarily easy work. There's a lot of

effort required to get your operation up and running. But

dedication to the task and motivation towards the end goal

of being in business for yourself should provide

substantial impetus for you to launch this project.

It often comes down to using time wisely and if you

like to watch television, why not look for ways to do what

you enjoy and make a few dollars at the same time? There

are numerous chances in this world to work in a field you

enjoy - and be successful at it! All it takes is a bit of

determination, being well-organized and believing in

yourself.

Most people have the ability to make a business of

their own work. But for various reasons they don't try or

they make the attempt, but believe they are going to fail.

Very often, they fulfill their own self-prophecy. They

choose to listen to the negative influences--all the

reasons why the business would fail instead of all the

arguments as to why it can succeed.

There's no reason why any business you try shouldn't

be successful. But the belief in yourself must overshadow

the things that can and will go wrong. By focusing on the

things you do right and building on them, your business can

provide you with the kind of income you want while letting

you maintain the freedom of being your own boss.

It all comes down to having the right attitude. If

you truly feel your business can be a smashing success, it

will be! Because you'll be looking for the ideas that work

well for the business, discard the ones that aren't working

and essentially try to understand the formula for success.

Many of us are afraid to fail and thus never attempt

the jobs we really would like to perform. It often seems

too unbelievable to be able to work and make a living at

some-thing we enjoy. Work isn't supposed to be enjoyable,

is it? We're meant to toil and labor for a few hours a day

and then take home a paycheck to spend on the things we

like doing. Isn't that right?

Well, if it were, there would be a lot more miserable

people out in the world today. But the truth is a lot of

Americans are doing something they love and earning a

living at it. Why not you?

You think that it's too late? That you can't really

leave your regular job because you need the paycheck to pay

your bills? That's O.K.--for now. You can start your own

busi-ness part-time and work at it, trying to perfect it,

seeing if it earns any money first before making the

decision to go full-time with it.

All you have to do is determine how many hours you

want to work at your new "-side" business to start and plan

accordingly. Don't try and overdo. Simply work hard and

smart in the few hours you've allotted. This way you can

test it out, see if the business has the kind of potential

you believe. If it does, you can gradually work more hours

in it until your income is well past what you made before.

The difference is--now you're doing something you

love.

Change is difficult for most--don't feel bad! But if

you'd really like to work at something you enjoy, if you

really want to be your own boss and run your own

business, if you really want to make money and feel like

work is fun again, then don't hesitate any longer! Change

is necessary, but it's only you that can effect the change.

It will mean altering your routine, changing your

habits, working long hours initially. But if it has the

power to change your life for the better, this work will be

worth all the time, sweat and effort you put in to make it

work. And it will work! You have to believe in that--and

believe in yourself before you start.

How many times have you watched sports and heard an

announcer say, "this team controls its own destiny"? What

they mean, of course, is that the team can produce the

results it wants simply by doing the job themselves. They

don't need to depend on any-one else for help. The entire

outcome is in their hands--to win or lose.

So it is with you. The ultimate success, the final

destiny of your business rides with your ability and talent

and, more importantly, motivation to succeed. You control

it, no one else, and it's you who will benefit directly

from your efforts.

So, start believing in yourself and read on. A

Chance to make money while watching television awaits.

OVERVIEW OF THE TELEVISION SCENE

Television pounced upon the scene during one of the

worst economic periods in our country's history--the Great

Depression. As a result, T.V.'s introduction to a

potential viewing public went largely unnoticed. People

had more than enough to do trying to provide for their

families.

Despite that timing, a few people had a chance to

view the future. That's exactly what they thought TV was,

but even they could not have dreamed of the successful

industry television has become. With the advent of cable

television, there are dozens of stations now competing for

the viewer and showing an extraordinary range of

programming from week to week.

Early on, there was only one station. NBC (The

National Broadcasting Company) was the first to broadcast

programs a few hours a week on the television set. It's

hard to imagine TV today on such a limited basis, but every

industry has to start somewhere. Within a couple of years,

there were a number of stations joining NBC and programming

was expanded.

