I know a lot of marketers in the social media space are saying that the old approach to advertising doesn’t work anymore.

No doubt there’s a ton of books written on the ‘new’ social media landscape and marketing strategies and techniques that
can be used effectively. And hey, that’s all good.

In fact, I not only believe a lot of what authors such as David Meerman Scott have written in their recent books – we’ve been putting some of these principles to work for our clients for quite some time.

What I found myself questioning the other day, is how can so many people say that the old direct response approach to selling products directly to consumers doesn’t work anymore…when the TV and magazines are filled with repeat advertisers hawking their wares.

The basic premise of direct-response is that you test a bunch of ads in different media. You take what generates the best results and then continually test different headlines, offers, guarantees, etc until you have a money making ad. Once you have that you run with it.

So here’s the thing ( I know this is clearly a rant, but anyways…) I’ve been seeing some direct response style ads for auto and home insurance, as well as for life insurance run for more than 6 months. I’ve seen one company run the same ad only with slight variations for close to a year.

Either these companies have found a winning ad and are raking the money in, or they’re a bunch of idiots losing money hand over fist. And if the former is the case, there’s no denying that effective direct-response advertising is still alive and well.

From the results we’ve been generating, the best recipe is using social media to leverage direct-response marketing principles. A lot more can be said on this last topic, but I’ve got to get running so we’ll leave it there for the moment.