Why Effective Marketers Must Embrace Direct Response Principles

Okay, just hear us out.

We know that the words “direct response marketing” evoke eye rolls and shudders out of many self-respecting marketers. According to prevailing wisdom, direct marketing is old-school. It’s gauche. It’s pushy. It’s…telemarketing. Ugh.

We understand. But we also have a confession to make: before founding A Brave New, we actually got our start working in direct response agencies. As we moved into the world of B2B marketing, we used to be a little embarrassed about our past.

But direct response marketing taught us some essential things that most marketing often glosses over — how to be tactical, disciplined, and laser-focused on actual results.

A Brave New is a B2B growth marketing agency, but we’ve got something up our sleeve: the core principles of direct response marketing. We’re going to share what they are, why they work, and how you can use them to make any marketing program more effective.

Core Principles of Direct Response Marketing

The core of direct response marketing is clear and direct communication.

The goal of the direct marketer is not to be creative, or clever, or create something that ends up in a list of Top 10 Raddest Ads of the Year. The goal of the direct marketer is to provoke the audience to take the desired action.

Let’s talk about the 6 principles that define direct response marketing, and how they all contribute to that single-minded goal.

Opposites Attract (Your Audience)

Okay, okay, okay. Are you confused yet?

If you’re familiar with the principles of inbound marketing, the rules of direct response marketing sound like they’re the exact opposite of a pure inbound or content-first methodology.

Inbound marketing is about helping your audience—winning hearts and minds by being radically helpful with perfectly timed education. It aims to build trust and connection between your brand and your audience. Direct response doesn’t do any of those things. It’s about asking the audience to do something, telling them the consequences if they don’t act and the rewards if they do. And then asking again.

So exactly why should you embrace the principles of direct marketing? This might seem like an either/or decision. Here’s why it’s not:

We love inbound marketing, and we think it works.

But pure inbound tactics alone aren’t as effective at provoking action as they are at creating engagement and building trust. Our experience with direct response marketing has taught us that inbound works better when there’s a balance between education and directly asking people to do what we want them to do.

Pure inbound marketing is all about attracting your audience by being helpful and then waiting for them to take action. If you’ve done your job well, they may eventually take that action but you don’t have the power to predict when that will happen.

Direct marketing makes the first move.

It’s about spurring the audience into action. And our clients hire us to get results, not to be inbound marketing purists. That’s why we use all the tools available to us.

By incorporating the discipline of direct response in the right places, you can get better results from your inbound marketing program. That’s because these tactics tap into some essential truths about human behavior.

Here’s a side-by-side comparison

of a purely educational ad vs one that makes a direct ask to show you what we’re talking about:

What Direct Response Gets Right About Human Behavior

Like you, we put care and concentration into the content we offer, the visuals we design, and the emails we send. But here’s the thing: our audiences don’t. And we know that.

To the average person, a marketing email from you (or from us!) is not their highest priority, and they won’t read it from start to finish. They might click on it, and they might quickly scan it, and they might glance at the CTA link. Or they might do none of those things.

That’s why direct marketers get to their point quickly, repeat their call to action multiple times, and emphasize it in bold font. They don’t expect the reader to take in every detail.

Here’s a side-by-side comparison

Weak Email:

Subject: What's in a brand? ¹

Preview: Branding is more important than ever ²

A brand is more than a name and a logo. It’s the memory that you leave in the mind of your customers. It’s your responsibility to make sure that memory is unique. ³

This is especially important because of the increase in competition. Hubspot’s Dan Tyre reports that competition has increased more than 4x over the last 4 years. That’s a lot. ⁴

We can help you develop a unique brand with our accelerated branding process. Schedule a free consultation. ⁵

Josh Dougherty
Co-Founder & CEO

1. Subject line isn’t “you” focused
2. Preview doesn’t tell specifically what to do
3. Intro is education focused rather than immediately capturing attention and telling someone why information is relevant
4. Data could be more specific and establish a clear connection between the data and the needs of the audience
5. Effectiveness is hurt because CTA is saved til the end of the email and not strongly connected as the core idea throughout the email

Strong Email:

Subject: Leave your mark ¹

Preview: Schedule your free brand consultation today ²

Companies used to have an average of 7 competitors, according to Hubspot’s Dan Tyre. In 2018, the average was more than 40. Today the number is even bigger.

