Increasing Return on Marketing Dollars

CONTENTS

• New Flare-Up in the Branding vs. Direct Marketing War
• Another Reason Response to Direct Mail Is Atrophying
• With A Little Bit of Buck... Slip
• The Virtues of Spying

New Flare-Up in the Branding vs.
Direct Marketing War

Ten days ago, the Direct Marketing Association of Long Island had as its featured speaker the co-owner of one of the area's advertising agencies. The topic was to be "Branding and Its Role in Direct Marketing." My hope was that the speaker would bring good news - a cessation to the war.

One side says a company's fixation on "branding" hurts response rates, revenue and profits. Its soldiers say that the sole purpose of direct response is to generate leads and sales. The other side believes that if you are exclusively focused on getting response, then you are sacrificing your brand. Its soldiers think the only function of brand advertising is to build brand awareness.

I expected the speaker to say that it doesn't have to be "either/or". Brand advertising and direct response can work together to break through the clutter of conventional advertising to reach and interact with new prospects, accelerate brand building, and establish greater lifetime customer value.

I was wrong.

First, we got a definition of brand - "a set of beliefs and attitudes about a product." Makes sense. However, a definition of "branding" did not follow. I would have to believe that branding, therefore, is the process of instilling a set of beliefs and attitudes about a product."

Now the speaker says that companies are better off branding, establishing the brand first, and then doing direct response advertising to follow. I explain that most companies do not have the budgets for both, and that the trend is to spend less money on branding, more money on acquiring and retaining customers.

She backs off a bit. "Well," she says, "you can do branding within the direct response effort."

What kind of branding strategies and tactics are we talking about, for example, in a direct mail package? If branding is instilling a set of beliefs and attitudes about a product, is building credibility branding? If so, I'm all for it. Is branding having a strong logo? I'm for that, too, as long as the logo does not overpower the promise you make to the reader.

Interestingly, the speaker talked about the features of a product being important in establishing the brand. As Yogi Berra said, "Include me out." Give me benefits over features any day.

The speaker had a glibness most of us in the direct response world don't possess. She said "Brand makes offers (appealing, I suppose), but offers don't make brand." Evidently, although she is a Long Island resident, she has never heard of those two offer driven stalwarts, Publishers Clearing House and North Shore Animal League.

What will end the war? Maybe better measurements of how spending money on brand advertising affects ROI. Maybe testing various branding techniques within direct response campaigns to see which help or hurt response. Maybe understanding the differences in brand perception between those customers acquired through direct response advertising and those influenced by pure brand advertising.

Another Reason Response to Direct Mail Is Atrophying

Veterans like me know that response to our direct mail is never going to be what it was decades ago. Among the prime reasons:

• Cluttered mailboxes
• Distractions from other media (and particularly now online media)
• The ageing of America - young people don't respond to direct mail

Hmm, maybe. But I just discovered another reason. Here's how -

My wife and I moved into a new condo community last November and we've made a lot of friends. In mid-November, we decide to throw a holiday cocktail party in December and invite about 20 of the couples.

"Let me do the invitations," I said. "After all, I ought to know something about getting response." We pick out the 20 couples we know best, so I know the list is pretty good. The offer is pretty good, too - free food and drink and you don't have to take your car. It's a Sunday night, so you don't have a conflict with Saturday big plans and you can even watch the first football game on Sunday.

OK, now for the package. I go buy holiday postcard stationery at Staples (I don't get a thing for product placement here). I write the invitation as a funny poem, and I personalize each of the invitations with the couple's name.

We put the invitations into high quality 6x9" envelopes and write out each couple's address. Our address label serves as the corner card.

The invitations go into the mail on Tuesday morning. Mid-day Wednesday, my wife calls me from her sister's upstate asking about response. With a wife like this, who needs clients?

"Nada," I say. "We only mailed them yesterday." Thursday goes by with no response, and I'm beginning to worry about how good the copy was. Maybe I can blame lack of response on the Post Office.

Friday we get our first two responses and they are positive. My wife returns from upstate and over the next three days asks those she runs into about the party. "Invitation?" some of them ask, "we don't remember seeing an invitation."

