It’s the first question everyone asks, and the honest answer is that there are two separate bills.
Production is making the ad: script, shoot, edit, voiceover, music, Clearcast clearance and delivery to the stations. You pay it once.
Airtime is the media: the slots your ad runs in. You pay it every time the ad goes out, and it’s usually the bigger number.
Get both into your head at the same time. A beautiful ad with no money left to air it is a very expensive showreel.
What a TV ad costs to make
Most of the TV ads we make land somewhere between £15,000 and £45,000+VAT. Some come in under that, a few go well over.
What moves the price:
- Where the footage comes from. An ad built from your own footage and stills, with a new voiceover, music and end frame, is the cheapest route. We call it a library ad. A full shoot with crew, locations and actors costs more.
- People on screen. Actors are paid a fee plus usage, and usage depends on where and how long the ad runs. A known presenter costs more again, but can be worth every penny (more on that in our piece on brand ambassadors).
- How many versions you need. A 30” master, 15” and 10” cutdowns, social versions in square and vertical, subtitled and textless copies. Planning these from day one is cheap. Going back to set for them later is not.
- Animation and effects. Motion graphics are usually reasonable. Full 3D or heavy VFX adds up.
What shouldn’t move the price much is clearance and delivery. Every ad goes through the same Clearcast and technical checks, whoever makes it.
What airtime costs
Airtime is sold on how many of your target audience see the ad, not by the minute. The price shifts with the channel, the region, the time of day, the time of year and how far ahead you book.
A few things worth knowing:
- You don’t have to buy national. Regional ITV and Channel 4 airtime lets you test on one part of the country first. CI Group’s first campaign ran on Channel 4 South and returned £5 for every £1 of airtime in its first five weeks. They scaled up from there.
- Addressable TV lets you go smaller still. Sky AdSmart and the broadcasters’ streaming services can target by postcode and household type. Good for local and niche businesses.
- January to March is cheaper than Q4. Christmas airtime is the most expensive of the year, because everyone wants it.
A good media buyer is worth their fee here. They’ll know what your money buys right now, and they’ll often get better rates than you can on your own.
So what budget do I need?
If you’re testing TV for the first time, plan a production budget you’re comfortable with and enough airtime to run for at least four to six weeks in one region. That’s long enough to see whether the phone rings.
If you want a ballpark for your own idea, send us what you want the ad to do and where it’ll run. We’ll come back with two or three budget levels, from a full shoot down to something built from footage you already have.