Stop Beating Around the Bush

Despite all of the different methods of advertising, it comes down to two basic forms: Direct Response or Image. For most everyone who reads this, direct response is absolutely the only form you ever, EVER want to do. Unless you're Nike or McDonalds and have spent a bazillion dollars on building your brand, image advertising is a colossal waste of time and money. For discussion purposes, image advertising, is that soft, feel good kind of ad that makes people see you in a real human light. See: white doves in funeral marketing pieces--car dealership finance specialists smiling while shaking hands with a happy, satisfied customer. It won't work . Stay clear. Direct response, as its name implies, is a call to action. In its most rudimentary form, it's a time-sensitive pizza coupon, an oil change discount, and a half off offer at the local dry cleaner. It moves consumers to your front door with cash in hand--maybe. The offer has to be extraordinary, targeted to the right audience, contain a unique selling proposition and be creative enough to garner interest. Direct response is fast and you can measure it. You know if you got it right immediately, not at some indeterminate point down the road. When that coupon arrives via email, snail mail or some other mass distribution method, you either have new customers or you don't. This lets you test your message on smaller groups and take corrective action if something isn't working without wasting a lot of time and money. As direct response advertising continues to grow in popularity, PLAN, EXECUTE, TEST and REFINE. The wrong message to the wrong audience in a direct mail or email campaign can yield a dismal 0 to 1% response rate where a well-planned and executed campaign can see results of a 10% response rate and higher. Go where the results are. Get started with a strong direct response marketing campaign and see marked, significant increases in your bottom line.