Electronic Retailer Magazine, Itv Story

+Bienvenido a Miami!Page 32

Interactive TV: Just a Click AwayPage 36

DR Disruption Social and Over-the-Top television are revolutionizing the way people view and interact with content across platforms and networks. Direct marketers must learn these new trends if they hope to survive TV’s brave new world.Page 28

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Through conceptionThrough developmentThrough promotionThrough protectionThrough success

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4 electronicRETAILER | February 2012

tableof

CONTENTS28DR DisruptionSocial and Over-the-Top television are revolutionizing the way people view and interact with content across platforms and networks. Direct mar-keters must learn these new trends if they hope to survive TV’s brave new world.By Sarah Sain

32Bienvenido a Miami!The Great Ideas Summit 2012 returns to Florida, where ERA members and direct-to-consumer industry leaders will gather for education, networking and fun in the sun.By Sarah Sain

36Interactive TV: Just a Click AwayLearn how both viewers and the direct marketing industry will reap the benefits of interactive television’s rapid growth in 2012. By Jacqueline Renfrow

40What Your Consumer Says About You MattersThe marriage of customer testimonials and social media is unveiling legal issues that the FTC and the industry must quickly balance in order for direct response to maintain its integrity. By Peter Marinello

7 Calendar of EventsUpcoming Industry Events February through May

11 Industry ReportsConnect, Collaborate and Discover with MyERA

52 Member Spotlight

54 Advertiser SpotlightHighlighting This Month’s Advertisers

55 Bulletin BoardDG and Discovery Launch Digital Distribution System

55 Advertiser Index

56 Classifieds

16 eMarketer ResearchWho is the U.S. Hispanic Market?

18 IMS Retail RankingsThe Top 25 Shows and Spots

20 Jordan Whitney’s Top CategoriesThe Top 5 Shows and Spots and the Top 3 Categories

22 Lockard & Wechsler’s Clearance & Price IndexIndex for 30, 60 and 120 Seconds

DEPARTMENTS RESEARCH

FEATURES

Social and Over-the-Top TV are revolutionizing

the way people view programming.

28

Vol. 9, No. 2 | February 2012

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TABLE OF CONTENTS

COLUMNS CHANNEL CROSSING

8 Your Association, Your Bottom LineA Time for Community and ConversationBy Julie Coons

14 FTC ForumWhere the FTC Says Facebook Went WrongBy Lesley Fair

24 Ask the ExpertWho Says Kids’ Products Don’t Sell on DRTV?Timothy Hawthorne

26 From the Executive’s DeskCreate the Complete PackageBy Steven Feinberg

44 Guest ViewpointFor Hispanic Vote, the Campaign is OnBy Marcelino Miyares Jr.

46 Guest ViewpointOwn Your Own Online MediaBy Jaffer Ali

58 Rick PetryMINI MeBy Rick Petry

49 DRTVSupporting Retail: Is This the Answer? By Dick Wechsler

50 FulfillmentAre You Delivering a Great Customer Experience?By Yolanda Kokayi

51 TeleservicesStop Losing Thousands of LeadsBy Scott Richards

electronicretailermag.com©2012 Electronic Retailing Association. All rights reserved. Published by Naylor, LLC. No part of this publication may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including by photocopy, recording or information storage and retrieval system, without permission in writing from the publisher. Reprints of articles are available. Visit www.naylor.com, click on “Client Support” and select “Article Reprint.”

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February 2012 | electronicRETAILER 7

FEBRUARY 2012 | VOLUME 9 • NUMBER 2Electronic Retailing Association2000 North 14th Street, Suite 300Arlington, VA 22201Toll Free: (800) 987-6462 | Phone: (703) 841-1751Fax: [email protected]

We’re moving! Look for ERA’s new address at www.retailing.org.

President and CEO: Julie CoonsExecutive Director, ERA Europe: Marcel AvarguesChief Financial Officer and Chief Operating Officer: Kevin L. KellyVice President, Government Affairs: Bill McClellanVice President, Marketing and Content: Dave MartinVice President, Sales and Group Show Director: Evan Shubin

Electronic Retailer magazine is published for ERA by

Naylor, LLC5950 NW 1st PlaceGainesville, FL 32607Toll Free: (800) 369-6220 | Phone: (352) 332-1252Fax: (352) 331-3525www.electronicretailermag.com

EDITORIALSenior Editor: Sarah [email protected] | (352) 333-6020Managing Editor: Elaine [email protected] | (800) 856-8092

Layout and Design: Barry SenykPhotography: Brian DavisMarketing: Kaydee CurrieContributing Writers: Peter Marinello, Jacqueline RenfrowContributing Columnists: Jaffer Ali, Lesley Fair, Steven Feinberg, Timothy Hawthorne, Yolanda Kokayi, Marcelino Miyares Jr., Rick Petry, Scott Richards, Dick Wechsler

Editorial SubmissionsSend press releases and other data to [email protected]

ADVERTISINGPublisher | Charles [email protected] | (888) 404-6154 Publication Manager | Heather [email protected] | (352) 333-3463 Publishing Consultant | Gina [email protected] | (949) 276-2346Publication Director | Matthew [email protected] | (352) 333-6014Sales Representatives | Pam [email protected] | (352) 333-3423| Shaun [email protected] | (352) 333-3385| Scott [email protected] | (352) 333-3446| Jessica [email protected] | (352) 333-3357

MAGAZINE ADVISORY BOARDMAB Chairman: Dick Wechsler, Lockard & Wechsler Direct

Hal Altman, Motivational Fulfillment & Logistics Services

Brendan Condon, REVShare

Danette Dickerman, R2C Group

Stacy Durand, Revenue Frontier/Media Design Group

Marty Fahncke, FawnKey & Associates

Edward Glynn, Venable LLP

Harry Hill, Oak Lawn Marketing Group

Maria Kennedy, Discovery Communications

Peter Koeppel, Koeppel Direct

Gary Latz, a2b Fulfillment Inc.

Collette Liantonio, Concepts TV Productions

Robert Logie, Studio Moderna

Ken Musante, Direct Response Payments

Rick Petry, Creative Writer, LLC

Joan Renfrow, Onyx Productions Direct Inc.

Gene Silverman, Hawthorne Direct

Anthony Sziklai, Moulton Logistics Management

Jeff Tuller, Savvier

Dan Zifkin, Zephyr Media Group

SUBSCRIPTIONSEmail Jerry Rozario, [email protected]

Published February 2012 ERA-M0212/6655

Please send your upcoming industry event listings to Sarah Sain at [email protected]. Note: Dates and locations are subject to change.

CALENDAR FEBRUARY-MAY 2012 INDUSTRY EVENTS

Feb. 6-10

Online Marketing Summit 2012February 6-10, 2012Hilton San Diego BayfrontSan Diego, Calif.For more information, visit www.onlinemarketingsummit.com

March 4-9

eMetrics Marketing Optimization SummitMarch 4-9, 2012Marriott Marquis San FranciscoSan Francisco, Calif.For more information, visit www.emetrics.org/sanfrancisco

April 20

2012 ERA Hong Kong SeminarPresented by ERAApril 20, 2012Hong Kong Convention & Exhibition Centre (CEC), 1 Expo DriveWanchai, Hong KongFor more information, visit www.retailing.org/events

May 7-8

Government Affairs Fly-InPresented by ERAMay 7-8, 2012Washington, D.C.For more information, visit www.retailing.org/events

Social Media Strategies SummitFebruary 7-9, 2012Mirage HotelLas Vegas, NevadaFor more information, visit www.socialmediastrategiessummit.com/2012vegas

Feb. 7-9

The Great Ideas Summit 2012Presented by ERAFebruary 27-29, 2012Fontainebleau Miami BeachMiami, Fla.For more information, visit www.eragreatideas.org

Feb. 27-29

Washington in Miami – A Networking Reception to Benefit the ERA PACPresented by ERA6:00 p.m.-7:30 p.m. February 28, 2012Fontainebleau Miami BeachMiami, Fla.For more information, visit www.retailing.org/events

Feb. 28

Merchant Risk Council’s 10th Annual e-Commerce Payments & Risk ConferenceMarch 27-29, 2012Wynn Las VegasLas Vegas, Nev.For more information, visit www.merchantriskcouncil.org

March 27-29

ad:tech San FranciscoApril 3-4, 2012Moscone Center WestSan Francisco, CaliforniaFor more information, visit www.ad-tech.com

April 3-4


tA Time for Community and Conversation

There’s been a lot of buzz surrounding The Great Ideas Summit 2012. And much of that excitement is attrib-uted to our return to Miami – a favorite destination for many. We’ll be rolling out the red carpet at the Fontainebleau Miami Beach and gearing up for three days of high-powered networking and deal making. Aside from the receptions, exhibits and special events on our agenda, we also have assembled a great educa-tion program that will include the Keynote Presentation along with long-form and short-form sessions located right on the Show Floor.

On February 28 and 29, ERA will present education featuring four Panel Discussions (hour-long sessions) and eight Lightning Sessions (12-minute presentations). ERA staff, the ERA Education Committee and more than 300 ERA members voted on these final 12 sessions via a crowd-sourcing initiative. Thank you to the Education Committee for, once again, supporting this initiative.

The 12 sessions include:• 10 Profound Marketing Secrets That Produce Big Profits

– Industry experts will reveal 10 of the most profound hidden secrets you can use to accelerate your results!

• Which Came First – Retail or DRTV in Seeking the Golden Egg? – Hear from major players in the industry as they compare and contrast the direct marketer mold from the start to retail outlet modeling to incorpora-tion of DRTV.

• The Real Men and Women of Madison Avenue – Understand the three things that you must do to create a memorable, lasting, results-driving brand campaign.

• The Road to Retail – A Superhighway with Many Exits! – Attendees will learn which path leads to increasing ROI and the shortest route to success.

• Apparel – The HOT Category for DRTV – Learn more about these popular apparel products and how you can market the next “must have.”

• Positive Reputation = Revenue: Increasing Your Online Market Share – This online reputation management session will teach DRTV marketers and service pro-viders how to navigate their online market share.

• For the Hispanic Vote, the Campaign is on! – Discover why ignoring the Hispanic electorate in 2012 could be at your peril!

• Deal of the Day Sites: A Game Changer – Learn how to immediately capitalize on this new segment by educating them about industry players, success stories, roadblocks and the economics of the deal.

• The Multichannel Marketing Advantage – Learn how to leverage all marketing channels from digital to direct mail to DRTV so that you can maximize sales at the lowest possible cost.

• Create Meaning ful Consumer Connections by Integrating Mobile with DR – How to build and implement an effective mobile and direct response strategy to build meaningful customer connections, and increase ROI and customer loyalty.

• How A Virtual Store Leads to More Sales – Understand how a 3D store with augmented reality allows customers to have an in-store experience from home.

• Don’t Run Your DR Campaign by the Seat of Your Pants: Have a Plan! – The 20 elements of a good DR plan, which include market opportunity, independent research, demographics and legal substantiation.On Tuesday, February 28, I encourage all of you

to attend this year’s Keynote Presentation titled “DR Disruption – What You Need to Know About Social and Over-the-Top TV.” I will be moderating this panel discussion and joined by leading experts Brendan Condon of REVShare, Andrew Gordon of Direct Impact Group and Ben Mendelson of the ITV Alliance to learn more about these technologies and the impact that social and OTT TV might have on our industry.

As you can see, we’ve put together an assortment of sessions designed to not only provide our attendees with valuable information, but also to serve as a conduit for conversation. It’s an opportunity to get people talking about the topics and issues affecting our business today. We want to keep the communication going between our speakers and attendees long after The Great Ideas Summit concludes. That’s why we invite ERA members to participate in our online community, MyERA, at myera.retailing.org and start a dialogue. This custom-ized social networking tool puts you in touch with our industry’s thought leaders, and gives us – ERA staff – direct feedback on the types of educational content you would like to see at future conferences.

Finally, be sure not to miss ERA’s Washington in Miami, a high-powered networking reception to help raise funds for the association’s E-Retail Political Action Committee.

For more information about The Great Ideas Summit 2012 or to register, please visit www.ERAGreatIdeas.org or retailing.org.

I look forward to seeing you in Miami!

YOUR ASSOCIATION, YOUR BOTTOM LINE BY JULIE COONS

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T H E G R E A T I D E A S S U M M I T R E T U R N S T O M I A M I .

F E B R UA RY 2 7-2 9, 2 01 2 | M I A M I , F L | F O N TA I N E B L E AU M I A M I B E AC H

For 2012, we’re back in the hottest, coolest city on the planet. The Great Ideas Summit is at Miami’s

fabulously reimagined, modernly luxurious Fontainebleau Miami Beach. Get the chance to shake

hands with nearly 800 decision makers, fi ll your brain with the latest selling strategies, and raise

your glass (and the roof)! It’s ERA’s Access2 with the right people and everything you need to grow …

all under the golden Florida sun. Register now and we’ll C you there. ERAGreatIdeas.org

C - L E V E L

GREAT IDEAS AT


Connect, Collaborate and Discover with MyERAARLINGTON, Va. – The Electronic Retailing Association (ERA) gave its members an early holiday present with the launch of its new online networking community, MyERA.

MyERA is a user-friendly online net-working community that allows ERA members to easily connect with one another, find new business leads, share ideas and content and much more. It’s the direct response industry’s leading resource for actionable content. The com-munity is also where ERA’s committees and councils are managed and also where ERA members can gain access to special members-only information, including eMarketer reports and best practice briefs.

Dave Martin, vice president of market-ing and content at ERA, says MyERA is a valuable resource that offers members new ways to think about and do business.

“We’re very excited to provide our members with this new and excit-ing community,” Martin says. “We encourage users to utilize MyERA as a business social networking tool that will help them stay closely connected

with fellow members and the industry at large.”

The MyERA website, myera.retailing.org, is a powerhouse tool for network-ing and collaboration. By logging into the community and creating a profile, both members and non-members can get access to personalized content alerts, exclusive info from the ERA Knowledge Center, easy access to con-nect and network directly with elite leaders in the direct response industry, start discussions with your peers and much more.

For more information about MyERA, contact Dave Martin at [email protected] or visit myera.retailing.org.

INDUSTRY REPORTS

Registration Now Open for ERA Europe ConferenceBRUSSELS, Belgium – Registration is now open for the 2012 Electronic HomeShopping Conference. After a record-breaking 2011 show in Stockholm, the ERA Europe Conference continues its travels, making its next stop in Berlin.

Taking place on June 24-26 at the Marriott Hotel near the famous

Brandenburg Gate, the show will feature many of the same elements that made Stockholm such a success.

“The standard was set high with Stockholm, but Berlin has its own f lavor,” says ERA Europe Executive Director Marcel Avargues. “The busi-ness should be more active; the edu-cation sessions are to be on the right track.” When asked why people should attend, he explains, “People will meet the entire core of the industry in Europe here. Whether you’re a vendor, an

inventor or a service provider to the industry, this conference is the place to go.”

“We want people to come to the con-ference and do great business and have a great time. That’s what it’s all about. You can meet all the right people in Europe in one location,” says Conference Director Nancy Barkan.

For more information about the 2012 Electronic HomeShopping Conference or to register, visit www.e-homeshopping.org.