My wife probes further. In her next life, she will undoubtedly return as a fearless investigative reporter. She finds out that some of our new friends/neighbors don't bother visiting their mailboxes (clustered an average of 100 feet from their front doors) every day, or every other day for that matter. Some of our invitees only check their mailboxes every third or fourth day.

Aha! So we can make sure we have the right list and offer, develop superb creative that stands out in the mailbox. But if we can't get recipients to the mailbox, that's a problem, isn't it.

I'm not a highly-paid consultant for nothing. My recommendation here: let's get the DMA to pressure the U.S.P.S. to use a small portion of the next postage increase for a consumer campaign. This would be a "Visit your mailbox every day it's good exercise and good for the economy (and good for the mental health of mailers)" campaign.

With A Little Bit of Buck... Slip

The almighty dollar may be losing the battle internationally, but the buck... slip is helping to win the war to increase response and profitability. What power this little soldier has, especially for its size and cost! How versatile!

Yes, of course you can use it to hype the premium you're offering in the package. Buck slips make premium testing so easy. Run a big photo of the premium on one side with a headline; put the details on the back; have calls-to-action on both sides.

But wait, there's more!

• Use the buck slip to summarize your offer. See what happens, for example, if you add a buck slip to your voucher or statement of benefits package. I've used the headline "Cut to the Chase!" for people who don't want to read the long letter in the package.

• Put your best testimonials on the buck slip. One on each side, and each with a photo. They may have as much impact on response as multiple testimonials within a brochure.
• Turn the buck slip into a mini-Lift Note. There's no physical lift of course, but you may lift response with "If you're hesitating about accepting our free offer, please read this."
• The buck slip can become your "chalkboard." For example, mortgage loan providers might use it to show the math - how much a customer can save monthly with a debt consolidation loan.

• Use the buck slip to show BIG BUCKS SAVINGS. It can be a coupon, greenbacks, etc.
  

The Virtues of Spying

People who know me will be surprised by the title of this piece. My position against government spying has been unequivocal since the "Attorney General's List" of the mid- 1960's. I feel differently about corporate spying - making sure you don't have an intentional or unintentional terrorist within your employees who is detonating your customer base and profits.

The focus of the spying or unobtrusive monitoring must be interaction points with customers. Look at this real, recent, explosive situation -

My wife goes into Jos. A. Bank to buy me a new suit as a surprise gift for the Silver Apple Award luncheon. A few days later, we go back to the store, so I can get alterations done. She introduces me to David, the sales person who helped her. I put on the suit, and the tailor makes his marks. My wife urges me to get a new shirt and tie as well, and David is right there helping. It turns out that the shirt and tie cost about half what the suit did because the suit was on sale. David asks when I need the suit and I told him I had plenty of time.

We come back from vacation and my wife picks up the altered suit a few days before the luncheon with no problem. Now it's the night before the luncheon. My wife goes to the package with the new shirt in it to see if it needs ironing. There's a terrible crease near the left shoulder as well as what looks like a smudge. She's aghast. I wear the shirt, however, as the suit covers the permanent crease and smudge she can't get out.

The following Monday, she calls the store and speaks to David. He is really upset about what happened, intimates that this problem has occurred before, and promises to exchange the shirt for a new one if my wife brings it back.

The following day my wife drives to the store. Only David is not there. She explains what has happened to the store manager. He says "It was the folding machine. First time this has happened." My wife says "I don't understand how you can sell a $75 shirt and not check the quality." He says "Look, lady, I'm giving you a new shirt. What do you want from me?"

She comes home livid, and transfers that lividity to me. Jos. A. Bank has not made its reputation on low prices, but on quality and service. I am about to make a call to headquarters, and then David, the original salesperson calls. Another salesperson at the store, a buddy, has told him of the store manager's outrageous behavior. It is David who has the smarts and gumption to call and apologize.

We learn that a) the store manager has had outbursts before; and b) the shirt problem was really caused by the way the shirts were put in the store's bin and the fact that those bins were dirty.

David has saved a customer by calling. Actually he saved more than one customer, because we were going to tell the store to everyone we knew. But kudos as well to his colleague who had decided he should monitor, and when necessary report on, the store manager's interactions with customers.

Who in your organization is capable of blowing up relationships with your customers? If you are suspicious, spy, and tell colleagues it is their duty to the company to spy as well.

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