Direct Marketing

While global ad spend has softened in many sectors, one format, the direct response ad, or infomercial, has seen a remarkable 18% growth in total units in the U.S. since 2007 according to Nielsen. In total, direct response comprises 14% of all TV advertising, a figure that may continue to grow as blankets with sleeves, super absorbent towels and language learning CDs gain a mixture of mainstream awareness and web virality.

For those who work in the trenches of Hispanic advertising, you know most Hispanic communications programs are direct response in nature. The biggest ad spenders in the U.S. Hispanic market (auto, retail, telecom and food / beverage) confirm this, as I discussed in greater detail earlier. However, it's important to keep in mind that while the "goal" of most of Hispanic advertising is direct response in nature, most Hispanic media spending does not go into performance media platforms like Direct Response TV (DRTV), direct mail and telemarketing.

For some time, I've been guilty of speaking in terms of Direct Response (DR) and Brand as if they were black and white. Left and right. Obama and McCain. You get the idea.

Valassis announced that shoppers saved nearly $3.5 billion with coupons in 2009, according to the Year-end 2009 Consumer Packaged Goods (CPG) Coupon Industry Facts Report recently released by NCH Marketing Services, Inc., a Valassis company.

The Household Diary Study (HDS) is a multi-year research study funded by the United States Postal Service.

Scarborough Research released an analysis highlighting the ways households are obtaining coupons. The study found that text messages and/or email are an emerging method for households to obtain coupons. 8.6 million (eight percent) of U.S. households currently acquire coupons via text messages and/or email.