As Seen on TV Inc. Completes $15 Million in Equity FinancingCLEARWATER, Fla. – As Seen On TV Inc., parent company of TVGoods Inc., recently received $12,155,000 in equity financing, bringing the total raised in recent months to $15 million.

The transaction provides the capi-tal necessary to accelerate market-ing and promotional efforts for a variety of products, as well as for the development of products to be introduced during the beginning of 2012. Management intends to use the majority of the net proceeds from the offering for purchasing product inven-tory for AsSeenOnTV.com, producing


new infomercial projects, building out retail distribution, media buying, and expanding global distribution and marketing of its products.

According to Chairman of the Board Kevin Harrington, “We are gratified that investors are showing support for our expansion plans and recent inno-vations. In this economy, we realize it can be difficult to raise capital to help facilitate growth but we are succeeding with this strategy, which can help the company, our partners and inventors achieve their goals.”

Canis Launches the UK’s First Shopping Radio NetworkLONDON, England – Canis Media has teamed up with WRN Broadcast to launch the UK’s first shopping radio station, Shop Radio.

Shop Radio will be broadcast on the Sky platform 22 hours a day, seven days a week and can also be found on the web at www.shopradio.com.

This new radio station will be the first of its kind in the UK to bring radio listeners the same quality products that TV viewers have had access to for more than a decade.

Ed Hall, chief executive of Canis Media, says, “I have been looking for the right partner to launch Shop Radio for nearly 10 years. WRN Broadcast is a great distributor of radio stations, and a combination of our market knowledge and experience and WRNB’s history in radio seems like a winning combina-tion to me.”

Swipe Solutions’ Rapid Response Team a SuccessLOS ANGELES, Calif. – Swipe Payment Solutions announces the success of its new Rapid Response Team. The five-person team responds to client requests, support issues, proposals or any needed action immediately.

Manned with the technology, more than 75 years combined banking and Glossary Link payment processing experience and 20 domestic banks

Read Electronic Retailer Magazine Online!

The latest editions of Electronic Retailer are available in our new digital format at www.elec-tronicretailermag.com. Also, browse back issues from the last five years, all online and at your fingertips. The new digital format is available as well via your smartphone or iPad and has a host of interactive features, including offline download, bookmarking and sending of pages to social networking sites.

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INDUSTRY REPORTS


STATWATCHBY IRV BRECHNER

As video takes over the web (180 million Americans watched online video in a single month**), having extensive video on DRTV product websites is a no-brainer.

While many DRTV advertisers do indeed have their short- or long-form commercials on their websites, that’s often where it ends. With all the video footage marketers have, there’s an opportunity to take it to the next level.

Let video do the selling instead of dense text. Think a slew of

10-30 second videos, using existing footage that you’ve already shot, repurposed for a differ-ent purpose. One might be “See how it works” with animation of the product’s operation. Another might be “See what a professional says” with one or more video testimonials. Or “Hear what the inventor says” with a video interview of the products’ inventor.

Think short and sweet “video bursts” that take

advantage of our insa-tiable appetite for video. Chances are good your online conversion rate will benefit.

*MarketingExperiments quoted in SeeWhy Webinar, 11/8/11; Internet Retailer, 4/10/11

**BizReport, 10/26/11

Irv Brechner is EVP and creator of Acquirgy’s Customer Acquisition IntelCenter and can be reached at [email protected]. Look for an extended version of StatWatch in the ERA Knowledge Center.

BY IRV BRECHNER

for our customers, Vice President of Business Development Curtis Kleinman says the company is proud of the team’s successful July launch and of it has accomplished in the months since.

The Rapid Response Team can respond within minutes and hours to nearly all requests. It is also available to help its priority e-commerce and direct response customers during off-hours, including evenings and weekends.

For more information, visit www.swipellc.com

Cannella Response Television Moves to New HeadquartersBURLINGTON, Wis. – Cannel la Response Television, the largest info-mercial media company in the DRTV

industry, has moved into its new cor-porate headquarters. The newly con-structed building doubles Cannella’s space to 9,600 square feet in order to accommodate a significant staff expan-sion necessitated by record growth for the company.

The new address for Cannel la Response Television is 848 Liberty Drive, Burlington, WI 53105. The com-pany’s main phone number, (262) 763-4810, remains the same.

“We have been eagerly anticipating this day since we broke ground on our new building in June,” says Frank Cannella, founder and executive director of Cannella Response Television. “Our new headquarters is testament to our continuing growth, our standing as DRTV industry leaders and, most sig-nificantly, to the people here who made it all possible.”

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It’s no surprise the FTC’s proposed privacy settlement with Facebook has attracted industry attention. The terms of a particular order apply only to the company in question, of course. But savvy retailers use FTC cases as compliance checklists to help them stay off the law enforcement radar screen. Where did Facebook go wrong, and what tips can your business take from the case?

The FTC’s complaint charges eight separate violations of the law. According to the FTC, Facebook falsely promised that people could restrict their information to a limited audi-ence, but then went ahead and shared it with users’ friends’ apps. In addition, the FTC says that when Facebook changed its privacy practices in December 2009, it overrode users’ existing privacy choices in a way that was both deceptive and unfair. What’s more, says the FTC, Facebook deceived people about how much of their information was shared with apps they used.

What about Facebook’s promise that “We don’t share your information with advertisers unless you tell us to”? The FTC says that in many instances, Facebook shared with advertisers the user ID of people who clicked on ads. The complaint also charges that before awarding apps the company’s “Verified App” seal, Facebook promised to put them through a “detailed review process.” But according to the FTC, Facebook really didn’t do anything different to check out the security of those apps. The FTC also says Facebook made deceptive claims about its photo and video deletion policy. “When you delete an account, it is permanently deleted from Facebook,” the company claimed. But even after users followed Facebook’s procedure for deactivating or deleting an account, Facebook still served up their photos and videos to anyone who accessed them via the content URL.

Electronic retailers who do business in Europe understand the significance of Facebook’s promise that it complied with U.S.-EU Safe Harbor Framework, a mechanism by which American companies can transfer data consistent with European law. But according to the FTC, Facebook’s pledge wasn’t truthful.

What does the future look like for Facebook’s privacy practices? The order includes a broad ban on deception and a violation kicks in substantial financial penalties. Furthermore, when Facebook offers privacy settings on its site, it has to honor them. What if Facebook wants to share certain broad classes of information in a way that exceeds the privacy settings a user has already chosen? Facebook will have to clearly and prominently disclose what it wants to do and then get each user’s affirmative express consent. What about just changing the privacy policy? No dice. That’s not “clear and prominent” under the order.

The company also has agreed to a comprehensive overhaul of its privacy practices, including regular audits by independent outsiders for the next 20 years. The program has to address privacy risks posed by existing products and new ones that right now are just a fleeting thought in a Facebook developer’s imagination. To ensure compliance, the order imposes strict monitoring and reporting requirements.

Looking for tips to help keep your company on the right side of the law? Visit the Privacy & Security portal at business.ftc.gov.

Lesley Fair is an attorney with the FTC’s Bureau of Consumer Protection.

FTC Forum

INDUSTRY REPORTS

Where the FTC Says Facebook Went WrongBY LESLEY FAIR

According to the FTC, Facebook falsely promised that people

could restrict their information to a limited audience, but then went ahead and shared it with

users’ friends’ apps.

The DRTV Experts ThatDrive Multi-Channel Sales

At Koeppel Direct we start by thinking inside the box to deliver

sales outside the box. Why? Because direct response television

(DRTV) is a powerful hub that educates buyers and drives sales

across all channels.

The Koeppel Direct team, led by Wharton MBA Peter Koeppel,

offers superior media planning strategies, and proprietary research

and analytics, combined with buying clout – all designed to ensure

your success.Christena Garduno, Chief Media Strategist and Peter Koeppel, President

Meet Us At ERA's Great Ideas Summit, 2/27-2/29/12, Fontainebleau Miami Beach, contact us at 972-732-6110 or visit www.koeppeldirect.com.

570155_Koeppel.indd 1 17/01/12 3:22 PM


EMARKETER RESEARCH

Who is the U.S. Hispanic Market?The U.S. Hispanic population is booming, and eMarketer estimates that by the end of this year 66 percent of it will be online.

As the number of Hispanics and their spending power continue to increase, so will the role of digital media in their daily lives.Marketers who want to reach them have a number of factors to consider. Language is only one of the issues to address.

While English may be many Hispanics’ primary language, they often still rely on Spanish to get information they trust.Technology and media usage are also key. Hispanics are early adopters of many of the latest devices, including smartphones

and tablets. They are heavy consumers of digital media and participate in a wide range of content activities as they make the desktop and mobile internet an integral part of daily life.

U.S. Buying Power*, by Race/Ethnicity, 1990, 2000, 2010 & 2015 (billions)

1990 2000 2010 2015

White $3,788.7 $6,349.6 $9,439.3 $11,841.3

Black $316.3 $600.2 $957.3 $1,247.4

Asian $115.4 $274.4 $543.7 $775.1

Multiracial $0.0 $59.6 $115.5 $164.6

American Indian $19.6 $40.0 $67.7 $90.3

Total $4,239.9 $7,323.7 $11,123.5 $14,118.7

Hispanic (can be of any race) $210.0 $499.0 $1,036.0 $1,482.0

Note: numbers may not add up to total due to rounding; *defined as disposable personal income, meaning the share of total personal income available for personal consumption, personal interest payments and savings

Source: Selig Center for Economic Growth, Terry College of Business, The University of Georgia, “The Multicultural Economy 2010,” Dec. 1, 2010

U.S. Hispanic Adult and Child Population, 2000 & 2010 (millions and % change)

Note: numbers may not add up to total due to rounding

Source: Pew Hispanic Center, “Census 2010” 50 Million Latinos,” March 24, 2011

2000

12.3

23.0

2010

17.1

33.3

50.543.0%

38.8%

35.3

Children (<18) Adults (18+) Total

45.2%


U.S. Hispanic Internet Users and Penetration, 2009-2015 (millions and % Hispanic population)

2009

27.7

2010

30.1

2011

32.2

2012

34.9

2013

37.0

2014

39.8

2015

42.1

Hispanic internet users % of Hispanic population

58% 61% 63% 66% 68% 71%73%

Note: can be of any race; individuals of any age who use the internet from any location via any device at least once per month

Source: eMarketer, January 2011

U.S. Hispanic Mobile Phone Users, by Age and Gender, 2009 & 2010 (% of respondents in each group )

2009 2010

Gender

Male 80% 80%

Female 71% 73%

Age

18-29 81% 90%

30-44 80% 80%

45-59 73% 73%

60+ 58% 50%

Note: 2009 n=1,754; 2010 n=1,375

Source: Pew Hispanic Center, “Latinos and Digital Technology, 2010,” Feb. 9, 2011

Actions Taken After Seeing an Ad According to U.S. Hispanic vs. Non-Hispanic Internet Users, October 2010 (% of respondents)

Search the internet for product/brand information43%

37%

Comparison shop for lowest price39%

31%

Shop in physical stores for product/brand38%

36%

Talk about it with friends/family36%

31%

Read product reviews30%

23%

Shop online retailers20%

16%

Nothing13%

17%

Hispanic Non-Hispanic

Note: ages 13+

Source: comScore, Inc., Conectados!: Understanding the U.S. Hispanic Online Consumer,” provided to eMarketer, Nov. 19, 2010


RETAIL RANKINGS

RETAIL INFOMERCIAL RANKINGS BY MEDIA FOR DECEMBER 2011

LONG-FORM PRODUCTS SOLD ON TVBased solely on media spending for programs aired on national cable networks monitored, media index and web activity.

© Copyright 2012 Infomercial Monitoring Service Inc.™ All rights reserved. IMSTVOnline.com. Satellite 2, 810-812 Park Way, Philadelphia, PA 19008. Phone (610) 328-6902. Fax: (610) 328-6791. Email [email protected]. IMS is a research and publishing company that tracks both long-form infomercials and short-form DRTV spots on national cable, broadcast and satellite networks. IMS Rankings are for December 2011. Rankings for each month are based on long-form infomercial media and short-form spot frequency of programs aired on networks monitored. IMS database and video library services involve all aspect of the DR industry. IMS provides weekly and monthly reports, rankings, verifi cations, evaluations, research, consulting, fi lm and video production and post production. No part of any IMS reports may be reproduced or transmitted in any form electronic or mechanical, including photocopy, or any information storage and retrieval system without permission in writing from IMS. IMS is not responsible for any loss due to errors or omissions in information provided, or for any loss of service due to technical or other diffi culties. Please visit IMSTVOnline.com for more information.

Rank Product Marketing Company Category Price

1 NuWave Oven Hearthware Kitchen Three payments of $39.99 plus $29.95 S&H

2 Shark Steam Pocket Euro-Pro Household Four payments of $39.95 plus S&H

3 My Pillow LifeBrands Household 60-day risk-free off er

4 MagicJack MagicJack Computers & Electronics 30-day free trial

5 Total Gym Total Gym Fitness Health & Fitness 30-day trial for $49.95

6 Meaningful Beauty Guthy-Renker Beauty $39.95 plus $5.99 S&H

7 Ninja 1100 Euro-Pro Kitchen Four payments of $39.95 with free S&H

8 Zumba Zumba Fitness Health & Fitness Three payments of $29.95 plus $15.95 S&H

9 Brazil Butt Lift Beachbody Health & Fitness Three payments of $19.95 plus $12.95 S&H

10 Wen Guthy-Renker Beauty $29.95 plus $5.99 S&H

11 Insanity Beachbody Health & Fitness Three payments of $39.95 plus $24.95 S&H

12 Genie Bra Tristar Products Fashion $59.99 plus $9.99 S&H

13 NInja Pulse Euro-Pro Operating Kitchen Four payments of $37.50 with free S&H

14 Nopalea TriVita Health & Fitness Free bottle; pay $9.95 S&H

15 Sensa Sensa Products Health & Fitness 30-day trial for $9.95 with free S&H

16 Shark Navigator Lift Away Euro-Pro Household Four payments of $49.95 plus $45.90 S&H

17 Food Lovers Fat Loss System Provida Life Sciences Health & Fitness Six payments of $19.99 plus $19.99 S&H

18 Miracle Fireplace Heat Surge Household $298 plus $49 S&H

19 InStyler Tre Milano Beauty 30-day trial for $14.99 plus $19.99 S&H

20 Tria Laser Tria Beauty Beauty Lead generation

21 10-Minute Trainer Beachbody Health & Fitness Two payments of $39.95 plus $9.95 S&H

22 OrGreenic Telebrands Kitchen $19.99 plus $6.99 S&H

23 P90X Beachbody Health & Fitness Three payments of $39.95 plus $19.95 S&H

24 no!no! Radiancy Beauty Three payments of $89.95 plus $14.95 S&H

25 CarMD CarMD Automotive Three payments of $39.95 plus $14.95 S&H


SPOT RANKING BY FREQUENCY FOR DECEMBER 2011

SHORT-FORM PRODUCTS SOLD ON TVBased solely on frequency of programs aired on national cable networks monitored.