When the competition is fierce, you need a brand that stands out. That’s why I hope you’ll schedule a free consultation today. ³

Your brand is more than a name and a logo. It’s the memory that you leave in the mind of your customers. It’s your responsibility to make sure that memory is unique. We’d like to help you with that process. ⁴

I’d love to talk with you about some ideas for increasing your uniqueness—here’s a link to my personal calendar so we can schedule some time. Looking forward to connecting. ⁵

Josh Dougherty
Co-Founder & CEO

1. Subject line is “you” focused, tells reader to do something.
2. Direct preview so that the reader isn’t surprised when they read email
3. Intro immediately captures attention and communicates consequences of inaction, then shifts towards call to action
4. Additional content uses deeper information to reinforce
5. Final CTA keeps up the theme while adding personal touch

Do we believe that oft-quoted and contested aphorism that the attention span of the average human being has shrunk lower than a goldfish’s?

Well, we don’t market to an audience of goldfish, so we’d consider that a vanity metric.

Here’s the thing: nobody is competing for the attention of goldfish. Everybody is competing for your audience’s attention.

• 

  “306.4 billion emails were sent and received each day in 2020 (Statista”

• 

  “Most Americans are exposed to around 4,000 to 10,000 ads each day (Forbes)”

• 

  “On average, Americans spend 13 hours and 35 minutes consuming media each day” (Emarketer)

We’re not saying that your audience is lazy or easily distracted. We’re saying that they’re just like almost everyone else—living in a world cluttered with content and contradictory messages. They’re busy cleaning out their inbox, scrolling through their feed, and making split-second decisions about what’s important and what isn’t.

How do they make those split-second decisions? Well, to put it in zoological terms, it’s the lizard brain that often makes the call. People want to impress their bosses and avoid the negative consequences of making a bad decision at work, but they aren’t often persuaded by logical arguments alone. They’re motivated by the desire for achievement, safety, belonging, competence, power, and autonomy. Or, they’re reacting to fear, envy, and jealousy. The best brands tap into these primal emotions and fulfill the need that they create.

Most of the time, an audience won’t be interested in what you’re offering — until they urgently need it. Then they’re highly motivated and spurred into action by a strong emotion. The key is to keep sending your message until it catches them at the right moment.

Direct response marketing doesn’t try to change human behavior. It understands and accepts human behavior as it is. Then, it responds in the most effective way to get action: through clear communication, repetition, and singular focus.

How to Incorporate
Direct Response Tactics
into Inbound Marketing

To start bringing direct response tactics into your marketing, use a SMART approach (specific, measurable, actionable, relevant, time-bound):

• Specific

  Each piece of marketing collateral should focus on asking the audience to do one thing. Excess details cause confusion and too many choices will sidetrack or paralyze your audience.

• Measurable

  Start by deciding how success will be measured. Define what “results” look like.

• Actionable

  Your message should give your audience a good reason to take action immediately, not put it off and forget about it. Remember that their decision will likely happen in a split second.

• Relevant

  Speak to the needs of your audience, and keep your message benefit-oriented in a way that appeals to their emotions. What’s in it for them?

• Time-bound

  Another way to appeal to your audience’s emotions is to create a sense of urgency by giving them a deadline to respond by. If they don’t feel the need to act now, they probably never will.

In our experience, the most powerful marketing combines tactics of inbound marketing and direct response. Here are some of the places we’ve found direct marketing principles to be the most effective:

• Conversion emails
• At the end of nurture pathways
• Landing pages
• Ads

Here’s an example of the difference

between a purely educational landing page and one that uses direct marketing principles:

EDUCATIONAL LANDING PAGE

1. This copy is true but doesn’t direct someone to act
2. Intro is education focused rather than immediately capturing attention and telling someone why information is relevant
3. This headline is weaker because it removes the you focused language, puts the focus on A Brave New not the reader and doesn’t push them to read
4. This sentence is informational but should compel someone to action
5. Note that having no CTA down here reduces conversion rates

DIRECT MARKETING LANDING PAGE

1. Use of the word “free” to generate interest
2. Headline focused on benefits
3. CTA tells user exactly what to do
4. “You” and “benefits” focused language
5. Specific listing of benefits
6. Repeated calls to action

Every time you leave your audience hanging or unsure what to do next, you run the risk of losing them. They may remember to come back to you later—or they may not. So make it a no-brainer for them to take action immediately.

By taking a direct, disciplined, and laser-focused approach at the right moments, you can cut through the noise and make it radically easy for your audience to respond. You don’t have to be awkward or pushy. Just meet the audience where they are, design your communication with their challenges in mind, and provide them with a clear path forward. You’ll see the results. That’s why no inbound marketing program is complete without a little bit of direct marketing.

And when in doubt, repeat your CTA.