Clayton Makepeace has released the latest issue of ‘Total Package’. The featured article by Drayton Bird is titled “Recession Survival Strategy: Force Your Marketing to Make Money – By Measuring”. [Article]


Clayton Makepeace has released the latest issue of ‘Total Package’.

The featured article:

RRecession Survival Strategy: Force Your Marketing to Make Money – By Measuring

by Drayton Bird

Dear Business-Builder,

Marketing is one of the first things to feel the axe when times get tough – and no wonder if you have no idea what it’s doing for you.

Do the following figures interest you?

By moving nine words from the bottom to the top of a form, a loan firm increased the number of applications by 240%.

Adding two words in an email subject line doubled the number of enquiries about a telephone service.

Putting someone’s face in a letter about investment increased sales by 20%.

Removing one piece from a direct mail piece for a bank increased return on investment by 92%.

If those figures don’t interest you, stop reading now. If they do, keep going.

Why managers cut marketing
When recession strikes, where do managers save money? Well, very logically they cut out things that don’t seem essential.

Often that means marketing … a rather vague discipline which often seems to ask you to spend a lot of money for an unquantifiable return.

This is because very little marketing is conducted in a measurable way. Yet all the really successful marketers – Procter & Gamble for instance – measure everything. What is more on today’s dominant medium, the internet, everything can be measured.

If you look at some of the world’s most successful firms – Amazon, E-Bay, Dell, or American Express, for example – they rely entirely or almost entirely on direct marketing.

Moreover, all internet marketing is direct marketing. That is, messages reach people directly via email, or they go directly to it when they go to a web page.

There are many other kinds of direct marketing – direct mail, mail order advertising, SMS messages for instance. And today the overwhelming majority of selling messages direct you to a website, giving you the chance to build a direct relationship.

But what they all have in common is they make it easy to gauge what you get for your money.

Why it makes sense
There are actually three reasons, all simple, why direct marketing makes sense.

First, as I have explained, by coding all your messages you can measure your results, and when times are tough you need to know what results your investment is producing.

Second, it is an ideal way to target and acquire the right kind of customers – the ones most likely to spend the most money.

And third, it is the perfect way to retain those customers for longer – and the customer you have got is from 3 to 8 times more profitable than an identical person who is not a customer.

In short, direct marketing, whether online or in traditional media allows you to spend your money where you will get the greatest return on investment.

But there is another reason which I first pointed out to an audience in India 22 years ago. Direct marketing is the closest thing yet to perfect marketing. Quite a claim, so let me explain.

What is marketing?
Marketing is defined by the British Chartered Institute of Marketing as: “Identifying, anticipating and satisfying customer requirements profitably”.

There is another, simpler definition given by an American millionaire many years ago who said: “Find out what people want and need, and give it to them – and you’ll get rich”.

Peter Drucker wrote that the aim of marketing is to “know and understand the customer so well that the product fits him and sells itself.” This is, if you agree with him, perfect marketing. And it is what direct marketing does better than any other method.

First, through the use of postal, telephone and internet questionnaires it establishes very cheaply what people say they want.

But as we all know, what people think they want or say they want are often not what they really want and not a good guide to what they will actually do. That is why a lot of research is very misleading.

Direct marketing solves that problem by clearly answering the BIG question: will they buy it? It does so by asking them to do so. As my old boss David Ogilvy put it, “General advertisers can only guess. Direct marketers know.” By testing different messages you can see what works and what doesn’t.

Why guess when you can know?
As a result I can tell you the answers to all sorts of interesting questions. Like what happens if you run long copy rather than short copy. How long you should have a phone number on the TV screen if you want to get the most replies. Where your headline is most likely to get read – and so on.

Peter Drucker also said, “The perfect advertisement is one of which the reader can say, ‘This is for me, and me alone.'” By definition no mass advertisement can be perfect; but one which is addressed to individuals via direct mail or e-mail can be.

So it is worth reflecting that the light at the end of the advertising tunnel may be that of an oncoming train called direct marketing. You can get run over, get out of the way, or get on board: but whatever you do, don’t ignore it.

Ten practical benefits of direct marketing
Here are ten things to remember about the power of direct marketing:

Unlike many other forms of marketing, it can achieve your objectives cost-effectively (i.e. it can sell at a cost you can control).
If it’s done properly, it also helps build your brand.
You can start with a relatively small investment, which has an immediate impact on the profits before you invest big money. This means you reduce risk.
Speed. There is a short lead time – especially on the internet. You can have an idea today and test it tomorrow.
You can refine as you go along (adjust the investment, the projections, depending on your results, etc).
Very flexible. Can be easily switched on or off. You’re not locked into a long campaign – unless it works. If it does, you spend more and keep spending longer.
It’s measurable, accountable: no guesswork.
There’s a massive opportunity in South Africa because so few companies are doing it properly.
It helps you persuade individuals and overcome their objections with more detailed arguments.
It is a perfect way to get leads and motivate your sales force.

Drayton Bird, Hon. F IDM

Guest Contributor

THE TOTAL PACKAGE

For more tips like this, e-mail drayton AT draytonbird DOT com saying “Ideas” (www.draytonbird.com)

Attribution Statement: This article was first published in The Total Package. To sign-up to receive your own FREE subscription to The Total Package and claim four FREE money making e-books go to www.makepeacetotalpackage.com.

The Total Package

*IMNewsWatch would like to thank Clayton Makepeace for granting permission to reprint this article.

Sharing is caring