© Copyright 2012 Infomercial Monitoring Service Inc.™ All rights reserved. IMSTVOnline.com. Satellite 2, 810-812 Park Way, Philadelphia, PA 19008. Phone (610) 328-6902. Fax: (610) 328-6791. Email [email protected]. IMS is a research and publishing company that tracks both long-form infomercials and short-form DRTV spots on national cable, broadcast and satellite networks. IMS Rankings are for December 2011. Rankings for each month are based on long-form infomercial media and short-form spot frequency of programs aired on networks monitored. IMS database and video library services involve all aspect of the DR industry. IMS provides weekly and monthly reports, rankings, verifi cations, evaluations, research, consulting, fi lm and video production and post production. No part of any IMS reports may be reproduced or transmitted in any form electronic or mechanical, including photocopy, or any information storage and retrieval system without permission in writing from IMS. IMS is not responsible for any loss due to errors or omissions in information provided, or for any loss of service due to technical or other diffi culties. Please visit IMSTVOnline.com for more information.

Rank Product Marketing Company Category Price S&H

1 Proactiv Solution Guthy-Renker Beauty $19.95 $0

2 Perfect SitUp Perfect Fitness Health & Fitness $59.95 $14.95

3 Mint Evolution Robotics Household $199.99 $0

4 Vibration Tri-Phoria Church & Dwight Co. Personal $0 $0

5 Pajama Jeans Hampton Direct Fashion $39.95 $7.95

6 Pro-Form Ab Glider ICON Health & Fitness Health & Fitness $14.95 $0

7 Slice-O-Matic Telebrands Kitchen $19.99 $6.99

8 Lipozene Obesity Research Institute Health & Fitness $29.95 $0

9 Ahh Bra Ahh Bra Fashion $19.99 $0

10 Salon Express Ontel/Spark Innovators Beauty $10 $6.99

11 Flex Seal Flex Seal Household $19.99 $9.95

12 Forever Lazy Allstar Products Group Fashion $29.95 $7.95

13 Kobalt Double Drive Kobalt Household $19.98 $0

14 Plaque Blast Telebrands Pet Products $10 $6.99

15 PajamaGram The PajamaGram Co. Miscellaneous $0 $0

16 Chef Basket Telebrands Kitchen $10 $6.99

17 Grout Bully Harvest Direct Household $10 $7.95

18 Gray Away Qbeauty Beauty $19.99 $13.98

19 InstaHang Product Trend Household $14.99 $7.95

20 EZ Moves Allstar Products Group Household $19.99 $7.95

21 Twin Draft Guard Hampton Direct Household $19.99 $7.95

22 2012 Gold Buff alo Coin National Collectors Mint Crafts & Hobbies $9.95 $4.95

23 Pro-Form TDF ICON Health & Fitness Health & Fitness $0 $0

24 OrGreenic Telebrands Household $19.99 $6.99

25 Eggies Allstar Products Group Kitchen $10 $7.99


FITNESSRANK SHOW NAME PRODUCT PRICE DISTRIBUTOR

1 Insanity Exercise program $119.85 Beachbody

2 The Firm Express Fitness program $89.85 Gaiam Americas

3 Total Gym Home gym $49.95 trial Total Gym Fitness

4 P90X Fitness DVDs $119.85 Beachbody

5 Zumba Fitness DVDs $89.85 Zumba Fitness

SELF-HELPRANK SHOW NAME PRODUCT PRICE DISTRIBUTOR

1 Free Money Book $29.95 QSN Direct

2 Humana Medicare Medicare Advantage plan Lead generation Humana

3 Brainetics Math/memory training $14.95 trial Launch Pad

4 Total Transformation Parenting program Lead generation Legacy Parenting

5 Life Lock Identity theft protection Lead generation Life Lock

BEAUTYRANK SHOW NAME PRODUCT PRICE DISTRIBUTOR

1 Lifestyle Lift Face lift procedure Lead generation Lifestyle Lift

2 Wen Hair care products $29.95 Guthy-Renker

3 Genie Bra Seamless bra $59.99 Tristar Products

4 Meaningful Beauty Skincare $39.95 Guthy-Renker

5 Tria Laser Hair removal device $445 Tria Beauty

JORDAN WHITNEY’S TOP CATEGORIES

JORDAN WHITNEY’S TOP INFOMERCIAL CATEGORIES FOR DECEMBER 2011

Source: The Jordan Whitney “Greensheet,” published by Jordan Whitney Inc., Tustin, Calif. For information about the “Greensheet,” Jordan Whitney’s consulting, tape library or category specifi c research reports, contact Clare Kogler at Jordan Whitney Inc. Voice: (714) 832-3353; fax: (714) 832-4422; email: [email protected] or visit our website: jwgreensheet.com. ©Jordan Whitney Inc. 2012


HOUSEWARESRANK SPOT NAME PRODUCT PRICE/OFFER DISTRIBUTOR

1 Slice-O-Matic Manual Slicer $19.99 Telebrands

2 Flex Seal Rubber spray sealant $19.99 Swift Response

3 Kobalt Double Drive Screwdriver set N/A Lowe’s

4 Furniture Fix Support panels for furniture $14.99 Hampton Direct

5 Space Bag Vacuum storage bags $19.95 ITW Space Bag

PET PRODUCTSRANK SPOT NAME PRODUCT PRICE/OFFER DISTRIBUTOR

1 Plaque Attack Dental spray for pets $19.95 Exceptional Products

2 Shed-Pal Dog grooming tool $19.95 Telebrands

3 Tagg Pet Tracker Pet tracking device $14.95 trial Qualcomm

4 Pet Rider Car seat throw for pets $14.99 Telebrands

5 Comfy Control Harness Restraint system for dogs $10 Telebrands

TOYSRANK SPOT NAME PRODUCT PRICE/OFFER DISTRIBUTOR

1 Pillow Pets Stuffed animal pillow $19.95 CJ Products/Ontel

2 Wuggle Pets Plush toy making kit $19.99 IdeaVillage

3 Happy Nappers Stuffed pillow for kids $19.99 Merchant Media

4 Fushigi Ball Magic ball toy $19.99 IdeaVillage/Zoom TV

5 Criss Angel Magic Magic kit $29.98 IdeaVillage

JORDAN WHITNEY’S TOP TRADITIONAL SHORTFORM CATEGORIES FOR DECEMBER 2011

Source: The Jordan Whitney “Greensheet,” published by Jordan Whitney Inc., Tustin, Calif. For information about the “Greensheet,” Jordan Whitney’s consulting, tape library or category-specifi c research reports, contact Clare Kogler at Jordan Whitney Inc. Voice: (714) 832-3353; fax: (714) 832-4422; email: [email protected] or visit our website: jwgreensheet.com. ©Jordan Whitney Inc. 2012


LOCKARD & WECHSLER’S CLEARANCE & PRICE INDEX BY EDDIE WILDERS

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The Price and Clearance Indices are based on a 52-week moving average, dating back to the first week of January 2011. The Index is calculated by dividing current week clearance percentage or CPM over the most recent 52-week average clearance or CPM. Trends are now compared to those of 2010.

CLEARANCE INDEX The very soft marketplace that advertisers were enjoying through the beginning of the quarter lasted right into the final week of the year. The higher percentages dur-ing December brought each length above 2010 levels. The 30-second clearance increased from 28 percent to 31 percent, while 60-second clearance rose from 25 percent to 28 percent and 120-second clearance jumped from 15 percent to 21 percent in 2011. Early indications of the 2012 marketplace show that this softness of the inventory should be around through at least the end of the first quarter.

The end of the holiday season brought us into presi-dential primary season with Iowa and New Hampshire kicking off the festivities. Local broadcasters will be in full political blackout windows, and inventory will be extremely difficult to secure.

The soft marketplace continues to afford direct response inventory on both syndication and network. Programming such as The Price is Right and the Today show are prime locations for DR advertisers, and 2012 should continue to afford these opportunities, if the price is right.


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2010 2011

PRICE INDEXStrong December viewership helped curb the 2011 price index, as the year finished strong. Stations such as Hallmark, Fox News and WGN continue to be direct response mainstays. USA, AMC and ESPN remained at the top of the view-ership mountain, while also allowing for a stronger DR presence in select dayparts. With the return of network prime programming, the NFL playoffs and the political season starting in January, viewership promises to increase once again.


aArmed with an insatiable appetite for the unique, pretty, soft and cuddly, today’s kids want more toys, dolls, art kits, pillows, music and entertainment than ever. They don’t even have credit cards yet, but their voices and buying habits are already being heard – and heeded – in many households.

Answering the call is a group of manufacturers and mar-keters who have their fingers on the pulse of the children’s market. They work in a category that hasn’t historically ranked high on the DRTV charts despite the fact that it racks up millions of unit sales annually.

Targeted to toddlers, preteens, teenagers and their par-ents, fun and educational products often translate into suc-cessful retail, web and catalogue plays. That not only helps extend brand life – Kidz Bop, for example, is currently in its 14th version – but also ensures that the products reach multiple generations of children over time.

Market research firm Packaged Facts reports that the kids’ market reached more than $21 billion in disposable income in 2010 and that families spent more than $115 bil-lion on kids in key consumer areas such as food, clothing, personal-care items, entertainment and reading materials. The fact that kids have a lot to say about how that money is spent translates into major opportunities for marketers who get into the minds of these young buyers and figure out what they want.

Sometimes the answer lies in the simplest of ideas. Bees, ladybugs, dogs and unicorns took on new identities in 2003 when Doug Fowkes introduced the world to Pillow Pets. The folding stuffed animals have since morphed into an entire line of plush products that includes blankets, hats and even bedroom slippers. The concept of an animal-shaped pillow is simple enough, but it took Fowkes’ marketing genius and a boost from DRTV to turn these products into a real goldmine.

John Miller, a pioneer who helped build the kids’ category with Better Blocks, Floam, Bendaroos and Pixos, is current president and creative director at Hutton-Miller in Boca Raton, Fla. Miller says those early products – plus newer innovations like Happy Nappers and the Gyro Bowl – have all helped to drive the children’s category.

“We realized early on that success in this category depended on how excited children got over the products, and whether they could get their parents to pick up the phone and place orders,” Miller says. “We call it ‘pester power’ and it works very well with kids’ products.”

However, the children’s category can be fickle: Kids sniff out inferior products quickly and jettison them to

the bottom of the toy box. “The key is to produce and advertise quality products that truly excite the child,” says Miller, who calls DRTV the “jumping off point” for all other distribution channels. “DRTV toy commercials have evolved from simply introducing products to creating categories that everyone jumps in on.”

Robert Yusim, president of Product Counsel DRTV in Winnipeg, helped bring to market DRTV products Moon Sand, Moon Dough, Air Hogs and Vectron Wave. He says the most successful children’s DRTV shows center on fun creative treatments that include the appropriate bal-ance of product demonstrations, fun displays and “magic transformations” that ooh and ah the young audience. “Getting kids to react and then lobby their parents is the hardest part,” Yusim says. “You can only do that through compelling creative.”

The momentum established by the many children’s products that left their mark on the DRTV world has opened doors for companies seeking a direct channel for their youth-oriented products. Both infomercials and short-form commercials have proven themselves effective ways to sell kids’ products and to create brand awareness and desire among a diminutive but influential component of today’s households.

Timothy Hawthorne is founder, chairman and executive creative director of Hawthorne Direct, a full-service DRTV and new media ad agency founded in 1986. Since then, Hawthorne Direct has produced or managed more than 800 direct response TV campaigns. Tim is a co-founder of the Electronic Retailing Association and is the author of the definitive DRTV book The Complete Guide to Infomercial Marketing. Tim was honored with the prestigious Lifetime Achievement Award by the Electronic Retailing Association in 2006.

ASK THE EXPERT BY TIMOTHY R. HAWTHORNE

Who Says Kids’ Products Don’t Sell on DRTV?

544946_Allstar.indd 1 8/8/11 10:49:25 PM


iIn marketing parlance, a “whole” product is one that contains every-thing a consumer needs to succeed in fulfilling the product’s promise. One might think of the whole product as the base product that acts as a kind of hub that the ancillary items or sweet-eners in an offer configuration sur-round like so many spokes, but that would be a misnomer. Instead, mar-keters should view their entire offer – from top to bottom – as a whole product. Every aspect of that product – from packaging and instructions, to the base product and all additional items, should work in unison to exceed your consumer’s expectations. Ideally, it is the entire package or “kit” itself that should facilitate your buyer’s ability to achieve success, for that success will create brand loyalty, and lay the foundation for an endur-ing relationship. The goal then is for every aspect of an offer to create consumer delight, for it is delight that fuels positive word-of-mouth that will accelerate the trajectory of your business.

To understand how this is done well, let’s examine Apple’s ubiquitous iPhone, a product that has the distinc-tion of being the most googled search term of the past year. Even the play on scarcity that Apple orchestrates with each new release of the iPhone is designed to create favorable sensa-tions on the part of the consumer. Simply put, once one has their hands on the newest iPhone, a buyer feels as though they are holding something special – something to be revered and coveted, and that will set them apart. And the darned package hasn’t even been opened yet!

The tactical sensation one gets from the box itself, with a sleek fin-ish and embossed cover, even down to the swoosh as the lid is removed, reinforces that the purchase decision

was a smart one. There is nothing extraneous in the packaging – it is Spartan by design. Lift the easy-to-open interior packaging and the ta-da moment occurs as you behold the phone itself. You turn it on and it works as advertised – imagine! You’re not overwhelmed by manuals; instead, set-up instructions are step-by-step and easy to follow. The pleasure is immediate. And yet, even while the iPhone is an ideal whole product, it also represents a seemingly infinite after-market dream.

The attention to detail that Apple puts into their packaging is one of the things that has contributed to making it the world’s most valuable brand. As many of the recent obituaries for Steve Jobs have attested, creating a prod-uct as seemingly organic as Apple’s typically are is an arduous process that requires tremendous attention to detail. Yet even direct marketers who may not have an Apple’s internal resources can work with experts in offer design and packaging that can help them create a wow factor that will perpetuate consumer delight.

Since many As Seen on TV prod-ucts are purchased on an impulse basis, the sooner buyers engage with your product, the more likely they are to use it, keep it and not return it. This initial entrée is the bridge to getting them to join your community and build a greater lifetime value with the individual consumer. Therefore, the marketer’s initial stick rate is key because it ultimately lowers your customer acquisition cost and enables you to sell more products to the same parties over time. Consequently, the box that you send a product in should be part of your branding, and when executed with care, it can reaffirm the buyer’s commitment to owning it. If attention is not paid, this can backfire. For example, one marketer

for a mental health program had all sorts of psychological maladies emblazoned on the box. While the words were in fact the conditions the product helped remedy, they were not the sorts of things a buyer would want their friendly UPS deliveryman to know about.

Once your box is opened, the faster the consumer can engage with the product, the better. You can’t imagine Apple would ever package anything in a clamshell that requires a circular saw to open, would you? Paying atten-tion to such nuances is what separates good brands from great ones and teaming up with a value added offer and packaging professional, who can help you think outside the box – liter-ally – is vital to presenting your product is its best possible light.

Steven Feinberg is the CEO of SF Global Sourcing (www.sfglobalsourcing.com) and the Chairman of the ERA Board of Directors. His company specializes in global sourcing of intellectual property via CDs and DVDs, value-added packaging, and all of the elements that comprise an offer – from books to hair razors to Yoga mats – by leveraging a worldwide partner network. Steven can be reached at 1-855-SF-GLOBAL or [email protected].

