Tools Need TV
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By Doug Garnett - President, Atomic Direct
New tools, and those that have been improved in some important way, need TV. But traditional TV doesn’t fit well with the hardware business. Instead, direct response television (DRTV) is the most productive television vehicle for tools.
The Challenge with Traditional TV
Traditional TV is too expensive for the hardware business. Most hardware products are lower margin products (especially given the pressure from the box stores). Complicating the situation, most hardware products appeal to a niche, which traditional TV can only reach at a tremendous premium. The result? Hardware companies need another option for TV --- because traditional TV doesn’t offer the immediate ROI required by hardware’s narrow margins.
The DRTV Opportunity
DRTV offers 30-second, 60-second,120-second, or 1/2 hour “infomercials.” These formats offer five key advantages to hardware companies:
- Only DRTV delivers product demonstration to a mass audience in a cost effective manner.
- Only DRTV leverages cost efficiency with national cable networks.
- Only DRTV takes advantage of the ability of national cable television to reach selected, targeted audiences.
- Only DRTV subsidizes the cost of media with profit from sales directly to consumers.
- Only DRTV has surprised the hardware business by driving niche products into retail selling superstars (Little Giant, Craftsman Robogrip, the Rotozip).
Hardware Consumers Need DRTV
In our research, consumers complain about the lack of information at retail stores. They laugh at the idea that traditional advertising helps them make purchasing decisions. And, while the Internet offers a wealth of “information,” they have to already know of a product and be seeking that information for the web to be valuable. In fact, DRTV fills a critical gap in their shopping experience: discovering new products.
So DRTV succeeds by offering consumers what’s important and meaningful to them —communication and demonstration they can’t get anywhere else. This combination produces amazing results like building higher margins (when people understand your product’s value you get more money for your product). Experience shows that educating consumers on a product using demonstration increases the value in consumer’s eyes even more than a good brand name — value that turns into higher margins at retail.
Before big box stores, the neighborhood hardware store provided consumers with information, understanding, and the ability to help people solve problems. But the big box stores changed all that and offered manufacturers much larger markets — but without the communication opportunity.
New Products or Shelf Potatoes
DRTV is ideal for introducing new products. It can also reinvigorate sales on tools that have been around for years. Most of the tools that have succeeded on DRTV had been on the shelf for years. DRTV’s role was to bring those tools alive and make them meaningful to consumers --- turning them from lackluster “shelf-potatoes” into category leaders.
DRTV offers manufacturers the opportunity to recover the value of communicating — with television. Shouldn’t you consider building your success through DRTV’s hardware store?
Case Study: Drill Doctor Drill Bit Sharpener
When Drill Doctor released its product, no one thought that a drill bit sharpener could succeed on TV — much less at retail. Especially one that is priced at $100.
But, with smart application of the 30-minute format, Drill Doctor sales have been fueled by television advertising — and helped them gain full distribution at the big box stores as well as nearly every other hardware outlet.
First introduced in November 2001, this infomercial campaign has been on-air ever since. This TV support is so successful that over 1/2 of all Drill Doctor sales are influenced by the infomercial.
Background on Doug Garnett
Doug Garnett is Founder & President of Atomic Direct — an advertising agency specializing in brands, consumer strategy, infomercials, and driving sales with television. Atomic focuses on hardware, housewares, and recreational products. Doug is also an adjunct professor of advertising in the business school at Portland State University.
Doug has worked with many hardware manufacturers including Sears, Newell-Rubbermaid, and the Professional Tool Manufacturing (Drill Doctor).