Choosing between direct response marketing or a mass marketing strategy is a question many small business owners face. Some choose and don't understand the choice they make. Discovering the only later that they made the wrong choice.
Regular Mass Marketing
Mass marketing is branding. Its goal is to let people know about your brand, products or services. The adage out of sight out of mind is what these ads are about. The more times your ads get seen, they will think about you when it comes to buying. This is the type of advertising you see big brands doing.
Mass marketing is expensive. With time it is effective. Many small businesses do not have millions of dollars to put into marketing. It makes mass marketing a poor choice for these companies. Yet this is the marketing strategy they choose because they see big brands doing it. Some learn it is a waste of money.
The better choice for small businesses is direct response marketing!
What is Direct Response Marketing?
A business owner wants money spent on marketing to deliver a return on their investment. You need to know what each customer is worth to do this. How much are you willing to spend to get a customer? It is possible with direct response marketing.
Immediate Customer Attraction
Direct response marketing focuses on the readers problem. Educating them about how your product solves their problem. Overcoming objections with information so they are able to make an informed decision. Its purpose is to get them to take action.
For direct response marketing, you can implement all the types of advertising used for traditional mass marketing. Whether it's website ads, newspapers, radio or commercial video, you can apply all those forms of advertising for the direct response marketing strategy.
Compared To Traditional Marketing
The main difference between traditional and direct response types of marketing is an action. If we compare those two types of marketing, we will notice the following:
Brand Awareness - for Traditional
The whole idea of mass marketing is to promote the brand name and raise brand awareness. It could take up to several years when your potential customers will remember and start to pick out your company's brand labels.
Immediate Sales - For Direct Response
On the other hand, direct response marketing expects immediate ROI (return on investment). This type of marketing is offering instant deals right away.
When you create some offer or deal in your commercial video, let's say, with Facebook ads with the button at the bottom to get it now, you generate leads and making money by converting an unknown person into paying customer.
Surely, the proper reaction depends on the goals of a certain advertisement you use. For example, you can ask to share contacts or sign up before getting a deal in exchange.
What the Key Elements of Direct Response Marketing Ads?
A Proper Headline
Direct response marketing tells a targeted story to a niche market. Done with sales copy, starting with the attention-grabbing headline. The headline is the first thing people see. It will decide whether your ad gets read. Therefore, always use some advantageous for the customer subjects while creating your title. Don't focus on your brand name or logo. It could hurt your conversion rate.
Focus on Your Customer's Problem
There will always be an offer designed to get a specific response because the targeted offer focuses on the consumers' interests or problems. It will have a call to action, persuading the reader or watcher to opt to do something. Often the offer has a money-back guarantee to take the risk out of buying.
Direct response marketing will have a way to respond like a buy now button and capture information. Online the contact information requested is an email address. This contact information is valuable because it allows you to contact prospects with other offers in the future.
Narrow Your Ad to More Personal And Informative
Speaking on direct response marketing, you should keep in mind two major factors to make more leads:
- Try to target more specific groups of customers and personalize your advertising subject accordingly. The consumer will more likely engage when the brand provides more individual interaction.
- When educating your customer through the Ads, use the most comprehensive information to attract the buyers. The less well known the product is, the more information you should to put in.
The Offer As a key-factor of Your Advertisement
As we said previously, direct response marketing is primarily a call to action strategy. Your CTAs should be simply reachable and clear. And your potential customer should know what exact or specific action to take.
Some Typical Examples of CTA:
- Buy now and receive a discount
- Buy now and receive and get one free
- Follow the link below;
- Contact us immediately;
- Use this coupon;
- Download a free E-book;
- Download a free version;
- Subscribe to our newsletters;
You can include several options of a call to action or even use some expiration counters such as - the deal will end in two days os something like this. In this case, when creating a feeling of urgency, the audience will respond quicker and impulsively. And this will be lifting the overall conversion rate.
The Benefits of Direct Response Marketing
Generating Instant Sales
Direct response marketing is designed for obtaining an immediate return on investment. Because of some specific factors that cause consumer behaviour, buyers can follow the fair price right away and make a purchase.
Tracking and Measuring Success
What makes direct response marketing so appealing is because it is trackable. Knowing which ad is responsible for the customer responding is something you don’t get with mass marketing. You can find out which target group is most effective, the engagement rate, or how many clicks is generated.
Communication to Specific Audiences
Your converted audience is interested in the product. Direct response marketing can help to configure a strong relationship between the brand and the consumer. By establishing direct communication, you can successfully contact your customer with some offers that they find useful to make even more sales.
The Most Effective Channels for Direct Response Marketing
It would be best if you used the advertising channels wisely. Think about how your target audience behaves. What drives their passion and attention.
To use the direct response marketing strategy more effective, consider to use the following channels:
- Online Digital Marketing Management
- Commercial Video or TV Ads
- Direct Mail Marketing
- Social Media Ads Marketing
- Radio or Podcasts
These channels are separated according to consumer behaviour. For example, if you're selling a book, you will likely choose radio or podcast. At the same time, the commercial video can describe solving such a problem to benefit your potential customer.
Conclusion
Direct response marketing is a powerful marketing tool. When starting a direct response marketing strategy, declare a direct and useful offer. Always incorporate some beneficial facts about your products or services.
Each time provides some methods for CTA (call-to-action). Once your advertisement is created and you accomplished your strategy correctly, you can set up your direct response marketing campaign on the specific Ad channels.