FROM THE EXECUTIVE’S DESK BY STEVEN FEINBERG

Create the Complete Package

CELEBRATING ERA MEMBER ANNIVERSARIES

Attention New Members!Join ERA now and receive a FREE registration to

any of our domestic conferences, including The

Great Ideas Summit 2012 in Miami! For

additional information, visit www.retailing.org or

email [email protected].

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ERA is comprised of nearly 480 companies from 40 countries. Thank you to the following members celebrating their ERA membership anniversaries in the month of January.

MEMBERSHIP ANNIVERSARIES.indd 1 12/29/11 1:52:50 AM


aAsk any five people how they most often watch television, and you’re likely to get five different answers.

One person pays for and watches traditional cable at home, while another subscribes to Netflix and watches over his Xbox. A third person views Hulu Plus over a streaming player connected to his f latscreen, and a fourth buys shows over iTunes to view on her iPad. Finally, the last person uses her laptop to see full episodes online.

As new trends and technologies emerge, consumers are changing the way they view and interact with content across a range of platforms. Gone are the days when the family gathered around the one household TV to watch a live program in primetime. Today’s view-ers want to watch their favorite shows when they want, where they want and how they want.

Content providers, advertisers and direct marketer must learn to connect with viewers across a variety of touch points if they hope to survive and thrive

BY SARAH SAIN

in today’s evolving television landscape. Social television and Over-the-Top (OTT) TV are relatively new trends that could have lasting implications for how the DR industry markets products. But what exactly are social and OTT television, and why should DR mar-keters pay close attention to these new technologies?

REVShare CEO Brendan Condon, Direct Impact Group President Andrew Gordon and Interactive Television Alliance President Ben Mendelson recently sat down with Electronic Retailer to discuss these trends and explain what they could mean for TV viewers and direct marketers.

What are Social and OTT TV?Traditional television was created to

be a social experience, Gordon says. When TVs were introduced in major cities, some of the first sets were located in bars so crowds of people could watch sporting events. When television sets made their ways into individual

DR DisruptionSocial and Over-the-Top television are revolutionizing the way people view and interact with content across platforms and networks. Direct marketers must learn these new trends if they hope to survive TV’s brave new world.

DR Disruption – What You Need to Know About Social and Over-the-Top TV Join ERA President and CEO Julie Coons at 4 p.m. Tuesday, February 28 at The Great Ideas Summit 2012 as she moderates the Keynote Presentation with leading experts Brendan Condon of REVShare, Andrew Gordon of Direct Impact Group and Ben Mendelson of the Interactive Television Alliance. The panel will examine social television and over-the-top TV and how marketers can leverage these evolving technologies to not only take their marketing to a higher level, but also to broaden their audience reach.



households, they found a comfortable home in the most social room of all: the living room. Families and neigh-bors gathered to watch programming meant for all ages, and the act became a cultural ritual.

Eventually, Gordon notes, as society progressed and cable gained in popu-larity, TV became more of a personal experience as family members within the same household would watch TV in different rooms of the home. The increase in cable channels geared toward specific demographics – MTV for young adults, Nickleodeon for kids and ESPN for men – also promoted individual viewing. However, there has always been the watercooler effect as people gathered at work to discuss programs and televi-sion events of the previous night.

“Social TV has really now become a global real-time watercooler,” Gordon says. “It really has made TV a social experience again.”

But what exactly is social TV? It’s the convergence of television and social media. More specifically, it’s when view-ers utilize social media to engage with programs, advertisers and each other to connect, promote, generate buzz … even raise ratings.

Social TV has grown quickly in large part due to the technology becoming so easily accessible in the last few years. Today, Nielsen estimates that roughly 40 percent of tablet and smartphone owners in the U.S. use their devices daily while watching TV.

Over-the-Top has become an essen-tial part this brave new television world for many of the same reasons that social television experienced its rise. OTT is when video and program-ming are delivered via the internet to TVs, laptops, gaming stations, tablets and mobile phones – think Netflix or Hulu, for example, two of the biggest OTT providers.

“I like to think of it as leapfrogging your cable box,” Condon says.

He explains that while OTT TV has been available for a few years, it’s now gaining real traction as consumers get savvier when it comes to technology,

which has also become more affordable.“With the wide distribution and

faster speeds of broadband and then the rise of HD TVs, it got so much easier to stream video,” Condon says. “Then you add tablets into that, and now as price points are dropping, the timing is just right for consumers to become more engaged in programming on multiple platforms. They actually expect it now.”

A recent study by The Diffusion Group illustrates just how much Over-the-Top video use has skyrocketed among viewers. It showed that 106 million households used OTT video services in 2010. And what’s more impressive: That number is expected to grow to 250 million by 2016.

“Originally, it looked like interactive television would quickly proliferate through cable and satellite, since they had the set-top boxes and controlled the TV technology in the home,” Mendelson says. “But the cable and satellite com-panies held back, not wanting to invest money and not wanting to mess with the business model. That left opportunities for Apple, Google, Roku, Boxee and all the screen manufacturers, particularly Samsung, LG, Sony and Vizio, and even gaming consoles to get into the business of delivering TV through the internet. Cable and satellite has responded with the ‘TV Everywhere’ initiative, and they still control the majority of TV in the home, but OTT is here to stay.”

A New Approach to Advertising

As consumers demand more online video and search out ways to engage with programming via social network-ing, content providers and advertisers are beginning to see the benefits of this potentially lucrative market.

While TV viewing is at an all-time high, Gordon notes that these added devices can have a negative effect for advertisers and marketers.

“People can be distracted with this second screen experience,” he says. “People are not necessarily watching the commercials or engaging with them.”

A study from IPG Media Labs and YuMe confirmed the long-feared belief that viewers are tuning out during commercial breaks. The study found 94 percent of viewers used some form of “companion media” while watching TV and online video. During ads, view-ers shifted their attention to the other media at a level three times higher when watching TV vs. online video.

What this shift has done is caused advertisers – both brand and direct – to look for traditional and non-traditional ways to reach audiences.

Take Pepsi, for example. The soft drink producer and official sponsor of Fox’s “The X Factor” jumped head first into social TV and launched two platforms for fans of the hit reality com-petition. Sound Off is a social network where fans of the show can gather online and earn Pepsi rewards, while Pulse is an aggregator of tweets and Facebook posts about the show.

Then there’s what CBS did during fall sweeps. The network complemented its sweeps programming with a super-charged social media plan in which stars and CBS Sports anchors took over the Facebook pages and Twitter accounts for their shows and interacted with fans. Ratings increased for many of the network’s shows.

NM Incite, a joint venture between Nielsen and McKinsey, was among the first to discover the relationship between social media buzz and ratings. It found that among 18- to 24-year-olds, a 9 percent increase in online chatter in the weeks before a show’s premiere correlates to a 1 percent ratings increase.

Condon notes that, more than any-thing, this conscious move by viewers away from traditional television adver-tising has forced marketers to get more inventive with their creative.

“What marketers are looking at here is a chance to really heighten the level of creativity and engage with their con-sumers,” he says. “And with this new Over-the-Top technology, you can get them directly to your website with little extra work and have a captive audience who’s ready to buy.”

DR DISRUPTION


But what about metrics? Well, there are a number of companies currently working on that. New ratings systems are being developed by companies such as Bluefin Labs, which has created measurements for how viewers respond online to TV.

Simply put, Bluefin’s technology platform, Bluefin Signals, watches every-thing (or almost everything – its data covers 115 TV networks, 11,000-plus TV shows and 346,000-plus TV telecasts) on TV and recognizes all social media conversations about the programming. It then gives each show a response level rating on a scale of 1 to 10.

There is also Trendrr.tv’s Total Activity, which monitors social media activity including tweets, public Facebook posts, GetGlue check-ins and Miso check-ins.

“It’s the Wild West right now,” Gordon says. “There needs to be some kind of best practices or standards, some form of actionable measurement that can help the industry start to examine patterns and behaviors across multiple screens so we can see how to better engage audiences.”

Time to Get on BoardAll the experts agree that now is the

time for DR marketers to learn about these technologies and start making changes for the future.

“The DR industry needs to become familiar with the new television land-scape that’s connecting television to the web,” Gordon says. “As marketers, we can’t just be tied to traditional televi-sion, where a lot of our industry still has their heads. As TV has changed and evolved, we have to as well. The smart ones are going to use this social phenomenon to market products in general beyond DR.”

Mendelson adds that DRTV is a natu-ral fit for social TV, OTT and interactive TV, in general. “All of those technologies are about interacting, and so is direct response TV. These technologies provide a way to greatly enhance the transac-tional experience by making it simpler and more immediate. The ability to

565843_Kingstar.indd 1 12/22/11 1:00:04 PM

instantly ‘click and buy’ or or click to visit a website, those are powerful tools to interact with the customer.”

But, as Condon stresses, since viewers can be watching at any time, it is impor-tant for DR companies to be ready 24/7 with support services for consumers who aren’t watching live programming.

“Consumers are so much more sophisticated about how they navigate

ads on TV now,” he says. “For DRTV, it’s all about getting the consumer to pick up the phone or call or text or visit your specific URL. Now, consumers expect to be the ones choosing when and how to contact you. You have to be ready for the consumer.”

Condon closes: “At the end of the day, it raises the bar for marketers to keep up.”


yYou could call it a homecoming.After two extraordinary years in the

heart of New Orleans, The Great Ideas Summit 2012 returns to Miami this February for three days of education, networking and fun in the Florida sun. Nearly 800 attendees and 25 exhibi-tors will gather February 27-29 at the Fontainebleau, one of the most his-torically and architecturally significant hotels on Miami Beach.

The theme of this year’s show is “Great Ideas at C-Level,” which ERA President and CEO Julie Coons says brings together the industry’s most respected thought leaders and key decision-makers all in one place.

“Miami will serve as the ideal setting for The Great Ideas Summit 2012. This is the place where ERA members and other industry professionals, for many years, have enjoyed visiting, and we plan to make this year’s mid-winter event a memorable one,” Coons says.

Attendees will have the opportunity to conduct meetings and network with

Bienvenido a Miami!

new contacts beginning Monday at the Meet & Greet Lounge. The idea for the lounge originated at last year’s Great Ideas Summit and was a huge success at D2C in September. Other networking events and receptions, including free networking breakfasts and lunches, as well as the Business Club and Expo Zone, located right on the Show Floor, will follow throughout the show.

Education DayEducation sessions will take place

throughout the day Tuesday and Wednesday at The Great Ideas Summit. ERA again employed a crowd-sourcing initiative in which the entire member-ship voted for the final 12 sessions that will be featured at the show. Topics will cover a variety of direct-to-consumer topics and offer audience members a number of valuable best practices.

This year’s education program will include Panel Discussions (one-hour ses-sions) and Lightning Sessions (12-min-ute presentations).

Sessions include:• 10 Profound Marketing Secrets That

Produce Big Profits• Which Came First – Retail or DRTV

in Seeking the Golden Egg?• The Real Men and Women of Madison

Avenue• The Road to Retail – A Superhighway

with Many Exits!Lightning Sessions are as follows:

• Apparel – The HOT Category for DRTV

• Positive Reputation = Revenue: Increasing Your Online Market Share

• For the Hispanic Vote, the Campaign is On!

• Deal of the Day Sites: A Game Changer

• T he Mu lt icha nnel Ma rket i ng Advantage

BY SARAH SAIN

The Great Ideas Summit 2012 returns to Florida, where ERA members and direct-to-consumer industry leaders will gather for education, networking and fun in the sun.

The Great Ideas Summit 2012

The Elec tronic Retail ing Association will host The Great Ideas Summit 2012 February 27-29 at the Fontainebleau Miami Beach. For more information and to register for the show, visit www.ERAGreatIdeas.org. Sign up before February 24 to take advantage of discounted rates.


The Great Ideas Summit Schedule of EventsMonday, February 27, 2012

8:00 a.m.-6:00 p.m. Meet & Greet Lounge Open8:00 a.m.-9:30 a.m. Finance Committee Meeting10:00 a.m.-11:30 a.m. Executive Committee Meeting9:00 a.m.-11:00 a.m. Electronic Retailer Magazine Advisory

Committee Meeting9:00 a.m.-12:00 p.m. ERA Europe Board of Directors Meeting11:00 a.m.-12:00 p.m. Exhibitor Advisory Committee Meeting12:00 p.m.-1:00 p.m. Asia Committee Meeting12:00 p.m.-6:00 p.m. Registration Open1:00 p.m.-2:00 p.m. Membership Committee Meeting1:30 p.m.-5:30 p.m. Nominating Committee Meeting2:00 p.m.-3:00 p.m. Education Committee Meeting2:00 p.m.-6:00 p.m. Exhibitor Move-In3:00 p.m.-4:00 p.m. Government Affairs Committee Meeting4:00 p.m.-5:00 p.m. New Member Reception (invitation only)5:00 p.m.-6:30 p.m. Opening Reception6:30 p.m.-8:00 p.m. Diamond Partner Reception (invitation only)

Tuesday, February 28, 2012

8:00 a.m.-5:00 p.m. Registration Open8:00 a.m.-9:00 a.m. Committee and Council Chairman Breakfast9:00 a.m.-10:00 a.m. FREE Networking Breakfast9:00 a.m.-5:00 p.m. Show Floor Open (Expo Zone, Business Club

and Learning Lounge)9:30 a.m.-10:30 a.m. Panel Discussion 11:00 a.m.-12:00 p.m. Panel Discussion12:00 p.m.-1:00 p.m. FREE Networking Lunch1:30 p.m.-2:30 p.m. Lightning Sessions4:00 p.m.-6:00 p.m. Keynote Presentation and Reception5:00 p.m.-6:00 p.m. CEO Summit (invitation only)6:00 p.m.-7:30 p.m. Washington in Miami – A Networking

Reception to Benefit the ERA PAC

Wednesday, February 29, 2012

8:00 a.m.-12:00 p.m. Registration Open9:00 a.m.-10:00 a.m. FREE Networking Breakfast9:00 a.m.-5:00 p.m. Show Floor Open (Expo Zone, Business Club

and Learning Lounge)9:30 a.m.-10:30 a.m. Panel Discussion 11:00 a.m.-12:00 p.m. Panel Discussion 12:00 p.m.-1:00 p.m. FREE Networking Lunch1:30 p.m.-2:30 p.m. Lightning Sessions5:00 p.m.-6:30 p.m. Closing Reception5:00 p.m.-8:00 p.m. Exhibitor Move-Out* Schedule as of January 11, 2012.

566298_TwoD.indd 1 1/4/12 3:11:07 PM

34 electronicRETAILER | February 2012523463_Jordan.indd 1 3/23/11 6:14:26 PM

BIENVENIDO A MIAMI!

• Create Meaningfu l Consumer Connections by Integrating Mobile with DR

• How a Virtual Store Leads to More Sales

• Don’t Run Your DR Campaign by the Seat of Your Pants: Have a Plan!Also on Tuesday, three of the

industry’s leading voices in televi-sion advertising will take the stage for the Keynote Presentation. REVShare CEO Brendan Condon, Direct Impact Group President Andrew Gordon and Interactive Television Alliance President

Ben Mendelson will join Coons for a panel discussion titled “DR Disruption – What You Need to Know About Social and Over-the-Top TV.”

Coons says, “This hour-long discus-sion will enlighten our audience about these two emerging technologies, what’s driving this shift and how they might impact our industry in the near future. I hope this will inspire further dialogue within our community beyond what’s addressed during the keynote.”

