Direct marketing expert Murray Raphel a regular columnist for years for Direct Marketing Magazine compiled his best columns into a marvelous little book with a title that is instructive in itself… “But? Would Saks Fifth Avenue Do It”

I suggest that you get the book and I suggest you consider the implications of its title. Are we too concerned with image and too bound by convention to command the attention and the interest of the marketplace?

Saks Fifth Avenue may be able to continue and prosper almost exclusively because of its image established over many years but can you? My friend Gary Halbert says that the first clue to an advertising expert who can’t sell is a lot of conversation about image. If you need or want a lot of results from your ad dollars you cannot afford typical image advertising.

Consider the retail menswear business as an example. Look in the yellow pages at the retail menswear ads. Get an Entertainment Magazine like those given away free in hotels and look at those menswear retail ads. Get your newspaper and look at those retail menswear ads.
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I’ve spent this week blogging about my favorite type of small business marketing, which of course is direct response marketing. If you have understood what I have said so far, you should hopefully embrace the idea of thinking, talking and only investing in measurable results marketing.

But I did mention in an earlier post that there is a 1% added benefit factor inherent in direct marketing. It applies to those who do not respond to a given mailing or other direct marketing effort still will be positively exposed to your company.

In fact, there is a cumulative effect of such exposure that creates additional customers over a long period of time and you will benefit from this.

However, I am opposed to counting it to attributing cash value to it to offset marketing costs. Your marketing should pay its way with current, measurable results.

I will cheerfully tell you that I am not very well liked by certain folks in the ad agency, media and consulting businesses for my strong criticism of non-measurable marketing. However, I insist that any business not devoting at least 90% of its total advertising, marketing, and promotion budget to direct marketing is mismanaged.

I would never buy stock in a company not putting over 90% of its marketing money into direct marketing. I encourage you to be very tough minded in your marketing investments.
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In my last post, we finished up our discussion on the different strategies to create profit improvement and I informed you that I was going to switch gears just a little and talk in detail about my favorite subject and strategy which I rely heavily on to insure the success of every business I own or have an interest in.

Of course that subject can be none other direct marketing.

I am a strong, enthusiastic advocate of direct marketing. For most businesses, small or large, direct marketing consistently delivers the best results for dollars spent. We need to begin with an understanding of direct marketing versus other types of advertising, promotion and marketing. Let’s talk first a little bit about the others.

There is institutional advertising. This type of advertising is often intentionally used by big corporations and blindly copied by smaller ones. It essentially says to consumers and/or to stockholders here we are, here’s who we are, here’s what we do and we’re nice guys but it never asks anybody to buy anything or to take any action. It’s image building.
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Direct response advertising and direct marketing requires Great Courage to be successful for several important reasons.

First of all, you have, maybe, 5 seconds to grab attention, another 10, 20, 30 seconds at most to convince the person to read further, you have to suck ‘em in like a carnival barker promising a naked three-breasted woman snake charmer just inside the tent. Direct response advertising is not the time or place to be subtle or gentle or “professional” (whatever that is).

You have to risk the scorn and anger of your peers, the disgust of your own family or staff, the derision of those who will certainly be offended by your brash approach, you have to “all in”. There’s an incredibly cluttered advertising environment.

Several years ago…only two weeks after the Super Bowl, I offered a $100.00 bill to three different people who watched the game, if they could correctly name an advertiser and describe their commercial. They could recall only three commercials, but couldn’t match them with their advertisers.
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