How to Sell a Reality Show Idea

If you have caught yourself watching some dumb reality show and exclaiming in frustration," I could think of a better idea than that!" The fact is you probably can. If you think you can't get your reality show on TV because you don't have a lot of show business buddies waiting for your next brilliant idea, then you are wrong.

It is hard to become a screenplay writer in Hollywood. Writing screenplays is an art and takes decades of work to be able to get produced as a screenplay writer. If you can't put that type of time into your reality show you need to become a producer.

Producers usually fund the creation of movies. Small and independent movies are produced by producers trying making a name for them and requiring a lot of capital to get things moving. There is another type of Hollywood producer, known as a creative producer. This person's job is to come up with a good idea for a movie and selling it to a more established producer. Being a creative producer allows you to sell your good ideas without taking the gigantic capital risk and without.

A reality show is made up of a set of situations designed to produce dramatic situations in real people. In other words, your reality show must be designed to create watchable television. It doesn't matter how dumb or immature your reality television idea is, if it will drive television watchers to sit in front of their tubes for one half an hour every week, then you have a good chance to sell a reality show idea.

It seems reality shows take one of two formats. The propped up game show or the documentary-esque type show. For example, The Biggest Loser, a reality television show where people compete to lose the most weight. On the more documentary side of the reality show could be considered MTV's popular Real Life, where people are being filmed going about their lives in a giant party house. As you can see the game show type of reality show involves a highly engineered set of situations compared to the documentary-esque style of reality show.

To be able to sell your reality show, produce a coherent schematic of how the show will work and make it into a presentation. The next step is to find organizations that find and buy reality shows (here is a hint: look just after the credits on some reality shows). To get your foot into the door don't be afraid to just call these companies up and tell them your"elevator pitch" to sell your reality show.

Kevin Downey, http://www.broadcastingcable.com/article/97248-Here_s_How_To_Sell_a_Reality_Show.php , Broadcasting & Cable