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December 12, 2006

Direct Response Advertising or Brand Advertising? Or Both?

Hallie Mummert, Editor in Chief of Target Marketing Magazine penned an interesting column about the challenges of integrating the best of direct response advertising with that of brand advertising. Hallie makes some interesting points:

While the merger of brand and direct is logical in theory, it's the process part that's still got many marketers baffled--and me, too, for that matter. What branding tactics can you incorporate into a direct response campaign before you interfere with the call to action--because for a campaign to generate response, there's no such thing as being "a little direct." It either is direct, or it isn't.

While there's truth here, I also feel there is some happy middle ground. Consistency of core messaging over time is an honored approach by the best direct response advertisers, and that comes straight from the halls of brand management theory.

Imagine suddenly having to measure the value of your creative and messaging ideas with hard numbers, when for the extent of your career the yardstick has been a more subjective process. I'm guessing that while a select percentage of advertising professionals are up for the challenge, many more are not jumping for joy.

Perhaps the greatest difference between brand advertisers and those of us who've been raised in the world of direct response advertising is the difference in comfort level with the question: "How do you know?"

Brett often recalls a meeting he was in years ago while interning in brand management at consumer products marketer General Mills where discussions about trade promotions were taking place. As a just-off-the-boat intern, he somehow managed to eek out essentially this same question to one of the senior people at the table. "How do you know these promotions generate incremental profit after taking into account the costs of the promotion?", he asked. And the answer that came back was "We just know. We've been doing this for so long". True story. My guess is they have a different answer nowadays.

Posted by Jeff Small at 01:30 PM | Permalink