However, with the new channels coming in, on the screens, it has become hard for the media planners to decide about the right channel and right amount of budget to be spent on each channel for a campaign.

People’s meter which is at least providing  viewership data on the basis of its sample size,(let’s not discuss the sample size ) .It is being extensively used by the corporate clients ,multinationals  and structured local companies of Pakistan .Media Logic is the only company which is providing viewership trends in the form of numbers to the clients , advertising agencies and all other companies with stakes in media , may have access to the reports ,generated from people’s meter.

Those reports ,if do not give a clear mathematical  idea , at least it tells you about the trends of the people’s choice , what they have liked watching most and which program is becoming popular and which genre is getting maximum eyeballs at some point of time .

Pakistan as it is not considered a rich country from international perspectives and as per world economic indicators, GDP and other parameters consider Pakistan a growing but not flourishing economy. The main reason is the system of taxes, which is not working at all but people are not willing, neither accustomed to the payment of taxes. Majority of the population that may belong to any profession thinks that their taxes are not important to the welfare of the state. They also think that why they should pay taxes and many doesn’t even bother to think about it at all.

Still with this level of ignorance about taxes, if you go deep into the life of Pakistani, there could be variation in life style and there are huge gaps between the upper and lower classes but it will be hard for you to see an extreme poverty. There are reasons about this hypothesis, which we may discuss in some other article, however, briefly it can be stated that that Pakistan is one of the biggest philanthropist state in the world, culturally and religiously.

This paradoxical state of affairs makes people rich and Government poor and eventually it makes Pakistan a country which is considered an ideal market for FMCG’S and people specially in metropolitans are enjoying a reasonable buying power , even we can compare it with some countries of Europe as well . However any statistics about this analysis shall not be readily available.

The cost of advertising on TV channels in comparison with other countries is much lower   , a 30 seconds spot during a highly viewed program on a News channel with only cost 700 to 1700 USD.  According to market surveys regarding potential buyers, it may show a wide variety of audience, that maybe tuned to program “A” at one point of time. But if the option of filtering the right kind of buyer verses the product of their choice (product that is being advertised), the results will be very optimistic for Advertisers on TV.

Author: Maqbool Mirza -about author www.maqboolmirza.com