They
sizzle for attention…they shout for action in your mail, catalog
and website…they demand response! They're Hot Potatoes!
When you think of the children's game, "Hot potato, Cold potato", its quick pace is a good reminder of the spontaneity that's part of humanity, ready for us, as marketers, to tap into as a tool for creating excitement, and response.
"Hot Potatoes" are the things that you can build into your mail, catalog or website, to move your customer or prospect to more quickly respond.
To discover and create the "Hot Potatoes" that
move your customer and prospect to action, you need:
- good data or information about your customer
- the budget to implement some kind of program, and
- a creative team dedicated to developing a hot potato that will virtually
hop around in your customer's hands, begging for attention until they
finally act on it!
Hot potatoes can be visual grabbers that demand attention, such as 3-D packages, unusual materials in a flat package, a website with a preliminary page that's for your eyes only, or intriguing teasers on an OE. Consider for example, the classic Psychology Today mailing by Bill Jayme and Heikki Ratalahti, asking "Do you close the bathroom door, even when you're the only one home?" To an audience doing business to business, that may not be the hottest potato, but to a psychographic crowd who's intrigued by what makes life so interesting, it's as hot as they get. Other "Hot Potatoes" include offers, such as discounts shown off with coupons and limited time dates.
Let's look at some hot potatoes that have done the trick in some current and past programs…
1. The OE teaser.
In business to business, it's rare to find a truly intriguing OE teaser
anymore. We generally find that offers are the "Hot Potatoes"
of choice, for many reasons. But as in the earlier Psychology Today example,
an outrageous or unusual teaser, which fulfills inside, can be a very
"Hot Potato". Take this case - an oversized envelope with the
teaser, "What do you get when you cross Elvis, Einstein, Godzilla,
Influenza, and Super Glue?"…the "Hot Potato" is in
the intriguing and unusual choice of subjects listed. This package was
delivered to directors of web sites, and was offering a web portal which
could draw in customers and keep them coming back again and again. The
psychographics told us that these people are stirred into action by the
quirky and unusual, but still look for things we all do - benefits!
To make the "potato" even hotter, the back featured, "How
to give your Web Site the Pull of Elvis, the Presence of Godzilla, the
Smarts of Einstein, the Viralness of this year's flu, and the Stickiness
of Super Glue…free!" This "Hot Potato" was all that
was needed to pull in over twice the projected number of prospects to
call and ask about the product and take advantage of an offer which was
not even mentioned on the OE. Now, that's hot!
2. The Wrapper.
In the catalog world, a wrap or a wrapper can be a hot potato if handled
in an intriguing way. For example, you can often turn a previously received
catalog into a hot potato with a special offer on a wrap. You can also
include other inserts in a poly bagged or mylar bagged catalog. Just a
few years ago, we took an Herbalife catalog and converted it into business
generation tool by inserting a letter and a prepaid phone card, ready
for use once they responded, along with a special offer to their dormant
sales force. These people were ignoring other mailings and even the catalog
they had been receiving, but given these extra goodies, that phone card
and poly bag combo became a "Hot Potato".
3. The lumpy package.
"Hot Potatoes" have been around in the publishing arena for
years…you find a key (for a car you may have won), a coin which peeks
seductively through a glassine window, a pen or pencil just waiting to
be used. One of the best purveyors of the lumpy package today is the premiums
supplier called Nelson Marketing, now called 4 Imprint. Occasionally their
packages arrive as boxes of sample goodies for our own personal use. But
their lumpy envelopes get opened quickly in my office, because of those
colorful pens inside that click and change messages, have squishy fingerpads,
and imitate the formidable Mont Blanc for less than a tenth of the price.
I can't resist finding out how affordable the pens are, and considering
how often I receive these packages. The lumpy package becomes a "Hot
Potato" I must deal with.
4. The 3D package.
Much maligned and often poorly conceived, the 3D package is a very "hot
potato" if correctly developed by the marketing and creative team.
Just the fact that it's dimensional helps a lot. But there are key ingredients
to making the 3D package successful.
A good example of one that 'blew it' is a DM box package I have sitting
on the floor of my studio, with a stuffed cat inside. Their first big
mistake was in their sloppy data - I'm not their market, at all! To make
a 3D package pay off, the data must be meticulous, and that means you
simply can't just buy mailing lists and be on your way. Ironically, this
company specializes in data!
Their second mistake was the lack of tie-in with the concept. I never did figure out why the stuffed cat was in there, and the copy never provided any payoff to that concept. To make a 3D package really successful, there needs to be good reason for sending an object, and there must be a well crafted letter inside paying that off.
A third problem was that the package was falling apart inside. A diskette had been rubber-glued to a card inside, and the disk had come off and was floating around beneath box filler, likely to be ignored or lost. Stage management is a key ingredient to the 3D package, and it's not for the faint hearted or the inexperienced production manager.
And finally there was no signal to respond in terms of a response card. Most creatives will convince a client to 'just this once' not put the reply form in the package, fearing it may 'dirty' the package up. But every 3D package must have a reply form to make it work, In fact, with that, you can have a double "Hot Potato" when you use the power of the dimension, AND an offer, shown proudly on the reply form.
These ingredients make for an extremely powerful package that can bring in double digit response to even the toughest consumer and b to b market if done correctly.
5. Offer strategy.
Your offer can be an irresistible "Hot Potato". Offers are often
ignored in the web and catalog, and sadly, not used often enough in the
mail. But each of these media, including emails, web sites and microsites,
catalog and mail, can have a "Hot Potato" effect with the right
offer.
For example, when responding to a lead generated with fulfillment materials, you're really missing the boat if you don't toss in a limited time offer such as a discount coupon as a "Hot Potato".
Offering a first-time discount for registration on a website is rarely used but extremely hot! Alternate offerings can work well too, such as sending e-coupons for partner companies such as Amazon.com, CDNow, or even pizza delivery! Tip from someone who's been there: don't try to create one of these plans in just a few weeks - we've found that it often takes time to convince other dot-coms to see the benefit of relationships with a new slew of customers…so plan ahead!
An important point to remember regarding offers, is that your market must be interested in what you are offering! For example, when offering a video holder, Republic Home Video's catalog had an offer that was cold. But when we developed an exclusive offer -- a calendar made from their own private photo collection of old time movie stars, the offer became a very "Hot Potato" indeed.
We've tested many offers for Isuzu Motors -- from Swiss army knives to limited edition prints -- and have found some offers which are the "Hot Potatoes" every good marketing director dreams of. But remember, no offer is a "hot potato" without a time limit shown clearly, and it won't be hot if everyone is offering it. So to make your offer a "Hot Potato", it should be yours alone, in some way.
Of course, your best friend when it comes to hot potatoes -- and all direct marketing efforts -- is testing. You may find in a test that one teaser is 10 times as effective as another. Or one offer is many times more interesting to your prospect, giving you outstanding response and a pattern to play off of the next time you mail. Last year, we proved the power of a 3D package generating leads for Isuzu in a head to head test which soundly beat the flat package both in response and in ROI, and the back end response was the highest they had ever experienced for such a program. But if we hadn't tested, the question would have always remained about the financial payoff for that format. Testing proved effectiveness of that "hot potato"!
In conclusion, your mailings and other marketing efforts are underachievers unless you regularly test and employ the "Hot Potatoes" that abound. It's time to gather your team and decide which ones to use in your next efforts!
