TV or Not TV

One of our consistent themes has be lack of enthusiasm for television advertising. This is not just the curmudgeon in us. Although TV can be cost effective to reach large numbers of viewers and useful to introduce or support a brand. However, TV campaigns are usually structured so they are difficult to evaluate. The commercials can be expensive to produce and difficult to target to your market.

Traditional ad agencies have not helped and often sacrificed accountability in pursuit of creativity. Senn and Fallon’s interesting but unconvincing apology for ad creativity, Juicing the Orange, continues in the wrong direction. Fallon produced the memorable herding cats Superbowl ad a few years back. Though the production was memorable, viewers couldn’t remember the sponsor or that its business had to do with the ad.

What’s a marketer to do? An intriguing option is provided by online agency, Spot Runner. They deliver three benefits, which make TV at least worth a test – cheap yet professional production, easily targeted media buying, and convenient detailed reporting.

Spot Runner offers extremely low costs through web based automation. A full service ad agency can charge tens or hundreds of thousands for a custom produced TV commercial. With Spot Runner, you choose a generic commercial from a library of several thousand and then customize it for your product or business with your logo, graphics, offer, and a professional voice over. The result looks like the real thing rather than a homemade ready for YouTube spot. This costs all of $500 to $750 depending on the amount of customization. The ad can, and usually should, display trackable information such as a unique phone number, URL, or email address.

Once you have a commercial, where do you run it? Spot Runner has an automated media buying process, which allows targeting as precisely as individual zip codes as well as specific times. The process is roughly similar to creating ads through Google’s AdWords. Spot Runner’s appears easier for the novice TV advertiser. Unlike Google, you can call Spot Runner with questions and problems.

Does this mean that TV should be part of your marketing mix? It does mean that if you have $1500 to $2000 for production and a media buy, you can find out.