Unpaid commercial endorsements.

[mangeorge]

This is posed as a question, but I think I'm more skeptical than anything else.
Every once in a while I see a commercial where a customer/client of a business expounds on how great that company is. Then the small print at the bottom of the screen says that the person in the ad is not compensated.
Why? Why would someone appear in a commercial for free? I wouldn't.
I'd want my fifteen minutes and some cash.
Well, maybe for the Salvation Army. But no one else.
Peace,
mangeorge

[Hazle Weatherfield]

Maybe they are compensated with that company's free goods or services that they usually pay for?

[Sanders]

If the customer/client is a business, the exposure is free advertising.

If it's an individual, maybe they're just really grateful?

[Napier]

People express opinions often enough - just look at In My Humble Opinion, next door. Why not express them about a product or service? If it's a positive opinion, understandably, the provider may want to put it on the air.

I just finished "A Thousand Splendid Suns", and it was an incredible novel. My Scion station wagon is convenient, comfortable, reliable, and inexpensive. I really like the Panasonic Lumix camera I bought last summer. Many of the land surveying products from CST-Berger, like the lath bag I received yesterday, are inexpensive and perfectly serviceable. It would please me to recommend any of these excellent products, without compensation, just because I'm human!

[mangeorge]

I do express my opinions about products I buy. For instance, I'm very happy with my Honda Ridgeline and my (original) iPhone, and I tell anyone who asks. I also write reviews and opinions where convenient. But if I were to make a commercial for the company, especially where everyone else is being paid, I'd want my piece of the pie. Because I too am human.
I'm not overly grateful to a company for providing what I pay for. I am grateful for people giving reviews and opinions outside the company's influence.
Let's just say I appreciate the quality of the product or service I pay for.