World War II provided a minor interruption to service

since the government had to place a restriction on

broadcasting. But this only had the industry working hard

behind the scenes, ready for the day when the moratorium

was lifted. After the war ended in 1945, the restrictions

were repealed and the dawn of a new media era was

beginning.

Television flourished in the fifties and new

programming was the rage of the industry. Each year many

of us looked forward to the introduction of new shows to

watch along with our favorites, held over from the previous

programming year. Family gatherings around the TV set were

common as more and more households obtained one.

Today, nearly 100 million households have a

television set or two, not to mention a video cassette

recorder (VCR), all to keep up with the latest offerings

from a seemingly infinite number of channels. Satellite

dishes have expanded viewing capability well past our

normal limits.

What does this mean to you? Simply put, here are

your dollar-making opportunities. The television industry

is so large, yet it is experiencing its most dramatic

growth ever, thanks to the expanding cable television

market. With growth come needs; needs you could fulfill.

If you watch TV a lot, and enjoy it, this chance is for

you.

These opportunities are unlimited and it doesn't

matter where you reside or how far you progressed in

school. No matter where you live, there is a cable

television company with the ability to hook a television up

to its service. Cable is ready, willing and expanding--and

its profits show it. The government has recently focused

on this industry simply because of the outrageous amounts

of money it seems to be making. With cable advertising

income closing in on the $4 billion dollar mark, this is an

industry that hides no longer.

In fact, it has been shown that cable TV watchers

tend to buy more goods and services than non-cable TV

subscribers. Thus, companies are clamoring to get their

advertising pitch out to these viewers, hoping for the

best. It's not just the Home Shop-ping Network that's

doing well, but advertisers on all shows who are benefiting

from this marketing boom. People that can afford cable

television monthly rates are the ones who tend to consume

more products anyway--and businesses know this.

This booklet will introduce you to several

opportunities in the expanding television market. But it

will be important for you to understand what you're seeing

on television. Watch the commercials on any network. See

if there is any pattern, any trend to what's being sold--

and how. Take notes and see what you've learned from this

viewing. Who are the ads directed at? Are they visual?

Talky? Funny? Serious? What are the pro-ducts being sold

most often? Does it vary by time slot? You can make a

reference chart for yourself as you digest and interpret

this information.

Your understanding of what's going on can mean the

difference between success--or not. Your ability to

understand viewing patterns and what works for advertisers

will help you establish yourself as someone with

credentials to give advice on television advertising.

Television is a very innovative medium. Those in the

industry are always on the watch for individuals who

possess this trait of coming up with new ideas and concepts

for those that push their wares on television. And all it

takes is the time to watch your television--all channels,

different times, different days (weekend vs. Weekday) and

then analyzing your data to make inferences about what

works well and what doesn't.

The remainder of this booklet shows you where some of

the opportunities are in this exciting medium. Good luck!

WORKING IN ADVERTISING -- WITH LOCAL BUSINESSES

Your job now is to watch TV!

That's right--turn on the set and get to work! It's

time to get your new business off the ground.

Starting with local companies may be a good way to

begin your career in the tele-vision industry. More

specifically, your first job will be to watch commercials.

And, perhaps, listen to your local radio stations to

monitor their advertising, too.

Begin by making a list. When you see or hear a

commercial, write down the local company doing the

advertising. Radio stations with commercials are easy to

find. So are television stations. Concentrate on your

local TV stations for now. That's where you'll find a lot

of your local advertising going on. However, don't

overlook some of the cable channels who may also introduce

local advertising, especially during the day.

It will become clear early on that the local

television advertising market will be dominated by just a

few companies. List them.

Then begin to watch their commercials more carefully.

What time of day are they running? How long are the ads?

What age audience are they aiming at? Do you like the

commercial? Are there any mistakes in it? Record all of

this information.

Begin to draw up a large notebook of your impressions

along with specific data about when the ad ran and for how

long. Amazingly, local companies contract for a certain

number of ads running for a certain length, at a particular

time of day, yet they are unable to monitor whether the ad

ran or not. You may also notice that the ads are time-

sensitive, such as advertising a sale for a certain time

period. If the ad is run after the sale is over, it's a

waste of time and money for the company, yet they may never

hear about it from anyone.

