On the Rebound

These days merely opening the paper or listening to the evening news is guaranteed to bring on a bad mood. Oil and food prices go one way while employment goes another — and the forecast is for more of the same. This makes consumers nervous. And nervous consumers are cautious ones, especially when it comes to their purchasing behavior.

But remember, people still want to buy. To bring them around, marketers have to focus on two things: the essential drivers of direct response and the emotions that influence consumer behavior.

BACK TO BASICS

Everyone can get caught up in the latest DM tools and trends and in the process lose sight of the basics. This isn't much of a problem when business is booming. But now that it's not, it's time to take a fresh look at the four key drivers of direct — audience, offer, message and cost per contact — and ask the tough questions.

• Targeting and audience selection accounts for 30% of the total performance of any direct campaign. What have you done to hone your targeting? Are your response models up to date? Have you examined your segmentation methods? Should you add or delete channels? What about credit-challenged or marginal prospects? Perhaps some pruning is needed.

• Offer strategy — what it is and how it's positioned — is responsible for another 30% of your results. Is there any way to restructure an offer to increase its perceived value to folks who've tightened their grip on the purse strings? Have you considered adding something to your base offer to lift your targets' spirits, say by providing a surprise bonus? Have you considered putting urgency to work through an early bird special or limited-time promotion to spur response right now?

• How you handle the overall direct message while leveraging brand assets accounts for 20% of program performance. Have you maximized the value proposition? And have you tested concepts that speak directly to your targets' financial concerns?

• Cost/contact — getting the greatest reach for the least expense — constitutes the final 20% of program performance. When times are tough, you really must do everything you can to drive cost out of your system. Have you attempted to renegotiate media buys? Have you maximized printing efficiencies? What about creative development? And don't forget to look into ways of getting incremental value from online partners — the more exposures the merrier.

Revisiting direct marketing fundamentals is unglamorous work. But in an economic environment like this you can't afford to leave any stone unturned.

EMOTIONAL DRIVERS

I don't know the number of down cycles the nation's economy has suffered during the last 50 years. But I do know that direct marketers have been a lot better off since 1956, when Victor Schwab developed his list of the core emotional drivers that motivate human behavior. A copy of this list is never far from my reach.

Victor was one of the first to fully articulate the concept that, for marketers to succeed, they have to understand how their products or services enable consumers to get what they want. People want health and popularity. They want to satisfy their curiosity and win the affection of others. They want to save time, money and discomfort. They want to be good parents. Be creative. Up to date. And so on.

Not having what we want is painful in a very real sense. And it's in our nature to want to move from pain to pleasure — the pleasure of getting what we want. This includes the avoidance of something potentially troubling or embarrassing that could be painful, unless we take advantage of an opportunity to move toward something delightful instead.

It's the emotional component of human wants that moves people to action in good times and bad. So, as you review your copy platforms, it's essential to find ways of tapping into six major emotional drivers:

• Fear

  Since people don't want to lose money and are afraid of making mistakes, the headline on a print ad for Fisher Investments offering an exclusive report, “The Eight Biggest Mistakes Investors Make,” pushes the fear button with a vengeance.

• Greed

  Graphic designers and architects are always preaching that “less is more.” But my college economics professors taught me that consumers always prefer more to less. We can't help but want a lot of stuff. Even better, we want a lot of stuff for free. In tough times, it's a good move to appeal to the greed of your target by merchandising the wonderful things they'll get if only they respond or buy. Time magazine did this with a recent subscription card.

• Exclusivity

  The catalog business was created to provide people with plows, seed, towels, clothing and a great many other things they wanted but couldn't get in their local stores. Like their forebears, today's consumers want offerings they perceive to be exclusive, unique and valuable — from educational information, such as a research report from a consulting group, to a bundle of home entertainment services from a satellite TV provider that isn't available anywhere else. People want what others don't or can't have. They want what's in scarce supply. What can you do to make your offer more exclusive?

• Guilt

  Perhaps the rawest of our emotions. It hurts our psyche just as much as if we'd cut ourselves, or swallowed something that caused our stomach to ache. When rough circumstances require marketers to pull out all the stops, that's when they have to strip the logic from their headlines and copy, and go for the gut. In a head-to-head test of two approaches — logic versus guilt — a mailing piece for heart defibrillators with a guilt-oriented headline (“What if somebody died and you could have prevented it?”) outpulled a logic-oriented alternative package 2-1.

• Approval of others

  No one likes to admit it, but we all want to be liked, to be looked up to, and to gain others' approval. This was what drove people to the U.S. School of Music way back in 1926, when John Caples' legendary ad headlined “They Laughed When I Sat Down at the Piano But When I Started to Play!” touched a national emotional nerve. And it's the essence of what drives the branding of BMW, Swiss Army, Rolex, Prada and so many other prestige names today. And I've got news for you: In a shaky economy, the emotional need of your target for approval, respect and admiration is greater than ever. Use this need to your advantage.

• Ego gratification

  We all have images of ourselves that psychologists consider part of the ego, which demands satisfaction. Ego drives American consumption. One way to gratify the egos of your target audience is to tell people they're special, noticed and recognized — and as a result, something you have to offer or sell is being held only for them. Headlines such as “We've reserved this special offer just for you” or “You've been specially selected to receive…” or “We have your gift ready to go” are tried and true ways to elicit response. Another is to alert prospects that they've just been admitted to a special group or club. The cruise-line industry does this well with its past-passenger communications, using headlines like this: “Welcome to an exclusive club reserved for only a privileged few.”

FULL SPEED AHEAD

Yes, the times are uncertain. But direct marketers need not be. We know what to do. Aided by a renewed focus on neglected fundamentals, abetted by the insights of Victor Schwab and inspired by the creative examples of people like John Caples, DMers have the knowledge and tools necessary to thrive in the toughest of economic environments.

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RUSSELL KERN (Russell@thekernorg.com) is president of The Kern Organization, a DM agency in Woodland Hills, CA. This is the first of two articles about marketing in a down economy.