5-7 Channels ... And We Should Put Something On

Traditional advertisers bemoan the demise of the mass appointment TV audience, but DRTV veterans shrug unconcerned. Provided that media rates are set by sane GSMs, fragmentation will never destroy the direct response model. We've always built our audience by methodically aggregating comparatively small groups. One thousand clusters of 1,000 consumers respond significantly better than do 1 million viewers you reach all in one shot - so long as historical response data directs your audience targeting and media buys.

Response: November 1, 2007
By Timothy R. Hawthorne

Media Zone: 5-7 Channels ... and We Should Put Something On

As I write this, it's premiere week for the major TV networks. "K-ville," a post-Katrina police drama, just debuted on Fox and has the reviewers gushing. It drew about 9 million viewers. Clearly the mass media isn't as mass as it used to be.

In the early 1980s, when I produced for NBC's hit TV show "Real People," we routinely had audiences of more than 30 million, a stratosphere now only reached by "American Idol" and the Super Bowl. But in a fragmented marketplace, and despite there being 110 million TV households, 9 million viewers put smiles on network executives' faces.

Traditional advertisers bemoan this demise of the mass appointment TV audience, but DRTV veterans shrug unconcerned. Provided that media rates are set by sane GSMs, fragmentation will never destroy the direct response model. We've always built our audience by methodically aggregating comparatively small groups. One thousand clusters of 1,000 consumers respond significantly better than do 1 million viewers you reach all in one shot - so long as historical response data directs your audience targeting and media buys.

Direct response marketers should feel similarly at ease with the fragmentation of the marketing channels themselves. Television, the Internet, magazines, store networks, radio, video games, cell phones and books all compete for consumer attention. Agencies compete for accounts, with each medium's evangelists armed with statistics to justify investments in advertising.

The Web? According to the E-tailing Group, 77 percent of consumers claim Web sites influence their purchase decisions. E-mail? McKinsey Quarterly says that 83 percent of marketing executives now employ it. Mobile? SeeSaw Networks just surpassed 30 million impressions each week. Newspapers? Even our stodgiest medium still attracts six percent of the national ad spend.

Obviously these channels overlap. Magazine readers listen to radio. Online shoppers watch lots of TV. But each advertising medium offers unique audiences and opportunities to convert extra sales.

Fragmented audiences and media threaten only the one-trick ponies. Multi-channel marketers and ad agencies should thrive. Scores have expanded their service menus. But direct response marketers have a decided advantage. We embraced fragmentation long ago. It's fundamental to our equations for campaign success.

To sell a specialty fishing item, we might place long-form media on regional sports channels and run short-form spots during syndicated hunting and fishing shows - from Portland, Ore., to Portland, Maine. But we won't buy 30-second commercials on "American Idol," no matter how many millions we momentarily miss.

Cross-channel marketing abides by the same principle. Since even the most creative and strategically placed DRTV won't reach every fisherman, we build VideoactiveTM Web sites optimized for search and attract many new sportsmen that way. We design print campaigns for outdoor magazines and reach more new interested buyers - whose response we painstakingly track. We acquire address lists from online newsletters and magazine subscription databases, and reel in still more customers with E-mail and direct mail campaigns.

For most advertisers, seeking a Super Bowl-sized splash is unrealistic. Thanks to cross-channel marketing, it's also unnecessary. Look beneath enough lily pads and behind the tall reeds, and those clusters of consumers add up pretty fast. They always have in well-managed DRTV, and they will even more in cross-channel campaigns. Assuming, of course, that you have something good to put on.

Timothy R. Hawthorne is chairman and executive creative director of Hawthorne Direct, a full-service DRTV, print, mail and digital ad agency founded in 1986. A 34-year television producer/writer/director, Hawthorne is a cum laude Harvard graduate.