What if there was something wrong with the sound? Or

the information, such as a wrong address typed on the

screen? Any mistake will likely cost the advertiser and

more then one or two errors will severely affect the

company's credibility.

Advertising is not cheap, and if not done right, can

cost a local business hundreds, even thousands of hard-

earned dollars. Most companies can't afford that and no

company wants to see any valuable marketing dollar thrown

away. The whole purpose of advertising is to reach a

specific market at a specific time with a specific message.

Anything other than that is unacceptable.

Now, you've been at this for two or three weeks and

have a pretty full log built up. You've noted the several

businesses you've specifically monitored, and made notes as

to any errors, patterns and potential results you think the

local business will realize. Now what do you do with it?

It's very simple! You're going to call the companies

for whom you've been tracking this information. If the

business is small enough, you'll probably want to contact

the owner. For larger firms, ask for the person in charge

of advertising. When you reach your contact, identify

yourself as the owner of a local advertising monitoring

service and you'd like to share some information concerning

a recent set of ads the company ran.

Then recite any errors, mistakes, mis-broadcasts,

viewing problems and give the exact dates and times for any

of the above. Not every company will give you an open

reception, but some are going to be impressed with the

quality and accuracy of your information. It will also

mean bottom-line revenue for the company, since a station

will refund some or all of the advertising money spent

because the advertisements did not run as planned or

promised.

This will enable you to pointedly demonstrate what

your service can mean, in actual dollars, to the company.

You are important because very often the television station

doesn't realize anything is wrong, either. The stations

need the advertising revenue so they aren't intentionally

fouling anything up. But because mistakes are frequently

made, and because more and more newer stations are out

seeking advertising revenue, you can carve a nice niche out

for yourself simply monitoring commercials in between your

favorite shows.

You never thought watching the commercials could be

so rewarding, did you?

Once you've passed this information along, offer them

a formal, written report that you'd like to hand-deliver to

the company contact. Point out that this service is

available to the local business to specifically track their

advertising results in terms of actual broadcast.

A written report is very professional and may give

the impression that you've been doing this for a number of

years. They may also be more inclined to try you out for a

couple of months to see if your service continues to help

them. It will certainly give them much more information

than they currently have.

You can decide how to charge them, by hour or on a

monthly fee basis. Don't set your price too high. Your

ultimate goal is to obtain several clients for whom you can

track advertising, since you can watch the same amount of

television and record for a number of area businesses.

Don't limit yourself to only area businesses, either.

State-wide or national firms have even less ability to

monitor local broadcasts, so they could be a large source

of monthly fee revenue for you, too. Your list of

prospects to contact about your monitoring service is

growing rapidly, isn't it?

It will be important to you, after contracting a

client, to know when their advertising is supposed to be

broadcast. When you started, your viewing was pot-luck,

but now that you have a client or more, you need to be able

to specifically monitor the showing and not leave your

seeing it up to blind luck. Get all the details to allow

you to monitor prop-erly such as length of advertisement,

number of times it is supposed to be shown, time frames

it's supposed to run, that type of specific detail.

Without this information, you can't do a proper job of

determining if things are going according to the company's

contract with the television station. A copy of that

contract itself would be ideal.

Once you have this information, you can record it in

your log book and stand watch. This will give you the

comparison information you need to do your work. The

company will no doubt feel that your nominal charge for

this service is well worth it.

As you increase confidence in your ability to do this

work, you can try for even larger accounts. While

nationwide advertisers often have an ad agency that does

tracking for them, it is quite often limited to big cities.

No one is likely keeping track of small town broadcasts yet

these can be of importance to the company advertising.

Several large firms sell many of their products to the

small-town customers and your monitoring service can tell

them if they are reaching people in your area.

The longer you work in this service, the more

successful you'll be. As time goes on, obtain client

referral letters and testimonials from your existing

customers. This will come in handy when you begin pursuing

the larger companies who advertise in every state and who

are more likely to pay fees to a monitoring service to be

sure they are getting the most for their money.

