What Is Direct Response Marketing + Why You Should Use It In Your Business
There are many different marketing strategies that you can use to market your service or product-based business.
While many marketing strategies are designed to build awareness and trust if your brand, direct response marketing is designed to elicit an immediate action, like buying a product or signing up for one of your services.
In today's blog post, we're taking a closer look at what direct response marketing is, some of the most effective techniques when using it, and answer whether you should be using it in your business.
What is direct response marketing?
"10 people have already signed up for this program!"
"We're having a limited time 50% off sale!"
"Buy one and get one free!"
These are some examples of tactics used in direct response marketing.
Direct response marketing is a type of marketing that drives your audience to take action quickly.
You may use direct response marketing to increase your sales on a time-sensitive offer, get people to visit your shop, schedule a consultation call with you, or take some other desired action.
This type of marketing is short-term oriented which makes it easy to track and measure. You can immediately see your conversion rates and sales, and determine what's working and what it isn't.
What are some effective direct response marketing channels?
Social Media Marketing
You can use your social media platforms like Instagram, Facebook, and TikTok to connect with your community, build brand awareness, and generate more sales.
The key to using social media marketing for direct response is to find a way to reach your target audience with a time-sensitive offer.
For example, you might post content to create awareness of your products and offer a fast action bonus to the first 10 people who enroll in your course. You may also run social media ads on that post so that you can measure and track conversions.
Other examples of direct response social media marketing could include hosting Instagram lives, using strong CTAs in your captions, and using scarcity tactics in your copy. Each of these examples allows you to create an offer on which your audience must immediately take action on.
Email Marketing
Here at Unruly, we’re die-hard fans of email marketing.
Email marketing is an inexpensive way to build a community of only your #1 fans who want to learn more from you, consume all of your content, and be the first to know about your launches.
This is why it makes a great channel for direct response marketing.
Let’s say, for example, that you have a product to sell. If you've taken the time to segment your email list based on what they've purchased or opted-in for the past, you can choose a list of people who would be interested in your product
You can then send emails or a sequence of emails to that list, making them aware of the product and using strong call-to-actions and a sense of urgency, like sales, coupons, “buy one and get one free," etc.
Being crystal clear on your ideal buyer or client persona is extremely important here. Are you using messaging that appeals to them? What motivates them to purchase? Be sure to include this in your emails!
Don't forget to use urgency and appeal in your subject and preview lines as well to increase your open rate.
SMS Marketing
Have you seen “Text me” followed by a phone number in anyone’s bio yet? Or notice your favorite brands collecting your phone number for a special discount?
SMS marketing is an emerging trend, and it’s connecting businesses with clients in a whole new way.
SMS marketing, also known as text message marketing, is a strategy based on sending texts to your community members to create a more personalized and high-touch experience.
Here are a few reasons why SMS marketing makes a great channel for direct response marketing:
It’s one of the most personal forms of marketing. People use texting to connect with their family and friends so once they opt-in to receive your texts, consider yourself part of that inner circle.
According to Mobile Marketing, average SMS open rates are as high as 98% compared to just 20% for emails!
You can quickly raise awareness around a time-sensitive offer.
Using this personalized channel for direct response marketing can help both product or service-based businesses see an improved ROI on their marketing.
Some SMS marketing platforms you can use are Community and Textedly if you're service-based or SMSBump and Attentive if you're an eCommerce brand.
Should I use direct response marketing in my business?
While big, popular brands like Apple and Amazon can rely on pure brand marketing to sell their products, small businesses still need to do the work of growing their communities first.
Direct response marketing can be extremely helpful for this! We can use its effective channels we talked about in this post along with its tactics to get our audience to become customers or clients.
Quick sales are not the only use of direct marketing strategy. We can also invite people to opt-in to our freebie, visit our website, or sign up for a webinar.
By using direct response marketing in this way, we can build our community and get in front of potential customers and clients who'll be more warmed up to buying in the future (if you've been providing value and nurturing them!).
the recap
Direct response marketing is a type of marketing designed to get your audience to take immediate action.
You can use it to generate sales for a time-sensitive offer or get people inside your email list!
Will you be adding direct response marketing into your marketing plan for Q2? Let us know in the comments below!
