Audience coordination, an industry in itself

Famous American movie and theater actor Jimmy Stewart once said, "Never treat your audience as customers, always as partners." Whenever you see a show whether entertainment or news, one common factor amongst them is the audience sitting there. Now the most common question while watching them is where do they get the audience from.

Everyday we see audience clapping on some dance and talent hunt shows and nodding approvingly during a current affairs programme. The person who arranges audience for the show is termed as audience or guest coordinator in the media field. They are mainly responsible for bringing the crowd for the show based on their requirement.

Vaibhav Bairagi, who has been in field for the past few years, says that arranging audience in Delhi is not that difficult because Delhi mainly hosts news and current affairs shows. “For news channel's audience we mainly arrange the audience from colleges or schools, because they get agree very easily as it gives them the feeling of coming on a TV show,” said Bairagi who works with News Express as Senior Executive Guest Editor. And What if they are not available, “Then we turn towards friends and family,” added Bairagi.

For Shalini Guliyani who works as a guest coordinator in Focus TV, the task of calling audiences is a very tedious process. “You have to call everybody and then you have to make arrangements as well for their pick up and drop off. It is difficult with students because they come on our word and are our responsibility. So we have to be very careful with them,” said Guliyani.

On being questioned whether they pay the audience to come on the show, Jeswin Thomas who used to work with NDTV on the same profile said that they never had to pay somebody for coming on the show. “Audience requirement in Delhi is comparatively less than in Mumbai because entertainment shows are not based in Delhi and so we mainly depend on mass communication students or coaching institutes for the audience co-ordination,” said Thomas, who now works with a PR firm.

On the other hand, for Mumbai based Manish Sinha who has his own agency for this purpose said that Mumbai has an entire industry based on this very point. “Everyday some or the other show is being shot in every studio and so the demand is always high. Sometimes the demand is so high that the same audience who were there in Indian Idol can be seen in Comedy Circus as well,” said Sinha.

When asked about the payment structure, he told that it depends on the production house. If there is a reputed production house the payment can go upto Rs.200 and if it's a mediocre one then it will be Rs. 50 to Rs.100. What attracts people to get ready for playing the part of audience. “The glamour, money and the temptation to watch the stars attracts the audience the most. We mainly choose college students who agree readily for earning some extra money,” added Sinha.

Looking at the way how the whole industry is based on audience, one can feel that how important is the role of an audience in any show.