Companies can spend a large portion of their

marketing budget on advertising. Your service is designed

to advise them if they are getting the bang for their buck!

NATIONAL MANUFACTURERS AND OPPORTUNITIES

O.K. Now you're into commercials! It's time to

expand this watching television business of yours!

All of the products you see advertised had some

planning and objectives behind them, whether the company be

large or small. Some of the companies may have started

small and, through a clever advertising route, expanded

their products and services dramatically.

You can now expand your ability to assist companies

with their advertising because you've been tracking what

works and what doesn't on your television set. You must

adjust your sights somewhat to the beginning process of

marketing a product. You've watched some of the end result

on TV, but these products find a market through the visual

medium by purposeful design.

Your job under this portion of your at-home business

is to identify potentially good company ideas for products

and demonstrate how a good television ad can help them

realize sales they previously would not have believed

possible.

Start with the companies you are monitoring

advertising for and expand from there. For your current

customers, ask them about new products in the developmental

stages. Since your customers are already doing television

advertising, you won't have to convince them of the

benefits of pursuing this media outlet for sales results.

You might wish to read and study a few books about

television advertising in preparation for this phase of

your business. Get familiar with all of the quirks of this

business.

However, your best learning tool is to watch

advertisements that you know are successful. Why? Try and

determine if they've hit on a formula for success. Compare

successful ad campaigns and look for a unifying theme--

audience, message, comedy, visual, talky, what? What makes

these campaigns successful and others--who have perfectly

good products to sell--not?

Not all of this will have a logical answer. People

often buy on emotional impulse, not practical reasoning,

and this sometimes defies answers. Who would have pre---

dicted the success of Mutant Ninja Turtles?

It may be a friend who has come up with a great

product or a small business with little or no capital for

an advertising budget. Should this discourage you?

Absolutely not!

In almost any media today, space trading is

commonplace. Hotels trade rooms for advertising time.

Retail stores may give gift certificates to a station in

exchange for run-ning a couple of ads. It happens all the

time.

If you have found a product that could be the next

big fad, you can very likely trade advertising time for a

couple of these products gratis to station executives.

What you should do is call the local stations and ask about

their trading policy. Find out the specifics. Then, when

you're approaching companies about helping to promote their

products on TV, you'll know what you can and can't do based

on the company's budget.

Tradeouts aren't going to put you ahead of the game.

You'll trade out more product than you'll receive

advertising time in return. But that's a small price to

pay if the product needs exposure and your company's budget

is limited. It's not completely unfair . TV stations know

that you have a wholesale price for the product and that's

likely to be closer to the value of advertising time you

receive in return.

Stations know if ;the product does well, you'll be

advertising your future business there. And why not? The

station was willing to try the product and take it in

exchange for ad time. They should receive your future

business. You also start to build up relationships with

client stations. This will be very important in your

future business efforts.

Now, how will you get paid in all of this? You've

identified the product, contacted the station, made the

trade deal. So the station is going to get some needed

advertising to get the work out about the product. What

about you?

Depending on the size of the business you're doing

this work for, you may want to get in on the ground floor

of potential profits. If it's a friend, you can help form

the company and be a partner in it. If it's a small

business, you should consider working out a percentage of

sales profits deal. If the product does well, under either

scenario, your potential payday is incredible.

Look at the two individuals who put together "Trivial

Pursuit". That involved coming up with some challenging

trivia questions. Production costs were very low., But it

caught on big with the general public and a small fortune

was earned on that one idea.

The next "Trivial Pursuit" or "Mutant Ninja Turtles"

is out there waiting to happen. You could be on to

something big.

How do you construct a marketing campaign for this

product? This will vary, but the following suggestions

will help you lay the groundwork for what you and your

partner/client wish to accomplish.

First, get some samples of the product and head down

to your local shopping mall and try it out on a few

passers-by. You could go to any area where people are

gathered in a large number to do this. Prepare a

questionnaire and then hand out the sample. Identify it,

if necessary and ask if the person has a few moments to

answer some quick questions. Once done, the product is his

or hers to keep.

