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With the ever growing expansion of broadband as well as the success of video streaming websites like youtube.com, it is tempting to believe that your business's advertising dollars be focused on internet ads rather than the old fashion TV ad. However, it was reported by Jerry Cobb of CNBC that "TV remained the primary place most consumers are willing to sit through an ad." But what does this mean? In a nutshell, advertising on television may still and may very well always be the most effective way for a video ad or commercial to be viewed.

According to the National Cable and Telecommunications Association (NCTA), as of December 2006 there are approximately 111.6 million television households. This translates into a tremendous opportunity for any size business to promote its brand, product, or service to such a large audience. But the very thought of advertising on television would be enough to deter any business because of the preconception of the high costs that may be involved. This may be true when it comes to broadcasting a commercial on a national scale or even to a large region such as the entire southern California area. However, a tremendous alternative exists that may be even more cost effective, affordable and less risky: local cable advertising.

Out of those 111.6 million households, 65.5 million of them are basic cable subscribers. Obviously, this is still a very great opportunity. And what local cable advertising allows businesses to do is target their audience more efficiently at much less the cost. Rather than delivering a commercial solely based on a specific program or programs, businesses can instead choose its audiences based on specific channels. For example, ESPN, MTV, Fox News, Home and Garden, and TNT each have particular audiences making it easier to target specific demographics. Let's say you owned a pizza place that also served beer and broadcasted sporting events on a big screen television. Most likely you would choose to advertise on ESPN regardless of the actual program since most likely it will still be the demographic you are choosing to market to.

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Another advantage is that cable TV allows you to advertise your business only to areas in which your potential clientele will come from. For example, let's say there is a local tutoring center. Most likely the people that would be interested in patronizing that business would be those that lived within a 3 mile radius. Through cable TV, one can specify exactly which areas they wish the commercial to air. As a result, the costs are lowered while at the same time you are only reaching your targeted audience who live in the surrounding area.

Earlier it was mentioned that one can advertise based on channels. But this does not prevent one from creating their television campaign based on specific programs. One can determine that several shows on different cable channels have certain viewers that fit their targeted demographic. For example, let's say there is a small hair salon that caters to both male and females. One specific channel may not be appropriate for them to air their commercial on. However, it may be appropriate to air the ad during reruns of Blind Date on Spike TV and the show What Not to Wear on TLC.

One of the important concepts of TV advertising is frequency. The more the audience sees the commercial the more likely they are to remember the business or product. And because the cost of running a commercial on local Cable TV ranges only from $8 to several hundreds of dollars depending on the time and television show. While for a nationally broadcasted commercial, it may cost thousands of dollars just to air the commercial one time. This will allow a business to spend more on re-airing the commercial. This increased frequency will of course lead to a chance that the desired targeted audience will be exposed to the ad.

But like any project or campaign there are risks involved. For one, there is still the cost necessary to produce the actual commercial. If this is not done carefully, the ad may achieve zero or even negative results no matter how many times it is aired on local cable TV. Therefore, it is especially important that the ad truly establishes the correct image and brand of the product or service that is trying to be marketed. At the same time, one should strive to keep their production costs down but not at the expense of lessening the quality, creativity, and effectiveness of the ad. This is when research, planning, cost analysis, storyboarding, and pre-production each play essential roles toward the success of conveying your message in your ad.

The other risk is what if no positive results are achieved after running the ad. In order to mitigate unnecessary spending on an advertising campaign that is not working, cable gives the business the ability to evaluate their advertising effectiveness over a short period of time. For example, one could run an ad for a week during MTV's daily weekday show, TRL, for $25 each show. That would come out to $125 for the week. After that week has been completed, the business could then evaluate the resulting traffic and sales to determine whether it is worth continuing the campaign. Or, perhaps this may just suggest airing the ad towards a different demographic. Either way, cable advertising allows a business to adapt and modify their campaign before having to commit a large amount of money to something that is progressing ineffectively.

But if done correctly, advertising on cable TV can lead to very successful outcomes for small, medium, and large businesses. By allowing business to pinpoint specific demographics and locations, it help lowers the risk of ineffectiveness of the advertising campaign. As long as the business does its due diligence in research and planning then the more they are likely to achieve success resulting in increased traffic and most importantly revenue.

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