Can’t Miss EventsSpecial events are one of the high-

lights of The Great Ideas Summit, and this year will be no exception.

The Opening Reception on Monday night will feature heavy appetiz-ers, music, a themed drink bar and high-powered networking with direct response colleagues. Eat, drink and dance the night away in Miami.

On Tuesday, following the Keynote Presentation, join colleagues for a

laid-back and relaxed Happy Hour to discuss the day’s events before heading over to Washington in Miami, a network-ing reception to benefit the ERA PAC. The event, formerly the ERA Leadership Event, is back in full force. Previously held at the D2C Convention, the event has changed venues to The Great Ideas Summit. Join high-powered special guests to help raise funds for ERA’s E-Retail Political Action Committee, the most important advocacy effort in the direct-to-consumer marketing industry.

Then all good things must come to an end Wednesday. Join old and new friends for the Closing Reception – it’s the last opportunity to seal the business deals and make the connections that can fuel your 2012 business year.

For those who have not yet registered for The Great Ideas Summit, there is still time. Visit www.ERAGreatIdeas.org for more information on the show and to register today. Members and non-members have until February 24 to take advantage of discounted rates.

“I look forward to reuniting with our ERA members, as well as meeting new faces in the industry,” Coons says. “The Great Ideas Summit 2012 in Miami is the perfect way to start off the New Year.”

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‘i“Imagine a world where people could get almost anything without ever leav-ing their homes,” says Maria Kennedy, senior vice president of direct response and paid programming at Discovery Communications.

When looking down the road at interactive television, this vision stands to become a reality sooner than later. Today, more and more technology

companies, with cooperation from major broadcast communication com-panies, are beginning to offer interac-tive advertising on television, or iTV. iTV allows viewers to request informa-tion, learn about local deals, purchase a product or watch a movie trailer – just to name a few – just by clicking their remotes while watching a television program. All the while, the advertiser

is collecting valuable information for target marketing.

Multiple EngagementsGone are the days when the audience

would sit and passively watch television. Today most viewers are simultaneously shopping online, texting a friend, tweet-ing about a program and watching TV at the same time. This growing number

Learn how both viewers and the direct marketing industry will reap the benefits of interactive television’s rapid growth in 2012.

BY JACQUELINE RENFROW

Interactive TV: Just a Click Away


of multiscreen viewers – people work-ing on laptops, mobile or some other interactive device while watching tele-vision – is contributing to the success of iTV. Also, the availability of iTV is spreading to more service operators through cable set-top boxes. So while consumer interest grows, availability grows and technology advances, the days of ordering a product through the television – without the need of a phone or internet – are drawing closer.

“Eventually people will be able to do almost anything through their televi-sion sets,” Kennedy says. “T-commerce will become more prevalent and net-works could become like mini shopping channels.”

One of the major players in mak-ing iTV possible is Canoe Ventures. Canoe, founded by the six largest cable companies in the country – Cox Communications, Cablevision, Time Warner Cable, Charter Communications, Comcast and Bright House Networks – is combining the impact and reach of traditional TV with new technologies and marketing solutions that will better connect consumers with brands. The idea behind Canoe and interactive TV is “to enhance TV so experiences on TV could be expanded and more deeply immersive for the viewer,” says David Grabert, vice president of marketing communications at Canoe. The company is accomplishing this task by offering relevant advertising as part of the experi-ence. The company’s model is to sell the technology to programming networks, who then sell advertisement time to the marketers and advertisers. Through this collaboration, Canoe’s footprint in the interactive television arena reaches 23 million households nationwide.

Control is a growing trend among television viewers. Kennedy believes that video on demand (VOD) is a format that will take off in 2012 as a viable vehicle for DRTV advertisers. VOD is a part of the increase in appointment viewing, meaning consumers are pick-ing what to watch and when. Discovery Communications reaches more than 45 million households via VOD networks.

“Many networks have free VOD services for their most popular pri-metime programs,” she says. “Viewers

have embraced VOD so much this year that the increase in viewership has kept some networks from canceling some primetime programs.” In some cases, audiences have increased 4 percent for some primetime broadcasts.

Technology UpdateWhat is in store for the future of iTV?

A lot of it depends on the developments in iTV technology in 2012. One com-pany at the forefront of iTV technol-ogy is FourthWall Media. FourthWall makes the interactive software that exists in set-top boxes. Currently, the company is a provider for millions of homes and contributes to iTV in three ways, the first being the delivery of interactive applications. The second role FourthWall plays is producer of bound – inserted into a broadcast – or unbound – completely independent of the programming – AdWidgets. In addi-tion, the company collects data from the set-top box for more targeted marketing.

FourthWall Executive Vice President Patrick Peters sees iTV as a way for television to catch up with the successful data collection that has historically only been available for web ads. “Once we can track usage the way we do on the internet now, everything is more accountable and, therefore, more effective,” he says. This is good news for direct response marketers, who depend on metrics.

“What we’re working towards in 2012 is a universal TV buy button, so regard-less of content, I can insert the button into a basketball game or something like that,” Peters says. Then, with just the click of a button, the viewer will be easily and seamlessly able to purchase a product.

More than 15 million households are currently exposed to the interac-tive TV landscape through Comcast Communications. Right now, a lot of Comcast’s advertisers are using what is known as the request for information (RFI) application, in which the viewer is exposed to a traditional 30-second spot and, in the middle, a graphic overlay comes up and asks if the viewer would like more information on a product or service. Then, that RFI is filled through snail mail with a coupon or brochure as indicated by the advertiser.

Other technology offered by Comcast includes Remind Record, where a pro-motion for a program pops up and reminds a viewer to watch or record that program. “This is valuable for programmers because their success is measured on ratings; plus, this could spark a growth in audience and scal-ing,” says Kevin Smith, vice president of digital media at Comcast Spotlight.

In addition, Comcast offers VODT, or video on demand telescoping, which is when the viewer can then opt to link to a longer format piece that includes interviews, trailers and exclusive footage while watching a linear spot. Though all of this tech-nology is still in the early stages, Comcast is already running hundreds of campaigns for advertisers in all categories including entertainment, automotive and retail. But Smith sees these new applications as “the heart of convergence” between traditional television advertising and DRTV.

On the advertising end of the tech-nology, Canoe is prepared to expand in two ways in 2012. First, the number of homes in which iTV technology is avail-able will expand – it’s currently at 51 percent of the digital cable households in the country. The footprint will get larger as more networks are added, offering advertisers a wider reach of viewers.

The second expansion will be towards in-program interactivity. Canoe is testing out interactivity such as trivia and polling. For example, if a viewer is watching a cooking show describing how to make pasta, advertisers could participate in polling that pops up and asks, “What’s your favorite pasta sauce?” “It’s a more immersive experience, and it can be up to the network, but it can be done with or without sponsorship,” Grabert says. The game could end with a clickable coupon or offer.

Grabert says all of this iTV technol-ogy is paving the way for the future of television advertising. It’s easier for the consumer, and it’s easier for the adver-tiser. “It’s a whole level of measurement that advertisers are not used to getting with a broadcast ad,” Grabert says. “This is a truly competitive DM tool and TV has an advantage that other platforms don’t have.”


Effects on DRTVSo what does all this new technology

mean for the future of DRTV?Peters says technology will change

the face of DRTV in three ways in 2012. First, ad time will be made more effective through iTV. “I may run a generic ad but using this technology, I can localize the offer, making the ad buy more effective,” he says. The second

change is that direct marketers will be able to make offers during actual tele-vision programming, which is timely considering the growth of product placement in television programs. And finally, the opportunity will present itself for consumers to click and buy immediately in the unbound category.

The model of how iTV time will be bought by DR marketers is still a work

in progress. It is a collaboration being worked on by networks, broadcasters and marketers.

“The marketplace will agree on a value, like any other medium, over the next few years,” Smith says. He is sensitive to working with direct response marketers who are familiar with putting a price on the value of an order or lead, so he realizes that working to find the right prices will take a lot of feedback and fine-tuning. “We’re smart enough not to create this in a vacuum. We will get feedback and insights and expertise of leading advertisers and DR advertisers.”

Working Out the KinksOne possible speed bump in the

iTV revolution is the question of how product purchases and RFI’s will be fulfilled. FourthWall currently works with PayPal, American Express and large fulfillment houses that have dealt with these kinds of demands before when testing out advertisements.

“It’s pointless to recreate a wheel,” Peters says. “Billions of products are being sold directly every day.” Companies such as Amazon are already experts at filling requests without a warehouse. So the missing link is going to be learning how to connect these factors for iTV with direct response fulfillment houses and customer ser-vice agencies.

Still, the future of iTV is strong and its benefits for viewers, advertisers and cable networks only seem to be growing.

“People just love to watch TV, and it’s one of the best places to deeply engage with a brand,” Grabert says. “Not only is it effective as a DM tool, but it has a positive impact on brand awareness, brand opinion and purchase intent.” With the average person watch-ing 146 hours of television per month, that’s a lot of time and people to reach, he says. And with the 100 million people in the United States who are paying for television, whether it be through cable, satellite, video providers or phone companies – it’s a channel that cannot be missed.

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INTERACTIVE TV: JUST A CLICK AWAY

A SupERAchiever is an industry

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What Your Consumer Says About You MattersThe marriage of customer testimonials and social media is unveiling legal issues that the FTC and the industry must quickly balance in order for direct response to maintain its integrity.

landscapes of up to 30 minutes in which to tell a compelling story and, not incidentally, sell their product.

Of course, with this greater creative expanse came the conun-drum of utilizing it in a way that would engage and retain viewers as well as convince them of the usefulness of the products and services. Predictably, it didn’t take very long for savvy marketers to incorporate the most effective and time-tested technique to sell their products – that is, have a satisfied customer talk about his or her experience to a captivated audience.

Sure, the question of whether the “customer” who talks about the product is actually an authentic user of the product

BY PETER MARINELLO

IIn the 1980s, the advertising industry first took notice of how infomercial and short-form direct response marketing broadcasts could be game-changers with respect to how advertisers communicate with their target audience. As cable television began proliferating in homes, networks working in the deregulated environment welcomed this new advertising medium into their programming repertoire as a means to fill late-night and early morning hours with programming that was kitschy and inexpensive. Similarly, creative marketers sud-denly found themselves free from the traditional constraints of the 30-second canvas and, instead, were presented with


is a relevant and germane issue – and one that necessitated enough clarity that the Federal Trade Commission issued its Guides Concerning the Use of Endorsements and Testimonials in Advertising, also known as the FTC Guides in 1980. However, it is the perpetuity and effectiveness of the technique that is most fascinating to those in the industry and what makes testimonials the skilled marketer’s Rosetta Stone.

The consumer testimonial prospered in the early days of print advertising, flourished when radio ruled the roost and experienced a rebirth with television advertising. The consumer testimonial has made more comebacks than Brett Favre. So, should we really be that surprised that the consumer testimonial is again wreaking havoc – from the perspective of sales effectiveness and legal uncertainty – in yet another platform of product sales? In fact, when compared to almost all previous advertising paradigms, it can be argued that the marriage of the consumer testimonial and social media will be the most prevailing of all.

In characterizing the relationship between the consumer testimonial and social media, the iconic television commer-cial for Reese’s Peanut Butter Cups from the 1970s comes to mind. For those old enough to remember, the commercial showed a guy walking down the street eating a chocolate bar. Walking down another street is a girl enjoying a jar of peanut butter. They run into each other on the corner, their peanut butter and chocolate get mixed together and they learn it is a delicious combination. Similarly, as is the case with any compulsory marriage, we have watched curiously as this serendipitous collaboration of the consumer testimonial via social media has progressed from its hopeful courting phase to now having to confront those bothersome pedantic issues such as the disclosure of material connections or the typicality of the depicted product performance.

In late 2009, in rode the FTC, which announced a helpful revision to its FTC Guides in order to address this new world of social media. The revised guides reflected three basic truth-in-advertising principles:1. Endorsements must be truthful and not misleading;2. If the advertiser doesn’t have proof that the endorser’s

experience represents what consumers will achieve by using the product, the ad must clearly and conspicuously disclose the generally expected results in the depicted circumstances, and;

3. If there’s a connection between the endorser and the mar-keter that would affect how people evaluate the endorse-ment, it should be disclosed.

Jeffrey Greenbaum, one of the nation’s leading practitioners of advertising law and a partner in the advertising, marketing and public relations group at Frankfurt Kurnit Klein & Selz, PC, believes, “The critical issue right now is transparency … You can’t trick consumers into thinking that they are seeing independent editorial content when what they are seeing is actually advertising. And if you are paying consumers to speak on your behalf, or if you have other material connections with endorsers that aren’t obvious, you need to make that clear.”

While the notion of disclosing pertinent information in a manner that is “clear and conspicuous,” not to mention in

close proximity to the triggering claim, has always been a challenge for even the most creative marketer in traditional advertising, one of the great conundrums for marketers is ascertaining what exactly constitutes “adequate disclosure.” After all, just what is the most effective method of disclos-ing material information in an emerging advertising medium where the communication landscape is limited and at a pre-mium (think: Twitter’s 140 character max).

Mary Engle is the associate director for advertising prac-tices at the FTC, and since the implementation of the guides, she has done her share of the yeoman’s work of publically explaining the applicability of the agency’s changes to con-cerned marketers.

Engle notes, “Marketers should keep in mind that their ads should give consumers an accurate picture of what to expect with their products or services. And when making disclosures, you can’t go wrong if you present the information as though you really want consumers to get what you’re say-ing, not as if you’re hiding it or hoping it will go unnoticed. … Clear and conspicuous disclosures are possible in almost any medium, although some platforms may present more challenges than others.”

We have seen several interesting disclosure innovations that have provided marketers who utilize social media some assistance to abide by the rules of the road. For example, CMP.LY offers technology that monitors and documents a com-pany’s social media interactions and automatically publishes disclosures in the form of “badges” within status updates and

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blog posts. It also provides short URLs to include in tweets.

Not surprisingly, some of the most useful guidance has been provided by the FTC itself through its announce-ments of several high-profile investi-gations in new media. The findings and conclusions in these matters have certainly become part of the legal ver-nacular for practitioners in the industry.

One of the earliest investigation involved advertising for clothing manu-facturer Ann Taylor. The retailer had invited bloggers to preview its Loft division’s summer 2010 collection, offering a “special gift” and promising that those posting coverage from the event would be entered into a “mystery gift card drawing” in which they could win between $50 and $500. The invite explained that bloggers must submit posts to the company within 24 hours in order to find out the value of their gift card. The FTC was concerned that the marketer failed to disclose that the bloggers received gifts for posting content about the event. Although the agency decided not to take action against Ann Taylor, the warning flare to marketers had been fired that the FTC has its antenna up regarding issues of material disclosure online.

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had deceptively offered free and dis-counted products to Facebook users who “liked” the company’s page, and that the number of “likes” presented to investors through press releases had been fraudulently obtained. NAD determined that the display of the total number of “likes” on Coastal’s Facebook page conveyed a general social endorse-ment. Because actual consumers “liked” the Coastal page, and those consumers who participated in the promotion received the benefit of the promotion, NAD determined that Coastal does, in fact, have the general social endorsement that the “likes” convey.

