Depending on the network that you choose to broadcast on and the time slot, this can be (somewhat) affordable or staggeringly, frighteningly expensive, but it's the only guaranteed method to getting on television; you buy your spot, and you provide the content to fill it, as long as it meets the television network's broadcast standards. If Mad Max and his mattresses can afford a little TV time, odds are you can, too, with a little scrimping and saving. The three standard approaches to this would be to:
1. Buy several ad spots of a length that will fit the run time of your animation;
2. Buy "paid programming" time on a broadcast network--you know what I'm talking about; we've all seen the Oxyclean shows on at three in the morning, or the fifty different varieties of Amazing Ginsu Knife; or,
3. Buy time on a local cable access channel.
These are the conventional methods for getting your programming on tv; the ad spots have the most chance of being seen repeatedly and impressed on the viewer's memory, but are also the most expensive (can you imagine the cost of running a commercial during American Idol?) with the shortest run-time. The paid programming option will have a middling price-tag and about the same likelihood of being seen; paid programming is generally shown very late at night or during weekend afternoon spots when fewer people are likely to be watching TV, but because it's on a broadcast network it's likely to reach more subscribers than the last and cheapest option, the local cable access channel. Local cable access will only reach cable subscribers in an area serviced by that particular channel, and odds are all but a small few skip right past it when they're channel-surfing, unless that brief two-second flash before the next channel catches their eye.
So you see, it's not an easy road to take. Everyone wants to be on TV, but very few make it; it's a long, hard trip, and one that can cost a lot of time, effort, money, and even heartbreak as you face rejection after rejection. But in many cases persistence does pay off, and if you're really determined, you might see yourself getting the results you wanted.
