Power Up Your ROI - With Integrated DRTV & Digital

By bridging the offline-online marketing gap through the use of landing pages, pay per click, search engine optimization, advertorials,  email and effective prospect management, our clients have seen response rates increase
an average of 34%, and conversions an average of 112% — often with little or no increase in budget. Discover how to increase your ROI through intelligent online integration of DRTV and Digital.

After watching a DRTV commercial, more than 50% of responders go online for more information.

Every marketer’s dream is to find a magic bullet; the one secret initiative that taps into the consumer’s psyche and unleashes a torrent of profits. It’s tough out there and getting tougher, but one thing is for sure in these uncertain times: you have to squeeze every last bit of efficiency out of your campaigns just to stay in the game. In our experience, there is no magic bullet but there is something that comes pretty darn close: integration.

Today, many direct marketers consider their strategies integrated, employing both offline and online elements. More often than not, however, each element is approached uniquely and not enough thought is given to the concept of bridging the gap. Different mediums and channels of response are placed in silos. In fact, even many marketing departments too often operate in silos.

The end result? A black hole of lost profit.

Now, more than ever, marketers must strive to ensure the channels complement each other.

A well-planned, integrated direct response marketing campaign eliminates the silos and delivers 3 key benefits to your overall campaign:

1. You will get more bang for your buck

2. Achieve greater reach, frequency and awareness

3. Conversion rates will soar

Let’s take a closer look at the relationship between DRTV and Digital.

Few direct marketers would argue that DRTV is the most effective tool in reaching the masses nationally and providing blanket coverage. For these reasons and more, DRTV is often considered the anchor to any direct response campaign. On the flip side, a well-planned and well-executed digital strategy can deliver an ROI that’s tough to beat from an efficiency standpoint. And many direct marketers are attuned to the impact that a fluctuation in offline presence has on their online sales and eventual bottom line.

The reality we’re faced with today is that more than 40% of all online sales are driven by offline media — DRTV, Radio or Direct Mail. That means a significant portion of your consumers are influenced offline, and go online either to find more information or with the intent to complete a transaction.

What are you doing online to ensure those consumers can find you or, even more importantly, find exactly what they’re looking for? If the answer is “not much”, you could be driving motivated traffic straight to your competitors. Yes, you could be spending tens of thousands of dollars to grow your competition!

So what is the solution? Ultimately there is no golden egg and every situation will benefit from a unique strategic approach. That being said, there are three tried-and-true guiding principles to ensure your ROI success.

1. Recognize Consumer Interaction Offline and Online

While every situation is unique to some extent, a baseline best practice is to ensure you understand your consumers and how they interact both offline and online. For example, are there elements that resonate in your offline messaging that consumers may then use to search online? Make sure your answer to this question is well informed. Many marketers think they know the answer but statistics continually prove them wrong. Take a look at the traffic being driven to your website or landing page. Which keywords or phrases are the top drivers? That will give you some indication of how your consumers are trying to find you.

2. Be There to Guide Them

You should also know that even if you provide a URL in your DRTV commercial, statistics prove time and time again that less than 10% of people will actually recall it correctly and type it directly into a web browser. Many marketers still struggle with this concept, yet it is so fundamental to bottom-line success metrics. So what happens to the other 90%? That, as we like to say, is the million-dollar question — quite literally. They will go looking for you, and when they do, will they find you quickly and easily? That is the black hole that you must always account for.

To funnel that crucial 90%; your website or landing page must show up — at minimum — on the first page of returned search results. If you can’t achieve that organically, then a paid search investment is your best bet.

Remember: this is not a game of hide and seek. You need to be upfront and visible to interested consumers.

Someone once relayed to me a story about 2 companies that produced a similar car-cleaning product. Company A was much larger and invested in a large DRTV campaign to boost awareness and drive sales. Company B couldn’t afford to market on that scale and invested some dollars into online paid search at the same time Company A’s campaign was launching. The result? After less than 30 days, Company B had to shut down the campaign temporarily because it could not fulfill the quantity of orders being generated online — sales that were likely generated by Company A’s offline investment.

Where did Company A go wrong? They neglected to bridge the gap and drove quality prospects straight to their competition.

3. Maintain the Scent

Don’t forget that consumers who are motivated to go online for more information or complete the desired transaction, were influenced by your offline message. It is not uncommon to see a 200% lift in online conversion rates driven by direct (i.e., DRTV) traffic. If your offline messaging is working, don’t stray from that.

Taking it a step further, put yourself in your prospects’ shoes for a moment. How do those two experiences compare? Is your prospective customer’s offline experience mimicked online? Does the sales cycle continue in a seamless transition? If not, I would venture your abandonment rates are pretty high off your entrance pages. A landing page offers you the ability to maintain a consistent online experience — from acknowledgement to click to conversion. Use it. Think of your landing page as the call center on the web.

Summary

The key to a successful integrated campaign is to consider the big picture. Now more than ever, consumers are choosing how they want to be marketed to, and advertiser success hinges on maintaining a cohesive presence wherever they go.

If you consider DRTV and Digital as individual campaigns; you may see success, failure and results that you can’t quite quantify. By taking a step back and looking at DRTV and Digital as one holistic, integrated campaign, you will soon recognize that the real power lies in how the channels complement each other to deliver the maximum ROI. Time to load the bases!