Direct response marketing

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Direct response marketing is a form of marketing designed to solicit a direct response which is specific and quantifiable. The delivery of the response is direct between the viewer and the advertiser, that is, the customer responds to the marketer directly. This is in contrast to direct marketing in which the marketer contacts the potential customer directly.

One common form today is infomercials. They try to achieve a direct response via television presentations. Viewers respond via telephone or internet, credit card in hand.

Other media, such as magazines, newspapers, radio, and e-mail can be used to elicit the response, but they tend to achieve lower response rates than television.

Mail order is a term, seldom used today, that describes a form of direct response in which customers respond by mailing a completed order form to the marketer. Mail order is slow and response rates are low. It has been eclipsed by toll-free telephone numbers and the internet.

Direct response ads like infomercials can be contrasted with normal television commercials because traditional commercials normally do not solicit a direct immediate response from the viewer, but instead try to brand their product in the market place.

In direct marketing (such as telemarketing), there is no intermediary broadcast media involved (which is why it is called direct). In direct response marketing marketers use broadcast media to get customers to contact them directly. It is direct response marketing because the communications from the customer to the marketer is direct, and this differentiates it from direct marketing in which the communications from the marketer to the customer is direct.