About the "Big Idea" and Other Gobbledegook

Written By Ted Grigg

After presenting a complex direct marketing proposal,  a neophyte direct marketing client asked the perennial question "What Is Your Big Idea?"

 I gave my typical response, "Direct marketing relies upon a set of discovery processes including research, testing and analytics. It is out of this discipline that big ideas emerge."

Another answer is that there is no big idea, but rather a multitude of good ideas expertly executed.

In truth, there are definitely big ideas in direct marketing. But the question they are really asking is "What is your magic bullet?" Many company leaders expect direct marketers (or any marketer) to pull rabbits out of their hats to solve problems in a few weeks that took years to develop in the first place.

It's as if every great achievement relies on a single, new idea that no one has ever thought of before.

But I think Solomon said it right thousands of years ago in Ecclesiastes:

"What has been will be again,

what has been done will be done again;

there is nothing new under the sun."

So there are really no new, big ideas floating around out there. It's the same answer to the same question disguised as a new revelation.

Here are a few examples going from old to new.

-Call to action = lead generation = squeeze page

-Converting leads to customers and customers to repeat buyers = Database marketing = Customer Relationship Management = Audience cultivation

-Market segmentation = Recency, Frequency, Monetary selection = Customer profiling = Behavior marketing

-Personalized response form = Landing page = Micro site

-Direct response = direct marketing = one-to-one marketing = selling one person one at a time

What we have here are the same ideas morphing into different terms or more sophisticated implementation. But the principles or big ideas remain constant.

I am skeptical about those who claim something new when it is simply the same idea more expertly executed.

Become expert first at the principles of direct marketing, then figure out creative new ways to implement them. Those big ideas already exist. It's now a matter of expanding those big ideas using today's more capable tools such as email, online marketing, behavioral marketing and deep analytics.

Can you think of anything really new that is not already driven by a marketing concept that has existed for years? If so, I would love to hear it and discuss it in this blog.

Ted Grigg

Ted Grigg is a direct response strategist who helps growth-focused companies reduce risk by identifying weak assumptions before they become costly mistakes.

Over the course of his career, Ted has evaluated several hundred million dollars in direct response testing across direct mail, digital, print, television, telephone, and other channels. His work combines direct response strategy, acquisition economics, customer analysis, creative evaluation, offer development, and disciplined testing.

Ted has worked on both the client and agency sides of the business. That experience gives him a practical understanding of the pressures facing executives, marketing teams, agencies, and service providers—and of the problems that arise when activity, media volume, or creative preference replaces a clear economic objective.

His consulting work helps organizations examine such questions as:

  • Are acquisition goals economically realistic?

  • Is the allowable Cost Per Sale supported by customer value?

  • Are targeting, offers, creative, media, and response paths working together?

  • Are tests structured to produce reliable business decisions?

  • Are unproven assumptions being treated as facts?

  • Is the organization measuring sales outcomes rather than convenient proxies?

Ted’s experience includes the development of direct mail and multichannel acquisition programs for insurance, healthcare, financial services, technology, nonprofit, manufacturing, retail, transportation, communications, government, and business-to-business organizations.

For a national direct-to-consumer insurance company, he developed a direct mail format that defeated established controls and helped expand the productive use of compiled prospect lists from less than 10 percent to more than 30 percent of total direct mail circulation within one year. He also planned Medicare lead-generation programs for more than 60 regional and national HMO and PPO organizations, with some programs exceeding sales projections by as much as 60 percent.

Ted founded Wyse Direct, a direct marketing division of Wyse Advertising in Cleveland, where he developed acquisition programs and helped launch a new technology product for Seiko Instruments by generating a predictable flow of qualified sales leads for its national sales organization. As vice president of new business development for the Grizzard Agency, he helped broaden the agency’s strategic capabilities and pursue new commercial and fundraising opportunities.

He is the author of The HMO/PPO Marketing Plan—A Step-by-Step Guide, published by Executive Enterprises, and has written numerous articles and conducted webinars on direct response strategy, testing, creative development, and marketing economics.

Ted earned a Bachelor of Arts degree from Abilene Christian University and completed two years of graduate study at Texas Tech University. He is the founder of DMCG, LLC.

http://www.dmcgresults.com
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