What you really want to know is whether the people

knew what the product was, whether they liked it, if they

would buy it, if the price you've established initially is

fair or not, whether they'd buy it as a gift or promotion,

and whether they'd tell friends about it and if so, what

would they say.

This is going to give you a lot of useful

information, especially if you are working with a number of

samples. Try and get different age groups involved, using

more the age group that you've targeted in your mind for

this product. This kind of feedback should be invaluable

in knowing whether you're ready to go and whether the price

you've set is fair and reasonable. In addition, hearing

what people said about the product and how they'd tell

friends about it will help you script a television

advertise-ment. If it's appropriate as a gift and many

indicate they would consider it when shopping for gifts,

that can be another theme for your TV ads, especially

around a specific holiday.

Handle the questionnaire yourself. It will help you

if you get direct feedback. If you're uncomfortable doing

this, it's O.K. to get some help, but try to be there

yourself so you can gauge consumer reaction. There is no

substitute for real-world testing.

You should certainly have a contract between you and

your client at this point. You're starting to put a lot of

time in and there needs to be an ironclad guarantee that if

the product takes off, so will your income in terms of a

share of the profits. Standard contracts can usually be

found at the library or at large office supply retail

outlets and these can be used to spell out your arrangement

between the two of you.

This feedback has given you the basis for a

television and/or radio script, which can now be written

once you and your partner have evaluated the information.

It may require some product modification, but better to

find that out early before too many are made. The script

will be based on what people liked the best about the

product. Emphasize it! Their reactions will likely be no

different than those that will be on the listening end of

your advertisement. Don't worry if you've never written

one before. You've now heard hundreds of them on

television through your monitoring service. The script

will practically write itself.

People buy for hundreds of different reasons and not

all of them will make sense to you. So, don't discard

people's reactions or comments to your product because you

think they're "dumb" or "hokey". Just because you wouldn't

respond to a product that way doesn't mean the rest of

America won't. Keep an open mind.

There are thousands of manufacturers who are

potential clients for you. And, as you'll soon realize,

having a piece of the action by making a percentage of the

profits deal is a fast way to potentially make a fortune in

earnings. Put together a few of these deals and you'll

wonder why you didn't get into business for yourself first.

And this all started because you began watching commercials

on TV!

STARTING YOUR OWN RATING SERVICE

You are probably familiar with the Nielson ratings.

Every major broadcast company prepares for the "sweeps",

that time of year when the Nielson watchers are glued to

their television sets. It's these watching results which

dictates advertising rates and revenue for the following

period. The more viewed the show, the higher the station

can charge and advertiser to run a commercial.

So many careers hang in the balance as a result of

the Nielson ratings. Shows are kept or canceled as a

result of who's watching, the only measurement of which are

these ratings. The Nielson company only uses about 2,000

homes in the country to monitor their ratings, a small but

apparently statistically valid sample.

This is not much different than the theory behind

Gallup polls and other such surveys taken. Once a certain

number of people are polled, statistically the results are

close to representative for the entire country.

About 90 million households have television sets. If

a Nielson rating of 20 appears next to a program's name,

that means approximately 20% of the nation's households

have tuned into this show, or 18 million homes. This will

dictate the amount a station can charge for revenue, based

on the number of people expected to tune into the show.

Nielsen uses little black boxes that can go on every

set in the house (and VCR, too). Information is recorded

regularly about what you're watching. The homes are also

designated by type with all of your basic census

information like age, gender, income, occupation and the

like being used to identify a composite viewer of a

program. This also helps an advertiser target a particular

show if the people watching are the target audience for the

specific product to be marketed. All of this information

is calculated and published for all to see.

Nielsen chooses the homes to participate by random

and automatically eliminates anyone who wants to volunteer.

Most of the larger metropolitan areas are selected for

these tests and your chances of participating are very low.

You might have better odds of hitting your state lottery!

Since large corporations spend millions each year on

television advertising, it stands to reason they'd like to

be well-informed as to who is viewing particular shows and

at what time of day. They've likely identified a target

audience and would very much like the extra input as to the

specifics about how best to reach that target group through

the television set.

Another major rating service is Arbitron, who does

much the same thing and uses the approximately 2,000

sampling figure that Nielson does, although different

households, of course. They also compile data that is used

to set advertising rates for television.

