DRTV is Key to Advertising Success
Historically, when economic times get tough, some of the first expenses that get cut by traditional marketers are marketing and advertising budgets. Why do traditional marketers cut advertising budgets during these times? Because, with traditional advertising strategies of reach and frequency, they are unable to measure the effectiveness of their campaigns, and their return on investment of the millions of unaccountable advertising dollars spent. Now, more than ever, is a great time to utilize direct response advertising as part of your marketing mix.
Direct Response Offers Reduced Risks
With DRTV advertising, the only risks are the costs associated with the production and media test of your infomercial and/or spot campaign, and because DRTV advertising is measurable, you will immediately learn whether or not your marketing effort is succeeding.
Reduced Media Cost
One of the benefits of a slowing economy is a lower media rate. The law of supply-and-demand tells us that when an economy is expanding, as it has during the past several years, television networks seem to continuously raise media rates. Thanks to tireless negotiations by industry media buyers, DRTV media rates are now lower than they have been in years.
Accountability
Now that advertising expenditures are being evaluated more critically than ever, having the ability to accurately measure the return on investment (ROI) is crucially important. With direct response radio & television advertising, every media buy is evaluated independently to determine its cost per order (CPO) or cost per lead (CPL). The marketer can immediately determine if the advertising is satisfactorily meeting goals and objectives.
Consumers Pushing Brand Marketers to DRTV
For many years, most traditional marketers looked down their noses at the direct response TV industry. DRTV was seen as limited in effectiveness to just a small segment of the American population. However, a number of recent surveys are showing that a far greater portion of the American television audience is responding to DRTV advertising than once believed. And, at the same time, a number of traditional marketers are setting aside some of their advertising dollars to test the effectiveness of the DR space.
Traditional advertisers have also knocked DRTV as an advertising outlet that has no brand-building capability. However, research also shows that more than half of customers who purchased a product advertised via DRTV actually bought that product from a retail outlet rather than through the number in the ad. Our industry clearly has become as an effective way to build a brand and push products into retail.