It is clear that uncertainty regarding the use of consumer representations on websites and other social networking forums are not going away soon. In fact, as more marketers use consumer endorsements to promote products through social media, it’s inevitable that new issues such as “like-gating” in the Coastal Contacts case will continue to arise. Often, self-regulation forums such as ERSP and NAD are on the front line with respect to resolving and explain-ing such issues. As Engle notes, “ERSP and NAD have the advantage of being able to respond more quickly to trends in marketing and advertising than the government sometimes can. ”

One last thing to note is that unlike in other traditional marketing venues, brand promotion may very well be occurring within social media without marketers’ knowledge, and people are discussing brands to third parties unbe-knownst to the advertisers. While there is continuing uncertainty about an advertiser’s responsibility for third-party content, the bottom line is that market-ers want to – and should be – tracking what is being said about their brands on social media in order to manage and maintain the brand integrity they’ve worked so hard to establish.

Peter Marinello is director of the Electronic Retailing Self-Regulatory Program (ERSP). He can be reached at (212) 705-0126 or via email at [email protected].

WHAT YOUR CONSUMER SAYS ABOUT YOU MATTERS

Perhaps the FTC case that resonated most loudly in the industry in 2011 involved advertising for Legacy Learning Systems. Legacy Learning advertised its Learn and Master Guitar DVD series by recruiting “review ad” affiliates to pro-mote the product through “articles, blog posts and other online editorial material, with the endorsements appearing close to hyperlinks to Legacy’s website.” These affiliates received “substantial commis-sions,” which they did not disclose, for each sale resulting from referrals and generated more than $5 million in sales of Legacy’s courses, according to the FTC. The company agreed to pay $250,000 to settle charges with the Commission.

Regulatory agencies are not the only ones keeping an eye on how companies are utilizing social media to promote products and services. Self-regulatory programs such as the Electronic Retailing Self-Regulation Program (ERSP) and the National Advertising Division of the Council of Better Business Inc. (NAD) have brought forth inquiries involving the disclosure of material information in social media.

More recently, in late 2011, NAD reviewed advertising for Coastal Contacts. A competitor of the adver-tiser contended that Coastal Contacts

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HSN, a longtime member, sheds light on some of the

legal issues that have created the biggest challenge in

its day-to-day operations, and discusses how ERA’s in-

volvement with advocacy has made a significant impact

on its overall business. retailing.org/superachievers

ADVOCACY SUPERACHIEVERCHRIS GASSETT

ERA_CaseStudyHSN[1].indd 1 11/22/11 12:42:57 AM


yYou don’t need to pick sides in the 2012 elections to be interested in the process and the outcome. In fact, for the Hispanic community this is likely a defining election in terms of power, key market strategies and momentum. Ignore the Hispanic electorate in 2012 at your peril, from national offices to key local races.

A national election can come down to one state’s electoral votes. A state election can come down to one county, and the power shift in Congress can come down to just a hand-ful of districts. Any one of these scenarios can be affected by Hispanics in several swing and highly contested states. Believe what you will, it is simple math.

Any marketer who has observed the evolution of market-ing to Hispanic audiences, especially through TV and radio, already knows this as fact. What remains to be seen is whether politicians pay this audience its due respect, or if they continue to pay it only lip service. My marketing experience and avail-able data shows lip service won’t cut it anymore in politics than it does in business.

The lip service politician will say that these markets and this audience do not produce enough registered voters to be a real political factor. Critical mass in politics is a matter of perception, and perception is starting to shape a new reality. More than 6.6 million Latinos voted in last year’s election – a record for a midterm – says data by the Pew Hispanic Center. Latinos represented a larger share of the electorate in 2010 than in any previous midterm election, representing 6.9 percent of all voters, up from 5.8 percent in 2006.

It is true that a significant share of voting age Latinos are non-citizens – 22.4 percent vs. just 1.4 percent, 4 percent and 24 percent of whites, blacks and Asians, respectively. But factor this out and you still have 21.3 million eligible voters. This represents about 12 percent of all eligible voters in the U.S. But do they vote? In 2008, 63.6 percent turned out to vote. And the research and polling organization Latino Decisions estimates that Hispanics will likely represent as much as 9.5 percent of registered voters in the 2012 general elections.

Let’s look at this from a geo-political perspective. If I asked you to identify some of the key states for the upcoming national election at either the presidential or congressional levels, you would probably list California, New York, Florida, Illinois and Texas, among others. These are not only the states in which Hispanics have the highest populations, but they also have the highest local TV market shares. Latinos comprise 33 percent of LA’s TV households. New York checks in at

17 percent. There is no doubt that any TV spots in these markets, which serve as an example of the growth being seen in almost a dozen states and major markets, will reach Hispanics whether a campaign intends to or not. The question then becomes, “Does a candidate, campaign or issue want to be ubiquitous with its messaging vis-à-vis Latinos or remain conspicuously absent.

Rapid population growth has helped fuel Latinos’ increasing electoral participation. According to the Census Bureau, 50.5 million Hispanics were counted by the 2010 Census, up from 35.3 million in 2000. Over the same decade, the number of Latino eligible voters – adults who are U.S. citizens – also increased, from 13.2 million in 2000 to 21.3 million in 2010.

Who says that voting represents the only political influence wielded by a community? Economic power and labor participa-tion are two other key indicators of participation. Automotive, retail, soft drink, beer and packaged advertisers have targeted this market for years. But now even Wall Street is taking notice at the Hispanic community’s impact beyond the financial.

According to the Huffington Post on Oct. 9, 2011, recogniz-ing the power that Latinos represent in the global marketplace as a vibrant market of 50.5 million strong with a $1 trillion in buying power growing at an impressive 347 percent rate in the last decade, a group of banking, Wall Street and other major corporate professionals recently discussed the need for action. “We’re here tonight to talk about America’s future ... the country needs a diverse pipeline of leaders to move our country forward,” said Michael Cavanagh, JPMorgan Investment Bank CEO of Treasury & Securities. “Latinos are the key to reaching these goals.”

I could give you Census data here. But let’s look a little deeper. Minority spending power spiked over the last 10 years, according to the University of Georgia Terry College of Business. The percentage gains in buying power during the past decade have varied considerably by race and ethnicity: 108 percent for Hispanics, 98 percent for Asians, 69 percent for Native Americans and 60 percent for African-Americans. The study projects that minority markets will continue to grow much faster than the majority market, and sooner or later this will translate to tens of thousands of $5-$25 contributions.

Now let’s talk issues – the two key vote drivers are unem-ployment and immigration. Although discretionary spend-ing and a seat at the financial table are available now for a large percentage of Hispanics, they want more. According to the Pew Research Project, the spread of poverty across the

GUEST VIEWPOINT BY MARCELINO MIYARES JR.

For Hispanic Vote, the Campaign is On

February 2012 | electronicRETAILER 45562387_Concepts.indd 1 11/30/11 9:01:33 AM

United States that began at the onset of the Great Recession and accelerated last year hit one fast-growing demographic group especially hard: Latino children.

More Latino children are living in poverty – 6.1 million in 2010 – than children of any other racial or ethnic group. This marks the first time in U.S. history that the single largest group of poor children is not white. For Latinos, this negative milestone is a product of their growing numbers, high birth rates and declining economic fortunes. Among Hispanic chil-dren living in poverty, more than two-thirds (4.1 million) are the children of immigrant parents, while the other 2 million are the children of parents born in the U.S.

To make matters ever more emotionally charged, 53 percent of Latino registered voters have undocumented immigrant friends or family. At least a quarter of Latino registered vot-ers know someone who is facing immigration enforcement.

Don’t make the mistake, however, of believing that Hispanics will line up as a block on these issues. There are several other issues that shape our political spectrum such as access to education, social values, crime and the military.

Momentum, power and key markets: Those are the three things at stake for Hispanic voters. According to the Radio Advertising Bureau, between $4.8 billion and $5.6 billion will be spent on political advertising in 2012. This should be enough to start investing in the Latino electorate. Now some thoughts on how to measurably sway Latino voters in 2012:• Start by allocating an effective share of your broadcast

and digital spend to the Hispanic electorate. If you take

the Hispanic electorate for granted, then expect nothing back – votes or contributions.

• Reach out to the market in both English and Spanish. According to Latino Decisions, one-third of Latino voters are predominantly reliant on Spanish-language media, one-third on English-language media and one-third on both equally.

• Think direct response. Nothing beats long-form advertising for education, contributions and driving traffic to events, websites, rallies, meetings and other measurable political activity.

• Use TV, radio, internet and mobile media. All are critical for reach and engagement. Do not over-depend on digital media just yet. Beware the digital divide.

• Targeting the Hispanic electorate is not a question of how much, but where. According to 2010 Census data, there are 118 existing congressional districts in which more than one-fifth of the population is Hispanic. Ninety-three of those districts are in California, Texas, Florida and New York – the four states with the most 2012 electoral votes. It is likely that Latinos will shape the electoral landscape in these states and other emerging Hispanic television markets in Ohio, Pennsylvania, Wisconsin, Nevada, Colorado, Iowa and New Mexico.

The election is less than a year away. The issues are now. The spending season has already begun. Politicians are mak-ing important choices in how and where they spend their resources. It is time they address the Hispanic vote.


iIf you are presently marketing products via television, you make your living buying television advertising and sell-ing products. The same goes for print. Buying media is what you are really good at, especially buying media at distressed rates. Of course, direct mar-keting flourishes in unsold inventories.

So it is natural to view the online space through a similar lens. When you look at the online media ecosystem, you could start licking your chops at the fact that nearly 75 percent of advertis-ing inventories lay fallow. This is a polite way of saying the inventory goes unsold. Much of it goes unsold because it is worthless.

Facebook generated more than 1 trillion ad impressions for 2011. That’s right, a TRILLION. These impressions can be purchased for as low as $.03/M. Theoretically, that is just 3 cents to be in front of 1,000 people. I say theoretically because it is overwhelmingly obvious that most folks on FB do not actually “see” the ads. Quickly, try to recall the last banner you saw.

At 3 cents to reach a thousand people, I am of the opinion that this is as close to worthless as can be imagined. Buying this media at any price is not likely to work for anyone except for the company selling you billions of impressions. And, at that price, I am not sure it is a windfall for Facebook either. But if you want to spend a quick $30 to “reach” a million people, be my guest.

I can see the wheels turning in your head already. Let’s do PI (CPA in online terminology) with the likes of Yahoo! and Facebook. These folks already know their media is close to worthless and know the unsold space will yield such a pitiful return with revenues shares that they rather not

even go there, or sell it for prices previously mentioned.

You see, as technology has advanced and we have become an “on demand” world, few people are demanding ads – in fact, they are well equipped to avoid them. Avoiding ads either through technology or attention, online adver-tising has become a prime example of advertising evasion. I exempt search from this avoidance, but that works on existing intent and does not cre-ate demand.

What follows is not a secret to anyone reading: Advertising is becom-ing less effective and the response to declining efficiencies in the entire ecosystem has been to increase the number of ads. The increase in ads everywhere has the net effect of exac-erbating the problem. We are spawn-ing a generation that has developed blindness to most advertising.

But not all media is created equally. Did you know what the fastest growing part of Amazon.com’s business is? The company is selling advertising. Amazon is one of the largest media owners on the planet.

The point is that every marketer needs to move beyond buying worth-less media and emulate Amazon. This entails understanding that you own considerable media assets when it comes to online space. Let’s take a look at what owning your own online media looks like.

It is my contention that every mar-keter who has a presence online owns considerable media. Let’s start with your website. How much traffic are you gen-erating? Each visitor represents a very special audience. It is an audience that is interested in some way in becoming a consumer.

Believe me, this is a special audience – and a very valuable audience.

In August of 2011, my company PulseTV.com put a 300 x 250 banner on every page of our e-commerce site. We split the impressions 50-50 between Advertising.com and rotated banners for our own offers. Our own offers performed three times better than Advertising.com’s revenue, and by November, we were just rotating our own product banners and now have eliminated outside ads and are utilizing all ad inventory for our own offers. This resulted in an extra $30,000 to our coffers in one month with only 500,000 page views. That is $6/M in revenue if you are count-ing and should be contrasted with buying Facebook advertising for 3 cents per thousand impressions. Our own media is worth 200 times that of Facebook media.

GUEST VIEWPOINT BY JAFFER ALI

Own Your Own Online Media


Complementing our media expertise, Chief is at the forefront of media results technology. We’ve developed intuitive tracking systems—TMO, our online visit and order tracking system which allocates (based on multi-level variables) unique web visits and orders back to each traditional media airing, allowing for a full analysis of media effectiveness and CONTINUUMcustomers against the original media source. Chief Media represents cutting edge, proprietary technology and unparalleled

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554155_chief.indd 1 9/28/11 2:49:24 AM

If you find yourself not having enough products to rotate in your ad inventory, then by all means sell those impressions. Remember, your audience is special because each individual has reached your site at least initially interested in buying your product or service.

This is one example of how valuable your own media really is. You own those views as opposed to renting a theoretical impression. Plus, there is no click fraud. A dirty little secret in online media is that almost 20 percent of clicks are fraudulent. Online media sellers are not aggressive in ferreting out fraud because fraud makes them more money rather than less. Their goal is to keep fraud at a manageable level just to keep folks buying it.

So owning your own media eliminates fraud and will perform several times better than any display advertising you will ever buy. But is your website traffic the only media you own?

The greatest media asset you own is your customers’ email addresses. When a customer buys something from you

and you capture the email address, you have the right to send that person addi-tional offers. Each person is an actual buyer and represents a golden oppor-tunity to engage in an ongoing dialog.

When you send someone a catalog, this is media. When you send someone an email, this is media. And the cost to deliver an email is extremely low. Using PulseTV as an example, we have more than 6 million email addresses and send out daily offers. This is like owning our own broadcast station as we “reach” 6 million people daily. I put “reach” in quotation marks because not everybody opens their email daily so emails that are not read are like banners that are not viewed. The difference here is that this is your own media and you can communicate with your audience daily. The email address is the most important piece of data you own. In the online world, data becomes media.

In addition to mailing your own offers, more and more marketers are contracting with third parties to deploy offers. They augment their revenue by

utilizing this media for other offers. It helps overall conversions as the more people buy online from anyone, the more likely they are to purchase from you. It is a bit counterintuitive, but it is true.

Another way to own your own media is to create or license content and get subscribers. In this way, you give sub-scribers value via daily jokes, recipes, random facts or articles for the right to include your advertising. These are called e-zines or newsletters. Over the years, PulseTV.com has alternated between selling advertising to compa-nies inside these e-zines and selling our own products.

When you own your own media, you have a great dea l of f lex ibi l ity. Understanding your online media assets and using those for cross-marketing products or selling the space to other folks is not a replacement for buying online media. You can do both. But first you need to understand that the most effective media you can possibly find is right in your own backyard.

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Here’s one big question often asked by many direct response television marketers: How much advertis-ing do I need to run to support retail? This is a tough question to answer because retail support often occurs after a successful DRTV campaign has enjoyed its greatest scale and efficiency. Scott Boilen, president of Allstar Marketing once explained that the company advertised Snuggies to support retail sell-through. Scott admitted that they didn’t know how much to spend, but that they erred on the side of spending more, rather than less. They simply didn’t want too little advertising to be the cause of poor sales. Whether or not the advertising had an impact on sales remains unknown.

