Dragons’ Den : Enacting persuasion in reality television

This article aims to cast more light on how persuasive practices in business are enacted for an audience on television by comparing two versions of the television programme Dragons’ Den. The main objective is to examine different interactional features of the programme within a cross-cultural analysis. Drawing on data from the Spanish and UK versions of the programme, the present paper is placed at the intersection between routine and cross-cultural business practices on the one hand and reality based broadcast on the other. The results show that the analysis of the key structural patterns in exerting interpersonal influence makes it possible to measure the impact and effectiveness of specific social influence tactics in entrepreneurial discourse.