DRTV – It Really Comes Down to the Media

I have run across the same challenge in pretty much every organization I have encountered that advertises on television.   But here is an insight that I have seen rocket companies – most notably Rosetta Stone, who aggressively executed DRTV – to the next level.  The natural belief is that your best chance of success is to air your spot at a place and time when your target audience is sure to be tuned in.  It makes sense, so it’s hard to convince people that there is another way to look at it.  But there is.

The fact is, there are many types of media out there – the most expensive of which is guaranteed on a particular network and time.   Let’s just do the math, comparing two different media buys:

	MEDIA BUY 1	MEDIA BUY 2
NETWORK	CNN	AMC (Remnant)
TIME	Wed 8pm	Sat 11am
DURATION	60 Sec Spot	60 Sec Spot
COST	$7,000	$150
CALLS	100	15
CONVERSION	10%	7%
AVERAGE ORDER	$250	$175
REVENUE	$2,500	$184
ROI	0.36	1.23



As is shown here, a much stronger ROI can be achieved on significantly weaker performance, as long as the media cost is low.  This is not a fictitious example, but a real life case of two specific media buys.  Now, your business might be very different.  You may not have a one step sale, but are instead capturing leads that you hope to convert at a later date.  Or you may have a much higher average order size.  But in the end, the concept holds.  Even though it may be counter-intuitive at first, when you can buy media at a fraction of the cost, it may not matter whether it hits your target demo all the time.  The math of remnant media is very compelling.

The Powerful Relationship Between TV and Search

Search (or Pay-Per-Click) advertising tends to be one of the most efficient advertising channels for companies.  If you have a good product, people are finding you online.  And when they do so by Googling your brand name, they often convert well.  This is because they are already a few steps down the path.

TV advertising is usually thought as the antithesis of this.  People are often unaware of your product or brand when they see the commercial, and its cost is substantially higher than that of a Search ad.  So companies often find it hard to justify spending on TV.  But if you have felt this, let me point out one important – and often overlooked – effect of TV…

TV advertising raises awareness of your product and brand. Just to be clear, I do not mean this in a fluffy brand awareness sense, but in a direct response sense.  Let me explain.  Say you are maxing out on your “branded” search campaign.  This is likely your best performing ad group.  As in all advertising mediums, you can’t buy any more inventory than is available.  However, in Search, it is possible to create inventory! How?  You guessed it – TV.  When a spot airs, you drive people to the web to learn more about your product, and they will do it using your brand name.  So although TV can be expensive, one of it’s benefits is that it creates media in what is likely your cheapest and most efficient channel – Search.

Stepping Into Broadcast Advertising

Your business is growing steadily. Things are going well. You started out on Google bidding 50 cents here and $1.30 there and built a stable channel in PPC. You then branched out to the affiliate world and navigated that questionable lot to find some good partners and grow your business even more. Then you took a leap and placed your first print ad, and held your breath for 2 months until you learned that it worked. And today, although you have a solid base of advertising in these vehicles, you still want to grow. But you pause before you take the next step because that is a whole different beast – broadcast advertising.

Broadcast advertising doesn’t have to be scary, but there are some important considerations before jumping into it. I am going to weigh the pros and cons of Direct Response Television (DRTV) and Direct Response Radio (DRR) here, but these principles apply even in the brand advertising world.

So your first question may be, how do I ease into this? This is the first pro for radio. Production for a radio spot is minimal, as it simply involves people speaking and a few sound effects. Even with numerous takes, it requires minimal time in the studio. Just make sure you get someone good to write your creative, because it will definitely impact performance. Next, you need to place some media and test the channel. This is again a positive for radio versus TV. For the price of one to two full pages in a monthly you can test radio and get a decent read.

Based on this, you may be thinking that radio is the obvious way to go. However, that may not be true. Yes, it will cost you significantly to produce and test a TV spot. But TV has the potential to change your business – as it has for Rosetta Stone and many others. Radio has done that for a handful of companies, but more times than not, it is an average performer in a company’s advertising portfolio. There are several reasons why, but the two biggest are 1) lack of focus and 2) difficulty scaling. What is a lack of focus? Think about when you listen to the radio versus watch TV. Usually you are doing something else while listening to the radio (driving, cleaning, working). This makes for a less attentive audience, and one that may not be able to write down a phone number or web address while driving. But the second reason is even more significant. On TV, there are maybe a few hundred networks. If you whittle those down to the big networks that have significant media available, we are talking dozens. But with radio, there are literally thousands of stations. Centralizing, managing and aggregating data for all those stations is a bear. There are a few agencies out there who do this, but not many good ones.

TV, in spite of its high hurdle of initial investment, can be a game changer. Now, it’s only for companies that have the cash, are patient enough to see it through (no spot hits it out of the park on the first go), and are able to handle real growth. As well, TV really only works for certain types of products. But if all these things come together, it can be an amazing medium. Just make sure you pick the right agency, because another downside of TV is, there are dozens of players that will all tell you whatever they think you want to hear. They get compensated based on the media you buy, so their interests may not be fully aligned with yours. You should be very critical when interviewing agencies.

Why “Direct Response” is Not a Bad Word

We all know those cheesy ads hocking gadgets for $19.99 with hyperactive hosts and outlandish offers.  But wait, there’s more to Direct Response than this!!!  In all seriousness, Direct Response, whether it be DRTV, Print, Radio or Direct Mail, doesn’t have to be like this.  I have many years of experience in the DR world, and I’ve never been associated with a product like the Chia Pet.  There are great companies with strong brands that utilize DR techniques.  These include Rosetta Stone, Tempurpedic and Bose among many others.

So what exactly is Direct Response Marketing?  I haven’t looked up the official definition, but from my experience, DR consists of a few elements:

1. making a specific offer
2. asking for the sale
3. measuring everything

I don’t see how this constitutes distasteful business.  To the contrary, it feels like savvy marketing.

So the next time you roll your eyes at a Snuggie ad, realize that there is a tasteful way to execute this, and that it may be a great way to grow your business without taking on undue risk.  And if you have trouble convincing your management team, just point out that they are already doing DR marketing.  Afterall, what is Pay-Per-Click advertising?  Strong headline ad, landing page with an offer and “Learn More” button, measuring every step of the process…smells like DR to me.