Has this ever happened before?

I have never seen a web hosting provider advertising their services on TV.
Could it be to do with the huge cost involved?

I think a local cable would worth to test this medium.

Godaddy did, albeit focusing on their domain names. But they are a host, and once you start purchasing something, they start pushing all their services. This surely was taken into account when they went for the SuperBowl.

Not a real TV, but at the time when Vito was producing the WHIR interactive "TV" shows (flash technology), there were quite a few sponsors.

I guess its must be expensive enough...

I think prices start at about £2000 here in he UK

Roughly around that. It depends on what the time slot it's programing schedule.

Tomorrow Night The X Factor 2007 premieres and I'm sure only Big Corporations will be advertising during that slot.

i am sure that the results are good, but it is too much expensive

You'll definitely need a large budget, placing one ad wont be enough to test conversions, it did well for Godaddy but they spent lots of $$$$

I don't remember the name of the site but their charges are quite affordable, something around $500 for tv ad.

There are too many factors here to give any general advice.

It depends on where you are located at and if cheap local TV space is available, it depends on how well you are cemented in your local community (to pitch sharing the cost with other business that compliment and not compete with your own), how creative and resourceful you are at actually producing the commercial, the quality of the product you offer once your impressions actually navigate to your site, how effective your campaign is designed, etc.

It is certainly feasible, but it is just like anything.

Effort = success.

The only way I would consider TV advertising (if on a limited budget - as opposed to GoDaddy) is to develop a campaign wherein you attack your local market with ads on local cable channels. Or another good one (believe it or not) is the TV Guide channel. Not sure if everyone has this channel, but in this part of the world, we have a permanent channel 24/7 that just shows TV listings, and along side the listings they run commercials in part of the screen (usually half screen). The rates aren't half bad. I know of several advertisers who have been there for years, so it must work. Rates are in the hundreds as opposed to the thousands. And they also help you put your ad together.

One tip. If you do explore the TV listings channel, try to negotiate the placement of your ad. For instance, you might sign up for 24 spots per day. They will normally be randomly placed in terms of time of day. However, if you can, try to negotiate being displayed a few minutes before the top of the hour. Think about it. There are many people who go to the channel a few minutes before the top of the hour to see what is coming up next. IMO, top exposure is if you negotiate display times such as 1:58, 2:58, 3:58, etc.

Vito

Vito, as always that great mind of yours is at work. Unfortunately not all markets have that TV listings channel.

Actually, I am reading a really interesting book called E-Leader and they bring up examples of dot-coms that spend their advertising dollars on TV in hopes of building an e-powerbrand. The commentary is that traditional advertising like that doesn't work as well as out of the box marketing. The author provides numerous examples and interviews that paint a picture that it is more effective and represents a fraction of the cost cmpared to TV/radio ads. One of my favorite examples was one company hired an actor dressed as a limo driver to stay in major American airports with the sign "Client X for Bill Gates". That attracted a lot of business people coming off those places were curious to know what company does that it would attract the attention of Microsoft.

TV ads are abit pricey these days.
I also saw Godaddy's ad on TV the other day.

I often wondered the same "why are there no webhost ads on TV"
My opinion is that it is better to get the word out there by online means or word of mouth other than the TV.

As we are targeting a certain group of people.
Afterall we are offering our client's an online presence.

many none computer savvy people watch TV.
It makes sense that GoDaddy.com would only advertise their domain name services (as this is pretty easy to get a good understanding on what their offering).

This is only my opinion.

I've seen Godaddy's advertisement once. I don't think I've seen any other on tv at all. I guess it would be something to try locally. The main reason someone might not try it, is due to the audience.

I mean.. how many people watching it, will honestly buy hosting? Unless every household had a website, it's not going to help much. Where as, if you sell a HOME product eg. vaccum, it will sell better, because almost ANY audience, would require a vaccum.