Tag Archives: Direct Response Advertising

The Perfect Direct Response Advertising Campaign.

Posted on by
Reply

Unfortunately there are still a large amount of company owners who believe that advertising their brand or product is a “Waste of money” and “Doesn’t bring results.” This maybe true, perhaps in the past they have worked with an agency who doesn’t know what they are doing, producing adverts and campaigns that weren’t properly thought out.

Alot of marketing/advertising budget is spent on adverts that attract the consumer but not necessarily to act or make a purchase. This is called “Image advertising” designed specifically to stay in your mind next time you want a drink, chocolate bar etc. The only problem with this is unless you have the cash flow of a marketing giant like Coke, Mars or Walmart you just won’t be able to compete.

The solution? Direct Response Advertising. This type of advertising is made exclusively to attract or generate a specific action or response. There are many different ways of getting your advert across be it TV, newspaper, radio or magazine. Direct response advertising is designed to generate leads, to make the consumer think a bit more about the brand or product. This means that you will have their details and can contact them with future campaigns, sales or offers. The question is how would the ideal UK Advertising Agencies go about doing this?

Step one – Create a quality/resourceful piece of content that will become an authority in that sector. This can be done through trial products, newsletters, tips, reports etc. Once you have decided what to write about and what format you are going to put it on. (email, mail, website, blog) Leave it alone and wait for people to request, download your content.

Step two – Once the requests and interest rolls in send, send send! Why does this form of advertising work well? It means not having to cold call or force the consumer into a place they don’t want to be. The discussion can be had on their terms even if they are only interested in spending a small amount of money. People don’t generally like being sold too, if you can show that your service or product offers good return on investment and have read your reports then a bond of trust has already begun.

It’s an obvious but very effective way of marketing. Think about it, if the person is calling up for your free information or after reading it then they are obviously already interested in what you have to offer. Now all you have to do is push the sale through. This also means that you can measure the popularity (or not) of your advertising campaign. Lack of interest? Change the campaign and try again!

The other benefit of direct response advertising is that you now have information on people who have previously shown interest in your product. Invite them to events, send them monthly newsletters. Invest your money in something that works!

Business to Business advertisers favour Direct Response

Posted on by
Reply

A recent poll has shown that the more traditional forms of advertising are favoured by professionals who advertise for business to business clients. The research that was collated by the Direct Marketers Association also shows that direct response advertising uses over 40% of marketing budgets.

In second place after direct response adverts is brand advertising which has a 16% market spend. Third was trade show marketing which owns 13% of the total market spend.

So what makes up the yearly spend in the direct response advertising sector? Over a quarter of the budget goes on direct mail (27%) closely followed by online advertising work on 18%. Other parts like catalogues and trade shows are responsible for 15% and telemarketing advertising counts for 12% spend. Surprisingly only 1% is spent using newer forms of media like content making, blogs and RSS feeds. It seems that Web 2.0 will have to wait its time a bit as far as direct response advertising is concerned!

Unfortunately this looks like it could be a major mistake within the business to business sector. Another recent survey shows that a large proportion of business professionals (87%) throughout the UK use the internet to find out more information on a product before they go through with a purchase or transaction.  If this sort of data was used with a business to business campaign I feel that advertisers could attract consumers not only easier but quicker too.

The Future of Online Advertising

Posted on by
Reply

A recent survey shows that youthful online/internet users want to be entertained with funny videos and content whereas the older users are looking for particular queries that are both useful and relevant.

The IAB (Internet Advertising Bureau) also known as the trade body for online advertising in the UK has collated the data and found the different kind of adverts that attract particular consumers on the internet. It is fairly obvious what makes up an effective advert, grab the viewers attention with relevancy and usefulness before offering an exciting incentive that will save the consumer money. Interestingly the results show that there are many key differences between the age groups.

The results showed that more youthful internet users aged between 18-35 are more intrigued by special sales or offers, entertaining and or exclusive information is also seen as important. Online users aged between 45-54 seem to be attracted by advertising that actually shows a benefit to its purchase. One thing that the age groups have in common is their want for a deal and during these times of economic depression that is not a massive surprise!

People who took the survey also believe that they have more access to and are more likely to click through on the “traditional” online advertising like banners, emails and sponsored links.  Every demographic that took part in this survey found that the most popular forms of direct response advertising are through adverts within a page and sponsored listings.

The data also showed that the popularity of new forms of digital advertising is gaining on their more traditional options. These new ads include using video, sound, games, widgets and free gifts, some of which have become very effective. The popularity and importance of social media in the present and the future can not be overstated. These forms of advertising will become more and more vital as the internet increases in users.

What is Britain’s Favourite Advertising Slogan?

Posted on by
Reply

“Good things come to those who wait.” A well known and excellently marketed slogan designed by Guinness has been chosen as Britain’s most popular and the one that is used most often in everyday life.

A recent survey taken by one of the largest UK advertising agencies has shown that nearly 50% of people frequently use the famous line from the Guinness TV adverts. The survey taken by 2,000 people decided that the Tesco’s advertising slogan “Every little helps” featuring celebrities like Terry Wogan and Jane Hurrocks was in second just slightly ahead of the simple “It does exactly what it says on the tin” by household products company Ronseal.

In fourth was the catchphrase used by fast food giants McDonalds “I’m Lovin’ It” and in fifth came Budweiser with their iconic “Wassssuuuuupppp?” commercial which was used by school kids everywhere.

A slight surprise to be as low as sixth is Nike’s famous line “Just Do It” with British Telecom coming seventh with their classic “It’s good to talk”

Tony the Tiger from Frosties comes in at eighth with “They’re grrrrreat’” followed by Orange the mobile phone company with “The future’s bright, the future’s Orange” Another alcoholic drink finishes off the top ten with “Probably the best in the world” from Carlsberg.

These results show that the advert doesn’t have to be beautiful or expensive (although Guinness do usually win awards for their adverts) to get peoples attention. The Tesco’s and Ronseal adverts are very to the point showing that an effective and catchy slogan can stick in people’s minds. As you’ll see below the slogans are short, memorable and creates an amount of trust .

The results also shown that 80% of UK residents use famous advertising slogans in everyday conversation. The most vital statistic however for direct response advertising agencies is that nearly 40% of people will be more likely to purchase a product if it has a decent slogan or advertising campaign.

Will Advertising Change Increase Facebook CTR?

Posted on by
Reply

Social networking giants Facebook are hoping that a different onsite advert format will change experts perceptions that advertising on social networks is failing.

Experts believe that because of Google the online advertising industry has become too absorbed by direct response advertising. Thanks to this there is a high expectancy on delivering a high click through or impressions rate, something that doesn’t appear to go hand in hand with social networking sites.

A main reason for this supposed failure in the social networking sector is that users are less likely to want to click on an advert that is likely to take them off of the site and away from talking to their friends.

The new advert idea that Facebook have come up with are to do with encouraging the user to click on a specific brand before passing on that information to their friends who are likely to be interested in the same thing. They are hoping to be able to do this without the user having to leave the site, something that should prove popular with Facebook users.

The idea is to get people to befriend a brand just like they would a peer. Here they can make comments next to a video or static advertisement where they will be informed on any recent news on the brand. (this has recently been tested on Facebook for an up and coming comedy film) This will hopefully in the long term increase the users brand awareness whilst also increasing Facebook’s click through rate.