Advertisers make a beeline for Indian Idol 4

Riding on the success of Indian Idol 3, advertisers are queuing up for the fourth season of the show. Sony Entertainment Television, which will air Indian Idol 4 starting September 19 has sold over 85 per cent of the advertising inventory.

The channel has almost doubled the number of sponsors this time, from six in Indian Idol 3 to 10 now. Nestle, Bajaj Allianz, LG, Sony India, Parle Agro, Procter & Gamble, Airtel, ITC, Tata Sky and Tata Motors have come on board as sponsors for the show.

According to sources, each of them has paid around Rs 4 crore (Rs 40 million). This apart, the remaining 10-second slots are expected to be sold for around Rs 200,000. The 10-second slots for the previous season was sold for nearly Rs 175,000.

Rohit Gupta, president (licensing & telephony), SET India, confirmed the development.

"Indian Idol 4 is almost sold out. Advertisers have shown keen interest after the hype created by the finals of India Idol 3. Being the festival season, brands tend to spend on high impact properties," he said.

Each sponsor will get 60 seconds per episode.

The channel expects to earn around Rs 50 crore (Rs 500 million) from the show, which is nearly twice of what it earned last year (Rs 26 crore). During Indian Idol 3, the six sponsors on air are said to have spent around Rs 3 crore (Rs 30 million) each.

The finals of Indian Idol 3 clocked a television viewership rating of 3.1 and ranked 32 in the top 100 ratings, as per TAM Media Research.

Indian Idol is a popular music talent search show based on the international format Pop Idol in the UK. The Indian edition was first telecast on SET in 2004.