Chapter 337 The Black Industry Chain of Ratings

"Ratings deposit?"

Meng Bai looked at the documents in his hand and asked in confusion: "What does it mean? If the ratings do not meet the standard and the film purchase fee is not enough, will an additional deposit be deducted?"

The life of a TV station is the ratings, because it is directly related to the advertising fees of advertisers. Therefore, whether it is a film or a TV series or various programs, the TV station will set a benchmark rating when purchasing films.

Taking "Peace Hotel" as an example, the TV station gave a purchase price of 1.8 million per episode, and the total price of 40 episodes is 72 million.

The TV station will sign a "stage payment agreement" with Arc Light, and pay 40% of the down payment after signing the contract. The remaining money will be paid in part every month, generally around 5%, and it will take about a year to pay off.

At the same time, the TV station will also require Arc Light to guarantee that the ratings of the drama "Peace Hotel" will be at least 1.0. For every 0.1 lower, the average price of 100,000 to 150,000 episodes will be deducted.

If the ratings drop too much during the broadcast, for example, below 0.5, the entire show will be immediately removed from the shelves, and it will be difficult to get the subsequent payment.

In a sense, it is actually a bit like a "betting agreement".

So far, there is nothing unreasonable. After all, the TV station took the risk and spent a lot of money to buy the project, so it is natural to have requirements for the quality of the series. And the quality is still determined by the ratings.

But now the so-called "ratings deposit" is a bit outrageous.

The TV station's film purchasing department explained to the outside world that in order to "avoid poor ratings", it is necessary to purchase "ratings operation services" from a third-party company with "professional qualifications".

"In short, the TV station requires the producer to spend money to buy ratings." Liu Jun said bluntly: "They said that as long as we pay the money, we can not only guarantee that the ratings data is fine, but also arrange for it to be broadcast as soon as possible."

"How much?"

"500,000 per episode, which can be paid in installments per day, but it cannot be overdue."

"Fuck!"

Meng Bai was directly laughed out of anger.

Good fellow, he took away nearly 30% of the profit with just one opening. Moreover, the money that the TV station gave him was paid in monthly installments, but he had to pay it on a daily basis.

Arclight could get about 28 million yuan for the first payment, and this damn "security deposit" would be 20 million yuan. Add to that the required publicity and promotion expenses, and he had to pay for it first.

"Which satellite TV station asked for this?"

Liu Jun shook his head: "Not just one, but all satellite TV stations are like this, it's just a matter of the amount. The price of 500,000 yuan is from Mango TV. The director of their film purchasing department said that they gave us a discount because Arclight and Mango TV have a cooperation."

"Ha, then I have to thank them, right?" Meng Bai said with a gloomy face.

Liu Jun understood it. In fact, when he first heard this request, he felt the same as Meng Bai now, and they both felt it was ridiculous.

Speaking of "black transactions" like this, there are also video websites. After all, there are no white lotuses in the capital market, but most of them are done secretly, not like TV stations, which are so open and aboveboard.

More importantly, the producer has to pay this money. Since the TV station can guarantee the increase of ratings, it can naturally reduce the ratings in turn.

The current TV ratings statistics system still uses the city network statistics system of Sofres, which is the CSM52 city ratings that often appear in film and television reports.

They will determine the sampling frame based on the market size and audience characteristics, and then select a certain number of sample households from it according to the principle of random sampling to form a fixed sample group for the ratings survey, and then infer the overall ratings data.

This is a relatively traditional sampling survey method, which has been used in the film and television markets of many countries in the world as early as the last century. The advantage is that it is convenient and fast, but the disadvantage is that it is very easy to suffer from "sample contamination".

This "contamination" behavior can also be divided into offline and online.

Offline means are relatively traditional, either to carry out concentrated publicity in the area of ​​the sample households, through advertising space, display boards, etc., to change the viewing habits of the sample households; or simply to buy off the sample households directly, constantly lobbying, giving money and gifts, and let them lie about the data.

Of course, these methods are more in the past when technical means were not developed and manpower was the main force. With the beginning of the digital reform of television signals, every household has used a set-top box, which can directly transmit data to the background, and gradually there is less need for offline manual statistics.

So these "black industry" beneficiaries gradually moved online, using hacker technology to pollute the data received by Sofres background through eavesdropping, interception or direct tampering, and then pollute the samples.

Both methods are effective means, and there have been "victims" before.

At the end of 2016, Zhejiang Satellite TV had a costume drama called "Beauty's Private Kitchen". The lead actors were Ma Tianyu and Shuangzi, who were very popular at the time, and the subject matter was also the most popular ancient idol

drama in recent years. It can be said that no matter how bad it is, it can at least get a score of 0.7 to 0.8. However, when the show was actually broadcast, the ratings were shocking. The first broadcast had a rating of 0.2, and it dropped to 0.1 on the second day. After a few days of broadcasting, it was directly cut off by Zhejiang Satellite TV.

The crew directly pointed out the situation and posted a Weibo to denounce Zhejiang Satellite TV. Then a stone stirred up a thousand waves, and many production companies expressed their support. Even the TV Drama Production Industry Association held a special press conference, stating that it would "resolutely crack down on the black forces of ratings fraud" and declare war on the black industry chain of TV drama ratings fraud.

How to say it, the voice is quite loud, but in the end there is no practical result.

From the current experience of Arc Light, it can be seen that the TV station has not changed at all, and still maintains this black industry chain, and it has become more mature.

In addition to tampering with the ratings so that the producers cannot get the final payment, the TV station has another method, which is to postpone the schedule. Anyway, if the producers ask, then they are

waiting in line. Some dramas are shelved for three to five years. By the time they are broadcast, the subject matter and plot are outdated. The greater probability is that the producers have gone bankrupt and disappeared.

Fortunately, video websites have emerged in recent years, and there is an additional channel for online broadcasting, which has curbed the suppression of some TV stations.

Otherwise, the means of Internet capital are just for fun. If you really want to talk about "fancy tricks", it has to be the big guys in these traditional fields.

Meng Bai tapped the table lightly: "Brother Jun, what do you think about this?"

Liu Jun frowned and said: "If you ask me, we are new to the TV series after all. Whether these rules are reasonable or not, they are not something we can change. As long as the total revenue can make money, we will pay it, just like feeding the dog."

Meng Bai smiled, the word "feeding the dog" is really apt. But there is nothing wrong with feeding the dog by yourself, but being forced to feed the dog is really unpleasant.

After thinking for a while, he looked at Liu Jun and said, "Wait for the TV station for a while, and I will ask someone for the specific inside story."

Among the companies that Arclight Film and Television is friendly with, many are mainly engaged in TV dramas, such as Huace Film and Television, Noon Sunshine, and Guo Jingyu's Changxin Film and Television.

Meng Bai plans to find out the situation first, and then decide what to do next.

At worst, he will just switch to online broadcasting in the end. Anyway, he always feels that it is a loss to use this money to "feed the dog".

(End of this chapter)