Ratings research, based on this background

information, is definitely a market that is open to

opportunity. Only 4, 000 homes in the country are being

utilized for this critical research, most of those in large

population centers. What about the small-town buyer? What

about all of the other TV viewers whose program choice goes

un--recorded and remains unknown to the companies trying to

position themselves to market a product?

Local business people would love to identify a target

audience. They don't advertise nationally. They can't

afford to have their product shown on "home Improvement" or

the "Super Bowl". But they're going to advertise and the

more they know about their viewing audience, the more

likely they will select the right combination to maximize

their television advertising dollar.

You don't need to put a black box in 2,000 homes to

handle this assignment. All you need to do is develop a

proper survey and start calling up people to participate in

your local survey. You can identify potential watchers who

would write down their viewing choices every day for two to

three weeks and you've got the opportunity to compile the

data listing more valuable than anything else locally; in

the TV market. You'll have information even that stations

probably won't have.

The first thing to do is construct your survey form.

Here are some of the items you should include:

First, get an overall perspective of the individual

who will do the survey for you.

Data you need is:

-Name, address, phone number;

-Number of people in household with names and ages;

-Occupation and approximate income level for entire

household;

-Number of television sets, VCRs and radios.

The next step is to have your ratings from in which the

members of the household record their viewing and listening

choices for the next month. Four weeks should give you a

great idea of what this household's radio, TV and VCR

habits are. Every member of the house should record their

choices by day, listing the show and the approximate

viewing time.

Next, they should answer information about their

commercial watching habits, including the ones they recall

the best, the ones they think were terrible and why, the

last three commercials they remember, or, of course,

whether they bother to watch the commercial at all.

Finally have them list their favorite show, least

favorite, favorite commercial and least favorite choice.

You now have enough information to compile your study.

The difficult part of this will be getting enough

individuals to cooperate and ac-curately do the study. But

your circle of people and your friends' circle and your

family's circle can all start to add up. Ask the people

you personally do business with to help participate.

Canvass your area well and you will find 100 or so people

to do the survey. Set up a database on your computer or

compile the statistics by hand (obviously a much slower

process). You should have a viewing pattern which will be

valuable information for many people.

Now, it's these people you need to contact to buy

your survey results. Do a flyer that indicates the basis

for the study and the type of results that were achieved.

You can price your report for $40-75, depending on your

area. Many businesses and every television and radio

station should be interested. If you picked up 30 clients

at $40 each, that's $1,200/month just to compile ratings

surveys. That's probably a con-servative estimate as to

the number of clients you should obtain with this data.

Continue to update your viewers and maybe pay them

$5-10 per month once you start to get this rolling. Their

input is what makes this monthly survey form valuable. You

will have to arrange to collect the surveys, probably using

a self-addressed, stamped envelope to make it easy for

them. Since you will know some of the people, you can make

other arrangements.

While prime time hours (8:00 P.M. to 11:00 P.M.) Are

the shows national companies will be interested most in,

the other times are less expensive for advertisers and more

open to local businesses. They will be interested in who's

watching what at ten in the morning and four in the

afternoon rather than strictly prime time news, so all of

your data is significant.

This is an easy and quick way to make a lot of money

watching television. You can then use this information and

your expert advice as an advertising monitor to assist

companies with their ad campaigns centered on the time

slots most favorable to their products.

FINDING CLIENTS FOR VIDEO PRODUCTION GROUPS

One way to use the information you've already

obtained is by referring businesses to video production

companies to film the advertisements. Many video

production groups need the business and appreciate the

referral and will pay a percentage of the filming fee to

you for bringing the business their way.

Many video companies do not have a staff salesperson

and thus your ability to bring them clients is a needed

plus. In addition, they don't have to pay you anything

unless you bring a client and they avoid paying all the

employee benefits costs such as FICA, unemployment taxes,

workers' compensation premium and similar expenditures.

You're a bargain at the price.

