DRTV Media Creative Requirements, Part 4
Continuing my series on the best ways to acquire new customers using DRTV, this week I highlight the importance of working with the right DRTV agency to maximize results.
(For part 1, click here, for part 2, click here and for part 3, click here.)
So, you’ve decided to take the DRTV plunge. You’ve done your homework on your product, have the right margins and know how to set up your operation to handle TV-driven traffic. Great! But …
Proceed with caution. Although those waters contain a ton of buried treasure that can be yours, they also contain sharks, poisonous jellyfish and electric eels. Just follow the principles.
For those of you who think you can script your own spots or infomercials, I have three words for you: Hold on there! It’s not just about, “if you order right now …” or “but wait, there’s more.” Just like direct mail copy should be left to the pros, so should TV scripts.
Find yourself an integrated DRTV agency that understands your product, your category and has demonstrated the ability to make things work for companies like yours. Then get out of the way!
Years ago, after I had just left a DRTV-focused company and was going out on my own, one of the first clients I worked with was a diet company looking to create an infomercial for a new product it created. Having worked a few years earlier for a company that had a hugely successful diet product DRTV campaign, I came into our initial planning meeting with the formula for making diet products work on TV.
Long story short, the owner of the company impatiently listened to our pitch on what works, and then said the five words that always spell disaster: “Let’s think outside the box!” He pitched us on why the infomercial should be about him. He was the leader, a pioneer in the diet and wellness industry. “My name will sell product,” he declared.
- Companies:
- Gilbert Direct Marketing
- People:
- Jim Gilbert
Jim Gilbert has had a storied career in direct and digital marketing resulting in a burning desire to tell stories that educate, inform, and inspire marketers to new heights of success.
After years of marketing consulting, Jim decided it was time to “put his money where his mouth was" and build his own e-commerce company, Premo Natural Products, with its flagship product, Premo Guard Bed Bug & Mite Sprays. Premo in its second year is poised to eclipse 100 percent growth.
Jim has been writing for Target Marketing Group since 2006, first on the pages of Catalog Success Magazine, then as the first blogger for its online division. Jim continues to write for Total Retail.
Along the way, Jim has led the Florida Direct Marketing Association as their Marketing Chair and then three-term President, been an Adjunct Professor of Direct and Digital marketing for Miami International University, and created a lecture series, “The 9 Immutable Laws of Social Media Marketing,” which he has presented across the country at conferences and universities.