Recently, we’ve been working with a marketer interested in learning if and how much media was needed to stimulate retails sales of a product that enjoyed broad retail distribution, no brand aware-ness and that had never before been advertised. In other words, we had the opportunity to understand the direct impact of advertising on retail sales. Here are the significant learnings:1. The results were immediate! Advertising started on

Day 1 and sales jumped on Day 1.2. Sales improved dramatically and equally whether

a 60- or 15-second commercial ran. It’s important to note that in this case, product benefits could be completely communicated in a 15-second spot – no easy feat.

3. Far less media weight than expected was needed to increase sales.

The results of this test run against prevailing conven-tion and may provide an empirical foundation from which to answer the question, “How much media is necessary to support retail for a DRTV product.” For example, a packaged goods company like Procter & Gamble would support a brand with 150 gross ratings points (GRPs) a week. It likely would target women 35-64, so it’s really a targeted ratings point (TRP). Each GRP or TRP represents 1 percent of the TV audience. A company like P&G might run the cam-paign anywhere from three to 10 weeks. If each TRP for a 30-second unit costs $7,000, the weekly budget exceeds $1 million. That is too rich for even the most successful DRTV advertiser.

What we learned with this recent test is that an effective media spend might be significantly less and prove to be reasonable for many DRTV advertisers. There are, however, two variables that need to be

pointed out. The first is that this is a great product. People really like it. The second is that the creative is clear and compelling. No amount of media is likely to help an undesirable product with ineffective creative.

The test looked specifically at the impact of com-mercial length and media weight on retail sales for this product in specific markets as compared to the national average at that same time. Daily sales data came from Wal-Mart.

Flight One involved running 50 TRPs a week in three markets with a 60-second unit. Almost immedi-ately, daily sales of the product in Wal-Marts in these markets exceeded weekly sales in all other markets. In fact, stores in these markets ran out of inventory. The planned three-weekly media flight was canceled after two weeks because of too much success.

Flight Two involved running 25 TRPs a week in one market with the same 60-second commercial. Weekly sales in Wal-Mart stores more than doubled compared to the national average.

Flight Three included running 25 TRPs a week in one market with a 15-second commercial. The results were identical to the second flight. Sales in Wal-Mart stores more than doubled compared to sales in Wal-Mart stores that received no advertising support.

Can 25 TRPs a week with a 15-second commercial effectively support retail for a DRTV product? If the commercial were clear and compelling, this test would indicate yes. The fact that the weekly cost of media would be $43,750 compared to P&G’s $1 million makes the findings of this test all the more interesting.

The nature of local broadcast media is another factor that needs to be considered. It’s easier to achieve share of voice in a local market than it is to do so nation-ally. And the ABC, NBC, CBS, Fox and independent stations that make up local buys, reach a different audience composition than national cable networks. The key, when applying the local lessons nationally, is to make every effort to replicate the day parts and media types used in each local market cell. That means including syndication and broadcast networks into the media plan.

So, “How much media is necessary to support retail?” According to a test we just completed, 25 TRPs a week with either a 60- or 15-second commercial, just might do the trick.

Dick Wechsler is president and CEO of Lockard & Wechsler.

BY DICK WECHSLER

Supporting Retail: Is This the Answer?


The customer experience: It has become more than just an industry term. It is what some would argue inspires brand loyalty. As marketers strive to build and grow their brands, delivering a great customer experience is mission critical.

Consumers today hold their brands to a high stan-dard. Every touch point within the customer experience must exceed their expectations.

The Customer JourneyIn the DRTV world, we often hear about the lifecycle

and journey of a product from concept to creation. But what about the customer journey? How does the customer experience your brand when they call to place an order? What about when they finally receive their much anticipated package?

Companies that approach customer satisfaction by confining the customer experience to the product alone, overlooking after-sale services such as packaging and accurate shipping run the risk of damaging their brand value. After a customer has taken the time to respond to the call to action and placed the order, only to have the box arrive late, poorly packaged and containing the wrong item, does not make for a happy customer.

With the power of Twitter, Facebook and blogging, a single consumer’s point of view can go viral in a matter of minutes. Managing brand impressions at every stage has never been tougher.

When the Product Leaves Your HandsToday, teams of organizations partner to deliver

products to the end customer hoping to create brand loyalists and eventually brand advocates. It is a huge multi-faceted process with several details to consider. But in the mind of the customer, the most important thing is getting the right product as soon as possible and in perfect condition.

After marketers have worked to develop a product and invested in marketing and promotions, there comes a point when the baton is passed. Brand marketers now have to rely on their fulfillment partner for the last mile. Order processing, how customers are informed of order/return status, save the sale efforts and how complaints are handled are all critical processes that impact the perceived quality of a customer’s brand experience. So how do marketers ensure they are really delivering a great customer experience? Pay attention to the back end details.

Fulfilling ExpectationsCreating consumer loyalty must be a core value of

a fulfillment partner. Quality has to be more than a slogan on a banner inside the warehouse. This is the last leg and consumers expect excellence.

Marketers can ensure delivery of a great customer experience on the back end by working with their fulfillment partner to ensure that there is:• A commitment to quality from senior management• A documented quality assurance process • A commitment to investing in technology• A system of training and testing employees • A system that operates based on the marketer’s

business rules• Internal and external auditing• A system for improvement implementation• A feedback communication loop to clients

The result: a great customer experience delivered right to your customer’s front door.

Yolanda Coleman Kokayi is the marketing manager of Innotrac. Yolanda can be reached at (678) 459-8425 or [email protected]

Companies that approach customer satisfaction by confining the

customer experience to the product alone, overlooking after-sale

services such as packaging and accurate shipping run the risk of

damaging their brand value.

Are You Delivering a Great Customer Experience?

BY YOLANDA COLEMAN KOKAYI

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You could be losing thousands of precious inbound telephone leads a year and not even know it. The reason? Misdials. The vast majority of misdials are due to callers automatically dialing 800 when another prefix such as 866, 877 or 888 was advertised. This is a problem that is easily remedied and can result in substantial increases in response and sales.

The 800-Prefix is Programmed in Peoples’ Brains

How can misdials possibly be so prevalent when adver-tisers go out of their way to communicate the proper toll-free number to call both visually and aurally? Because the 800-prefix is already programmed in peoples’ brains. The problem lies with the sheer amount of information that consumers are trying to process. Pundits estimate that the average consumer receives more than 6,000 advertising and marketing messages on a daily basis. As a result, they look for shortcuts to assimilate and compartmentalize an overwhelming amount of data. So when a consumer hears the term “toll-free,” his or her shortcut or default is to assume that the number being advertised is an 800 number. Simply put, 800 is to toll-free what dot-com is to the internet. Want proof? Ryan Seacrest, the host of American Idol repeats the number to call and vote – (866) IDOLS-02 – about five times per show. Nevertheless, as reported in the New York Times, about 250,000 viewers accidently dialed the wrong number, (800) IDOLS-02, significantly skewing the voting outcome.

The problem of misdials exists not only in broad-cast media. Below are just a few examples of monthly misdial activity pulled from our database.

Multiply the number of misdials a month by a year’s worth and the problem compounds into tens, even hundreds of thousands of potentially lost leads annually.

Take Misdialing for a Test DriveOne agency head questioned this assertion regarding

the superiority of 800-numbers, so I put it to the test: I chose one of the agency’s clients, the ASPCA’s Animal Poison Control Center. Its website says: “If you think that your pet may have ingested a potentially poisonous substance, call (888) 426-4435.” I purposely called the 800 num-ber, (800) 426-4435, not the 888 number, to see who answered.

As the phone was answered and I began to explain I was looking for the ASPCA, the person on the other end launched into an anguished rant about how my inquiry was a wrong number. After clarifying my real purpose, they explained that they were a family busi-ness of jewelers who forwarded their calls to their home on weekends and holidays. On a regular basis, they were awoken by misdials in the middle of the night from distraught pet owners who had misdialed their 800 number rather than the ASPCA’s 888 number.

You may wonder, wouldn’t callers simply redial the correct number? No doubt, in the case of a poisoned pet. But what about a scenario where someone has decided to call about a product on impulse? They may go online and begin price shopping or even checking out the competition instead of placing an order. Marketers need to strike while the iron is hot, and the solution to this problem is easy.

Big Rewards for Pennies The simplest way to correct this problem is to only

use 800-prefix toll-free numbers when advertising. In most instances, the incremental cost is pennies on the dollar compared to what you will recoup in leads and sales. Direct marketers are constantly striving to improve their results through offer and creative testing, telemar-keting scripting, media planning and buying and the like – so why wouldn’t you optimize the ability for your consumer to recall and accurately reach you? As the saying goes, the numbers do not lie. In the end, it is the marketers’ decision and using 800-prefix numbers exclusively is simply the right call.

Scott Richards is CEO of Dial800, specialists in marketing optimization. Dial800’s tool suite includes RapidRecall, the industry’s largest bank of numerically memorable 800 numbers and AccuRoute, state-of-the-art intelligent call routing. He can be reached at 1-800-DIAL-800 or at [email protected].

BY SCOTT RICHARDS

Stop Losing Thousands of Leads

Trying to Reach? Product Number Called

(Misdial)Correct Number

Monthly Misdials

SmartTalkPre-Paid Cell Phone

(800) 430-CELL (877) 430-CELL 64,000

Frontier Communications

Phone Company

(800) FRONTIER (888) FRONTIER 4,866

Metro Healthcare

Healthcare (800) 780-7000 (806) 780-7000 1,510

Ebay Shopping (800) 540-3229 (866) 540-3229 1,326


MEMBER SPOTLIGHT

The following companies are members of the Electronic Retailing Association and have been chosen to be spotlighted this month. Read on to better understand the different types of companies that comprise this vibrant, fast-paced, growing industry.

Who:

What: The infomercial business is getting tougher every day. And while it’s great to get a successful infomercial up and running, not making the most of that success is an absolute shame. That’s why some of the top infomercial makers in the world have turned to Vintage Marketing. We find ways to improve the effectiveness of your efforts. We do it based on years of experience in direct marketing. We do it through proprietary systems for making the most of every response. And we do it through some old fashioned digging and hard work. The process varies client by client, but the bull’s eye is always a sizable boost to your bottom line. As an international, award-winning direct marketing pro-fessional, Eileen Fraser has created direct marketing programs during the last 29 years for brands that include Chevrolet, Princess Cruises and Mattel. For the past 10 years, she has focused exclusively on helping infomercial and short-form marketers maximize sales and improve profits.Where: Santa Monica, Calif.Web: www.vintage-marketing.com

Why ERA: “ERA helps all my clients. In considering what to give that special client, what better way to show my sincere thanks than joining ERA myself!”– Eileen Fraser, President and CEO

Who:

What: Euro RSCG Edge is the world’s largest vertically inte-grated direct response agency. Edge is an innovator in every aspect of DR success: creative strategy and execution, channel agnostic customer touchpoint mapping, offer creation as well as online/offline media planning, buying and optimization. Clients include both Fortune 500 enterprises and entrepre-neurs who are bringing their first products to market. Edge delivers success to clients and their business models based on its philosophy to “Build the business, build the brand, in that order,” and its maniacal focus on metrics and results.Where: San Diego, Calif. (headquarters); Boston, Mass.; Los Angeles, Calif.; Portland, Ore.; London, EnglandWeb: www.eurorscgedge.com

Why ERA: “Edge has consistently garnered significant benefits from our ERA participa-tion and membership. The caliber of talent and access to expertise provided by ERA are unmatched and the annual conferences are a major driver of innovation within the industry and our agency.”– Steve Netzley, CEO

Who:

What: Swipe provides payment processing Check 21 and ACH solutions for e-commerce, MOTO and retail business. Swipe offers more than 30 domestic and international banking choices. Rapid Response is Swipe’s award-winning five-person support team providing 24/7 service. Each team member has between five and 20 years of direct response and e-commerce experience. Rapid Response is knowledge-able, accessible, responds quickly and shows great to detail. We also help customers during evenings and weekends with issues within our control and capabilities. Swipe is fully integrated with DR and e-commerce’s leading media buyers, call centers, fulfillment houses and CRMs, as well as other payment processors and banks. Behind Swipe’s customers is a management team with more than 75 years of experience in banking and payment processing. Swipe can facilitate high-volume processing offering detailed report-ing, multiple gateway solutions, stable banking partners, chargeback management and account updater for high processing volume capability. Curtis Kleinman is a 27-year banking veteran with a service-oriented mentality. Curtis


has a large world-class client list including many Fortune 100 companies.Where: Los Angeles, Calif.Web: www.swipellc.com

Why ERA: “The Electronic Retail Association does a great job of bringing education and world leaders together in a fun setting. You have been great listeners and helped me to achieve my goals quicker. The Moxie Awards were moving and amazing. Through ERA, my visibility and sales have gone through the roof. Thanks, ERA.”

– Curtis Kleinman, Vice President of Business Development

Who:

What: Downpat Music is the leading original music provider serving the DRTV industry. Many of our soundtracks have stayed on air for more than 10 years – themes like Carleton Sheets, SMC, OxiClean, The Juiceman, The George Foreman Grill and many more. We compose memorable music that DRTV producers use to help brand their infomercials, prod-uct videos and online videos. Working online, producers post their infomercial and the music is created for the show. Within days your infomercial will have a custom music sound adding dramatic impact to your product and making it stand out from the rest. We have composed music for major brands that use DRTV such as 3M, Cuisinart, Oreck, Procter & Gamble and, most recently, Remington for the Remington iLight Pro infomercial.Where: Danville, Calif.Web: www.downpatmusic.com

Why ERA: “After one year of membership we totally see the benefit of membership as we have developed new business relation-ships directly related to the ERA networking events held throughout the year.”– Pat Rickey, President

Who:

What: Results Producers doesn’t just produce infomercials and short-form spots for its clients, it produces revenue— well over half a billion dollars in the last 20 years. It has created winners for clients ranging from entrepreneurs such as the Aerobed and Smart Chopper to brand names including Sony, Norelco and Royal Caribbean Cruise Lines. Executive Producer Pat Finn has produced more than 400 DRTV and network television programs, and he personally oversees all of Results Producers projects from creative concept and production to final post-production. The veteran team at Results Producers does high-quality, high-definition productions without the high price.Where: Los Angeles, Calif.Web: www.resultsproducers.com

Why ERA: “We joined ERA to help minimize the risk and maximize profits for our clients by collaborating with other industry leaders. ERA is the trade association for all serious companies i n the DRTV industry.” – Pat Finn, CEO and Executive Producer


Advertiser Spotlight a2b Fulfillment Inc.see our ad on pages 35, 56150 Stewart ParkwayGreensboro, GA 30642Contact: Gary Latz, VP MarketingPhone: 706-454-0195, ext. 210281-466-2914 alternate officeEmail: [email protected]: www.a2bfulfillment.com

Speed matters. Same day processing of orders – guaranteed or its free! Reduce your per package costs by shipping from our strategic Eastern location. Turnkey service offering including warehousing, orderfulfillment, continuity management, discounted shipping, customer service, kitting, assembly, returns processing and product refurbishment.

Dial800see our ad on page 139911 West Pico Blvd., Suite 1200Los Angeles, CA 90035Contact: Scott Richards, CEOPhone: 1-800-DIAL-800Fax: 1-800-FAX-LINEEmail: [email protected]: www.dial800.com

Dial800 empowers direct marketers and agencies with powerful tools that optimize conversion and sales. You’ll have unparalleled insight into call volumes, buyer demographics, even the ability to listen to calls. We make complex call routing simple and can show you how to turn memorable toll-free numbers into unforgettable sales.