Some of the companies you work with may have a need

for video production to satisfy needs other than just

advertising such as training tapes or new product tapes for

salespeople. These are almost like infomercials describing

the product and how the management team thinks it should be

sold. Sales people find these tapes to be of tremendous

benefit in planning their own sales campaign.

Again, you can work out a fee arrangement with the

video production group. All you're doing is maximizing the

potential media dollar value of any one client. Even if

you only refer a few businesses, the money adds up

especially in addition to all of the other income sources

you now have coming in.

Check the yellow pages for the video production

companies in your area and contact them. Even if someone

else already has this idea, the production company would

rather have a multiple number of people on the lookout for

new business for them. Make your arrangements in advance

and then start thinking about the clients you could assist

by introducing them to the production companies you decide

to work with. Companies will begin to see you as an all-

purpose individual who can work on virtually every aspect

of their video and radio advertising. That's exactly the

position you want to be in. The more versatile and

knowledgeable you are, the more valuable you are as a

resource for these businesses. And, better yet, you are

your own boss!

CABLE TELEVISION AND YOU

As mentioned earlier, cable television provides you

with numerous more out last than you've ever had to explore

advertising options for your client businesses. A little

more homework is in order here.

Contact the major cable networks (listing to follow)

and find out what their advertising rates and guidelines

are; information you can eventually pass on to the client.

In addition, get the name of the advertising contact person

for yourself.

Then, when you are watching these channels, you can

record the same advertising information you were noting

earlier for your businesses. Now, in addition to reporting

to local businesses, you can offer the information to the

cable channel as well. They may well consider hiring you

to monitor their advertising in your region.

There's no real cost to you. This is information

that you are compiling for busi----nesses anyway. There's

no trouble to have additional logs in which you record the

information about their advertising record. Not every

cable channel will play, buy a few may buy into the

advertising program you're doing along with the monthly

ratings report for your area. You won't know unless you

ask!

You have enough information to get yourself started.

The following listings will give you the contacts at the

major stations you will need for part of your start-up.

Good luck and good watching!

LISTINGS

NETWORKS:

ABC

77 W. 66th Street

New York, NY 10023

(212) 456-7777

CBS

51 West 52nd Street

New York, NY 10019

(212) 975-5633

NBC

30 Rockefeller Plaza

New York, NY 10112

(212) 664-4444

FOX

PO Box 900

Beverly Hills, CA 90213

(310) 277-2211

CABLE CHANNELS

American Movie Classics

100 Crossway Park West

Woodbury, NY 11797

(516) 365-2222

Arts & Entertainment

235 E 45th Street

New York, NY 10017

(212) 661-4500

Black Entertainment Television

1232 31st Street, NW

Washington, DC 20007

(202) 636-2400

CNBC

220 Fletcher Avenue

Fort Lee, NJ 07024

(201) 585-2622

CNN (Cable News)

Turner Broadcasting

1 CNN Center

Box 105336

Atlanta, GA 30348

(404) 827-1700

Comedy Central

1775 Broadway

New York, NY 10019

(212) 767-8600

The Discovery Channel

7700 Wisconsin Avenue

Bethesda, MD 20814

(301) 986-1999

ESPN

ESPN Plaza

935 Middle Street

Bristol, CT 06010

(203) 585-2000

The Family Channel

P.O. Box 64549

Virginia Beach, VA 23467

(804) 523-7301

The Learning Channel

770 Wisconsin Avenue

Bethesda, MD 20814

(301) 986-1999

Lifetime Channel

309 W. 49th Street

New York, NY 10019

(212) 424-7000

MTV

1515 Broadway

New York, NY 10036

(212) 258-8000

Nashville Network

2806 Opryland Drive

Nashville, TN 37214

(615) 883-7000

Nickleodeon

1000 Universal Studio Plaza

Orlando, FL 32819

(407) 827-1700

TBS

1050 Techwood Avenue NW

Box 105264

Atlanta, GA 30318

(404) 423-5200

TNT

One CNN Center

Box 105366

Atlanta, GA 30348

(404) 827-1700

USA Network

1230 Avenue of the Americas

New York, NY 10020

(212) 408-9100

VH-1 Video Hits

1515 Broadway

New York, NJ 10036

(212) 258-8000