Advertising Impacts Your Choices More Than You Think

What made you choose to stop at Tim Horton’s this morning? (Yes, I said “choose to” because although you may think it’s just a normal part of your day, it is a choice.)  What made you by that particular box of hair dye or lipstick?  Think for a second about how much advertising really affects your daily purchases without  you even realizing it.

Let’s try an experiment.  Turn off your TV, radio and internet for a month.  Don’t look at a magazine, newspaper or any form of media for that time.  I doubt very many people could that for even a day, let alone a week or a month, or God forbid… a year!!

I’ve been doing a lot of family history research lately and I’m fascinated at how my ancestors lived their lives.  And as my hometown, the City of Timmins celebrates its hundredth anniversary this year, I’ve been interested in how people lived during that time.  A hundred years ago, my grandfather was a 3 year old little boy growing up on a farm just outside of Brodhagen, Ontario.  At that time, he didn’t have a TV, a computer, magazines or video games.  His parents were farmers living away from any sort of “city life” with really only the radio to keep them up to speed with what was going on in the world.

They went into town when it was necessary to buy what they needed.  That was it.  But, of course, once at the store, the manufacturers had their own “advertising”, like packaging to entice you to buy their product over another.  The store owner could have been having a sale, maybe to get rid of old product.  But unless my great-grandparents went into the store in the first place, they weren’t aware of the different products that were available or any sales that might be happening.  And if it wasn’t in the budget, they just didn’t buy it.

My great grandparents were not educated people.  In fact, even my grandfather only had a great eight education.  But even, today, with so many of us being much more highly educated, we’re not even fully aware of all the marketing activities companies do to entice us into buying their products.  That takes me back to our experiment.  If you lived like my great-grandparents did a hundred years ago, with limited access to media, how would your purchase decisions be different from how they are now?  Would you spend less?  Of course, this is only hypothetical because as we all know we can’t fully escape advertising.  But then again, do we even want to?

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Direct Marketing - It's Not Just Junk Mail

We have all had “junk” mail appear in our mail boxes.  Well, it’s only junk if it doesn’t interest you.  But that doesn’t mean direct response marketing doesn’t work.  If it didn’t work, nobody would do it.   Similar to sales promotion activities, direct response marketing is designed to encourage immediate action.  Things like catalogues, direct mail flyers, sales or fundraising letters, magazine inserts and statement stuffers.  Even some forms of television can be considered direct marketing.  Things like infomercials and commercials that encourage you to “Buy now!  Just call the toll free number on the screen.  If you call in the next 10 minutes, you’ll receive a free bonus gift!”  Direct marketing is very highly targeted to ensure that the advertiser is reaching only a very specific target market as opposed to mass marketing which attempts to reach a much broader audience.

 

Advantages of Direct Marketing:

·         Allows you to target your message to a very specific audience.   Whatever kind of business you have, you will have defined specific target markets when creating your marketing plan.  Mail-outs can be sent specifically to those people only instead of mass mailing something.  Also, each specific piece can be customized to each person in that target market.

·         You can evaluate its effectiveness. If you compare the number of responses to the number of pieces mailed, you can calculate the response rate. If you include coded coupons or response cards you can keep track of exactly who responded and from where.

·         Mail readers are actively involved.  When people take the time to read their mail, your message will have their undivided attention while they open and scan through it.

Disadvantages of Direct Marketing:

·         Many people don't like unsolicited offers and many are skeptical of their validity.

·         Increasingly, busy people don't even open what they view as "junk mail."

·         Using this method of advertising requires thorough maintenance of mail lists. Many small business owners don't take the time to update their mailing lists. With outdated lists, however, mail goes to undeliverable addresses, which is a waste of money.   Another possible glitch - an inaccurate list may misspell names or address a person who has died. These kinds of errors annoy, or worse yet offend, the recipient.

·         Some groups are concerned about the environmental impact of resources used for advertising mailings.

·         It can be expensive.  When creating a direct marketing campaign, you really need to weigh out the cost differential between producing the materials and the profits earned from any new business the campaign will generate.

Tips on Developing Your Direct Mail Piece

·         Focus on customer benefits and do it right at the beginning. The first sentence (the lead) in a direct mail letter should be about benefits.   Your prospective customer only takes a second or two to decide whether or not to keep reading or to pitch it.  So, make sure the benefits of your product or service are offered right up front.

·         Keep the offer simple, easy to understand and persuasive.

·         Include a "call to action."

·         Ask the customer to "call today."

·         Include a postage-paid reply card.

·         Make the offer for a limited time to encourage prospects to act.

·         Make it easy to respond or place an order. Include order forms if appropriate for your product. Include a:

o   toll-free phone number (24-hour ordering if possible)

o   fax numbers

o   email addresses

o   payment options such as credit cards

o   payment plans for big ticket items

·         Use a personal and friendly writing style. Mail is a one-to-one communication; make it sound that way.

·         Create different direct mail pieces to address different audiences - even when you're offering the same product. Your product or service may have a different benefit for different target markets. So, create multiple forms of the same offer for those different audiences.

·         Consider making your mailing "3D" by including an object in the envelope that will peak the recipient's curiosity.

Mailing List Options:

Mailing lists are available for purchase, but they can be quite costly, especially for small businesses on a tight budget.  A better option is to use your house list.  That means that you really need to be diligent about obtaining information from your current customers and people who have inquired about your product or service in the past and maintaining it.  Keep your mailing list current by periodically asking your customers for their current mailing address.

Success Measurements:

When you include coded coupons or response cards, you can track how many you have received and where they came from.  Direct mail experts tell clients to expect anywhere between a .05 percent and 1 percent response rate.  That means that if you mailed out 1,000 direct mail pieces, expect to receive about 10 responses.  That might not sound like a lot, but it’s better to receive 10 actual sales, than 500 “maybes” that you could be chasing down forever.  So, don’t increase the number of mail outs just to increase your response rate.  The quality of the response is what’s important.