Lockard & Wechsler Directsee our ad on the inside back coverTwo Bridge Street, Suite 200Irvington, NY 10533Contact: Dick Wechsler, CEOPhone: 914-591-6600Fax: 914-591-6652Email: [email protected]: www.lwdirect.com

Maximizing every plan, every buy, every opportunity. Driving exceptional results. Building and enhancing brands. Raising awareness. Maximizing acquisition. Revolutionizing tools and technology. Integrating digital and direct to build scale and improve efficiencies. Developing breakthrough, response-driven creative. This is what defines us and helped us grow into a nationally acclaimed, full-service direct marketing agency with more than $450 million in annual billings.

Motivational Fulfillment & Logistics Servicessee our ad on page 515820 Euclid AvenueChino, CA 91708Contact: Hal Altman, PresidentPhone: (909) 517-2200Fax: (909) 517-1570Email: [email protected]: www.mfals.com

Motivational Fulfillment & Logistics Services is a full-service, direct-to-consumer and retail fulfillment center operating out of more than 800,000 square feet in Chino, Calif. We assemble, package and ship tens of thousands of packages each day to individual consumers and major retail chains. MFLS is PCI compliant and EDI capable.

Moulton Logistics Managementsee our ad on pages 6, 567850 Ruffner AvenueVan Nuys, CA 91406Contact: Joel Crannell, Vice President SalesPhone: 818-997-1800Fax: 818-442-0310Email: [email protected]: www.moultonlogistics.com

Moulton Logistics Management is the industry’s leading direct-to-consumer fulfillment company. For 42 years, Moulton Logistics has provided technology and logistical solutions to some of the biggest names in marketing and publishing. Our services include direct-to-consumer order management and fulfillment, retail distribution and customer service contact center. Our automated operations, state-of-the-art web reporting and bi-coastal distribution centers will lower the cost of bringing your product to market.

SF Global Sourcingsee our ad on the outside back cover1000 Sansome St., Suite 280San Francisco, CA 94111Contact: Steven Feinberg, PresidentPhone: 1-855-SF-GLOBALFax: 415-288-9410Email: [email protected]: www.sfglobalsourcing.com

The global sourcing process just got easier: Simply contact SF Global Sourcing for a free, no obligation consultation. We specialize in direct-marketed consumer goods with a specialty in intellectual property distributed CDs, DVDs and printed material. At SF Global Sourcing, we source all ancillary product to complete an offer. And we do this for companies ranging from multinational brands to start-ups looking for a leg up in today’s hyper-competitive marketplace.

PLUG YOURSELF INTO THE ELECTRONIC

RETAILING INDUSTRY THROUGH

ADVERTISING OPPORTUNITIES

WITH ERA

Electronic Retailer is the premier publication for the electronic retailing

marketplace. With 93% of readers being C-Level executives or higher,

advertising in this publication connects you directly to the heart of

the industry.

In addition to print, your message is brought to life in a fully interactive

digital edition of the magazine. Readers will receive each issue in their inboxes and can virtually flip through the pages and click on ads to redirect

to advertisers’ websites.

For more information on customizing your

advertising program with ERA, contact:

Matthew YatesNaylor, LLC | Project Director(800) 369-6220, ext. 6014 |

[email protected]


COMPANY NEWSDG, a leading provider of digital

media solutions and technology to the advertising, entertainment and broadcast industries, and Discovery Communications, the world’s num-ber one nonfiction media company,

have created the industry’s f irst completely digital distribution sys-tem that wi l l del iver long-form infomercial programs to Discovery on a daily basis with never-before-achieved efficiency.

BULLETIN BOARDADVERTISER INDEXa2b Fulfi llment Inc.www.a2bf.com .............................................35, 56Allstar Products Groupwww.allstarmg.com ..........................................25Applied Perceptionswww.apcrc.com.................................................... 9Chief Mediawww.chiefmedia.com/er ......................... 47, 57Concepts TV Productionswww.conceptstv.com ......................................45Dial 800www.dial800.com ..............................................13Diray TVwww.diraytv.com ...............................................57 E&M Media Groupwww.emtvsales.com ........................................12Electronic Retailerwww.electronicretailermag.com .................54Electronic Retailing Associationwww.retailing.org ..........................10, 27, 39, 43Evolve Tele-Services, Inc.www.evolvetsi.com ...........................................42Global Infomercial Services Inc.www.giservices.tv .............................................57IMS-Infomercial Monitoring Service Inc.www.imstv.com ..................................................55InfoCision Managementwww.infocision.com .........................................12Jordan Whitneywww.jwgreensheet.com .................................34Kingstar Mediawww.kingstar.tv .................................................31Koeppel Direct Inc.www.koeppeldirect.com ................................15Litle & Companywww.litle.com .....................................................38Lockard & Wechsler Directwww.lwdirect.com ..............inside back coverMotivational Fulfi llment & Logisticswww.mfals.com .................................................... 5Moulton Logistics Managementwww.moultonlogistics.com ..................... 6, 56Newton Mediawww.newtonmedia.com ................................57Northern Response (International) Ltd.www.nresponse.com .......................................56Oak Lawn Marketing Groupwww.oaklawn.co.jp/english ...................inside

front coverOmni Direct Inc.www.omnidirect.tv ...........................................48OrderMotionwww.ordermotion.com ...................................56Profi t Marginswww.profi tmarginsinc.com ...........................41SF Global Sourcingwww.sfglobalsourcing.com ................ outside

back coverSKO Brenner Americanwww.skobars.com .............................................56Swipe Payment Solutionswww.swipellc.com ............................................57Two-D Productionswww.two-d.com ................................................33Venable, LLPwww.venable.com ............................................... 3William Sullivan Advertisingwww.williamsullivanadvertising.com ........56

PERSONNELREVShare, the TV advertising network that brings the accountability of internet advertising to television, has hired three new salespeople to assist in the expansion of its targeted ad sales business. Joining the company as account executives are Stephen Hurd, Gregg Brinin and Logan Connolly.

Daryl Buttrick recently joined Media Design Group’s outstanding team of long-form media buyers. A powerhouse in the industry, Buttrick previ-ously bought media at Mercury Media and Strategic Media.

KPI Direct, an integrated direct marketing and brand management agency, has hired Nida Lopez as marketing assistant.

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CLASSIFIED DIRECTORY

Electronic Retailer Online Classifieds can be found at www.electronicretailermag.com/classifieds. For more information on advertising contact Matt Yates, [email protected], (800) 369-6220, ext. 6014 (+1-352-333-6014).

COLLECTION SERVICES

SKO BRENNER AMERICAN

928.777.8813

YOU PAY FOR PERFORMANCE NOT

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• Speed Revenue• Increase Profi ts

www.paymentsmarket.com/booth/skobrenner

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INFOMERCIAL DEVELOPMENT & PRODUCTION

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FULFILLMENT

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Full Call Center • Full Service Direct Mail • Real-time Online Inventory Reports • Database ManagementContinuity Programs • EDI for Retail Ful llment • Drop Shipping for Shopping Channel Clients

Logistics Management

A Complete Range of Ful llment Services

1-888-765-MOULTON www.moultonlogistics.com

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ADVERTISING AGENCY

To learn more, call Bill Sullivan @ 973-214-4447 or email @ [email protected]

A Division of JL Mediawww.williamsullivanadvertising.com

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DISTRIBUTION & FULFILLMENT SERVICES

Electronic Retailer classifiedsput your products and services

front and center to theaudience you want to reach.

Contact Matthew Yates, (800) 369-6220, ext. 6014, [email protected]

ADVERTISE HERE

INTERNATIONAL DISTRIBUTION

International Distribution Direct Access to the Largest Overseas gninnalP tcudorP cigetartS aideM yriuqnI reP latigiD stekraM

Individualized Customer Service

[email protected]

www.giservices.tv

708.229.2424

Oak Lawn MarketingGroup Company

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MEDIA BUYING & PLANNING

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PAYMENT PROCESSING

Curtis Kleinman26 year banking exp.

V.P. Business DevelopmentE-Commerce Specialist

Tel [email protected]

Swipe Payment SolutionsLos Angeles, CA

The most Domestic/InternationalSolutions to help your business thrive

Swipe Payment Solutions is a registered ISO/MSP of HSBC Bank USA National Association, Buffalo, NY and First National Bank of Omaha, NE, Meridian Bank of Devon, PA and BMO Harris Bank, N.A., Chicago, IL

Direct Response

Anti-Aging

Continuity w/Trial

Educational

Internet

MOTO

Fitness

Retail Locations

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b Brands matter and here is why: Everyone is a brand comprised of a mosaic of singular attributes – from quirky personality characteristics to physical appear-ance, our circle of friends and especially the consumer items we surround ourselves with. The latter might be called our brand patina, and it ranges from the shoes we wear to the vehicle we drive to the books we cozy up to at night. Conscious or not, we make instantaneous decisions about whether something is going to enter the consideration set of our brand patina in the flick of a dismissive or accepting blink. It occurs on an almost subliminal level where a product’s aesthetic appeal or lack thereof determines the ultimate outcome of our relationship with it. It doesn’t matter if we’re talking about hangers (plastic = yuck) or hamburgers (cheese, please); this merciless Caesarian-like thumbs up/thumbs down is an immutable law that drives the marketplace. So what is a marketer to do? Pay attention.

That attention is best focused on 1) designing and manufacturing a product that is beautiful, functional and easy to use, and 2) spending the time, money and care to portray that product in its most aspirational light. There is a reason that the average 30-second branded television commercial costs $323,000 according to the 4A’s Television Production Cost Survey: Tender loving care requires legal tender. Yet even when certain products are gussied up in primetime on, say, the likes of American Idol, they still fail the personal branding litmus test. Hence, no amount of light-hearted frolicking by ham-fisted finalists around a Ford Focus can save it from the chop shop known as the brand patina guil-lotine. That may sound elitist, but the same principle applies to the size of the curd in your cottage cheese – we know what we like and we like what we know. Everything else is a no.

Hence a recent trip to the annual automobile show to find a replacement for my wife’s Honda Odyssey Minivan felt like a game of Mortal Combat where vehicle after vehicle was reduced to smoking metaphorical

shrapnel. Oh, I dutifully sat in every gas-guzzling SUV and luxury sedan knowing full well that in the end we would do exactly what we did: We bought another Honda Odyssey Minivan. Soccer moms rock their own brand patina; it’s just that their idea of a tailgate party is when the tailgate opens automatically.

Yet it was at that very auto show that I fell in love again – with a MINI Cooper S. Here was a line that spoke to me: British racing heritage, over a million customizable variations, nothing short of irreverence on four wheels. And the gas mileage – so good I was able to construct a carbon-footprint argument to sway the better half on how rational a decision it was to buy a convertible in a city where it rains 167 days a year.

However, that first encounter at the convention center was just the beginning of a brand seduction that has continued to flourish. For a MINI isn’t just a car – it’s a culture, and the company does a phenomenal job of cultivating its buyers. The welcome package I received contained an array of materials all designed to inspire positive feelings about the purchase decision – including a cheeky motoring manual, a MINI luxury magazine, stickers to affix on your visor, even a smiley face ball for your antenna. But perhaps the cleverest item of all was the “Chief Motorist” welcome card affixed with a paperclip in the silhouette of – what else – a MINI Cooper. What may seem like the most insignificant detail proved that with the right touch, even the tiniest feature is capable of communicating passion.

Achieving this sort of brand affinity is no easy task. A marketer has to buy into it heart and soul. It requires imagination, a lot of trial and error, and the ability to see beyond the associated costs. But in those moments when an advertiser is vying for attention, it is these sorts of nuances that can help win the war to capture an audience’s fancy. They say the devil is in the details, but when rendered right, it is those devilish details that can cause a chorus of angels to erupt. That is the soundtrack of success, as consumers reach for their wallet, their brand patina awash in a vivid new color; a color brought to life by the brilliant brushstrokes of a marketer’s ingenuity.

Rick Petry is a freelance writer who specializes in direct marketing and is a past chairman of ERA. He can be reached at (503) 740-9065, online at rickpetry.com or on Twitter at http://twitter.com/thepetrydish.

MINI Me

RICK PETRY

For a MINI isn’t just a car – it’s a culture, and the company

does a phenomenal job of cultivating its buyers.

NINE RULES FORDRTV SUCCESS

Since 196766 , Lockard & WeWW chsler has been planning, buying and analyzing direct-tt response campaignsfoff r maja or corporations and faff st-tt growing startups alike. In that time, we’ve established nine provenmethods to make DRTRR V make money – no matter what produdd ct you’re selling, no matter what mediumyou’re using. When every minunn te matters, these are the rules foff r success.

1 Make empirical, not emotional, decisions.And base them on cold, hard faff cts.

2 Numbers are everything.They don’t lie. But they do havaa e to be handled by experts so they give up their secrets andprovide meaningfuff l direction.

3 Programs should work the first time, every time.In the right hands, results can alwayaa s be improved, but not enough to resuscitatea program that’s dead on arrival.

4 Frequency is the benefit of success, not the key to success.An expert DRTRR V agency will help you run a successfuff l campaign foff r all it’sworth and advise you not to throw more money to the dogs.

5 Never force anything. YoYY u can’t beat a down cycle.The key is in knowing what the cycles are and going with the flow.

6 Don’t waste time. Opportunities are fleeting.A great media agency will be able to identifyff them and pounce on your behalf.ff

7 DRTV is a science. The discipline will lead you to success.Run hard with the winners. Cut your losers ruthlessly. Alwayaa s take advantage of allthe analytical tools and expertise avaa ailable to you.8 TeTT st early and often. Don’t wait for a campaign to weaken.TeTT st offff eff r,rr creative and media frff om the very beginning. There’s alwayaa s room foff r improvement.

9 TrTT eat DRTV and the Internet as a single channel.The Internet adds effiff ciencies to DRTRR V,VV and DRTRR V adds scale to The Internet.

ToTT give your campaign its greatest chance foff r success, come to an agency that knows the rules foff r success.

WiWW th Lockard & WeWW chsler,rr you’ll benefit frff om decades of DR experience including short-tt foff rm and long-foff rm TV,VV radio, direct mail, FSIs and print. YoYY ur media will beplaced by senior people with the experience and the long-termrelationships necessary to get the best deals.

And, your business will grow with an agency who actuallybelieves in direct response ads like this, rather than one thatreverts to awaa areness ads to promote itself.ff

For additional infoff rmation call Dick WeWW chsler now at(914) 250-0250 or visit www.LWDirect.com

Media Buying • Creative • DRTV • Infomercials • Print • Radio • Hispanic DRTV

IIrrvviinnggttoonn, NY

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HOW

YOUGET TO

W WOffer Development | Sourcing | Packaging | Delight

When your consumer receives your product everything about it should WOW them. At SF Global Sourcing we specialize in creating the highest perceived value with the lowest cost of goods possible. Contact us today to put the power of WOW to work for you.

Meet Us At ERA's Great Ideas Summit, 2/27-2/29/12, Fontainebleau Miami Beach

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Documents

Electronic Retailer Magazine, Itv Story