The Incomparable Value Comparison
Everything is relative, especially your price
The people who buy off TV are impulse buyers. It’s no wonder. We DR marketers do everything in our power to get people excited! After making them relive the colorless pain of their everyday problems, we present life with our solution as a Technicolor dreamworld. Then we proceed to:
Dazzle them with amazing demonstrations
Hype them up with strong social proof that our products are the best thing ever
Dial up the FOMO with perceived shortages and time constraints
Generally give them every reason to believe they must act now
In short, we fully grease Joe Sugarman’s slippery slide.
At some point, though, reason reasserts itself. As a general rule, the closer you get to the moment of truth (i.e. the prospect parting with his or her hard-earned cash), the more you need to make buying your product seem rational. Or as Sugarman put it: “You sell on emotion, but you justify a purchase with logic.”
Personally, I think Sugarman was giving consumers a little too much credit. Do people really use logic when making purchasing decisions? Consider one of my favorite DR appeals: “With the money you’ll save, it pays for itself!” Does anyone really believe this? Or is it just something that sounds good when you really, really want to buy something?
Maybe a better way of putting it is: You sell on emotion and justify with rationalizations. Luckily, we DR marketers are full of those. There are the aforementioned FOMO tactics that make every offer sound exceedingly rare and super special. (I had to buy it, honey! The guy on TV said it was a special TV offer that is not available in stores and supplies are limited!) But there are also more solid techniques like the tried-and-true “value comparison.”
This goes back to a marketing concept we’ve talked about before: perceived value. What is the perceived value of your product? One way to answer that question is to do a lot of research and try to figure out what’s in people’s heads. Another, simpler way — the DR way — is to put a value in their heads. That’s where the value comparison comes in.
We’re on step seven of my 10-point formula for scripts that sell. After spending several weeks in the first 30 seconds of a typical two-minute DRTV commercial, and then just a few weeks in the ‘middle minute,’ we are now entering the last 30 seconds. This is the moment of truth: the “call to action” (CTA). And a great way to kick off your CTA is to exploit something psychologists call the “anchoring effect.” Here’s a short explainer from Harvard University.
The anchoring effect is a cognitive bias that describes the common human tendency to rely too heavily on the first piece of information offered (the “anchor”) when making decisions. During decision making, anchoring occurs when individuals use an initial piece of information to make subsequent judgments. Once an anchor is set, other judgments are made by adjusting away from that anchor, and there is a bias toward interpreting other information around the anchor. For example, the initial price offered for a used car sets the standard for the rest of the negotiations, so that prices lower than the initial price seem more reasonable even if they are still higher than what the car is really worth.
Now, the smart folks at Harvard should know better than to write things like “what the car is really worth.” As economists like to say, price is whatever the market will bear. Who can say what anything is really worth? Is a leather bag really worth thousands of dollars? Ask my wife and she’ll say yes, but she has long been anchored by Gucci and other luxury marketers. I digress.
On the other end of the spectrum, here in the DR world, we set our anchors using the value comparison method that I mentioned earlier. Below is an example of this from my own work.
This is a simple yet effective technique that goes back to the heyday of the Masters of Marketing who invented the industry. When I started in the business 20+ years ago, we used reproductions of catalog pages or print ads and that same ‘big red circle’ graphic you saw. Today, I think it makes the most sense to do what I did and find your anchors on Amazon. Of course, finding them will require a counter-intuitive approach. If you typically sort listings like a consumer (lowest prices at the top), you’ll want to do the opposite here. I look for the most expensive product (within reason) that looks like my product.
What if your product is so unique that you can’t find anything that looks like it? No problem. In these situations, I find something generic in the category that has a similar perceived value and use that. This also presents a good opportunity for double-hit sales copy like: You could pay twice as much for an ordinary [product] … and it wouldn’t even do what [your brand] can do!
By the way, Amazon itself uses anchoring all the time. Indeed, it is built into their platform. However, they use a weaker form that is undermined by their own search engine. More on that in a moment.
Chart Watch👁️
Pooph, which I wrote about in last week’s Chart Watch, is #1 on the DRMetrix for the second week in a row. AquaCare, which I broke down for you two weeks ago, is now #3 in the nation. And Ontel has a new campaign that just broke into the Top 10.
Miracle Smile
Pitch: “Gently cleans and flosses your entire mouth in only 10 seconds”
Offer: $39.99 for one
Marketer: Ontel Products Corporation
Flossing hasn’t been a great category for DRTV. Coincidentally, Ontel’s Floss Master in 2017 was the last attempt at a water flosser. In 2015, two such items dueled: Global TV’s HydroBlast Pro and On Demand’s Dr. Hart’s Power Floss.
In any case, it could be argued that this product is closer to Idea Living’s 30 Second Smile toothbrush, an old infomercial hit — and that could very well be the secret to its success. Brands like WaterPik dominate this category, so being different is the only way to go.
As for the brand: “Miracle” is a workhouse that Ontel has slapped on all types of products — at least a dozen different projects over the years. The last test I logged under the brand was Miracle Hot Plate in 2020, which didn’t roll out.
Other Miracle items over the years include: Miracle Foot Repair (2001-2002), Miracle Socks (2011-2012), Miracle Slippers (2012), Miracle Peeler (2014), Miracle Copper Socks (2014), Miracle Mask (2014), Miracle Bamboo Pillow (2015), Miracle Bamboo Cushion (2016), Miracle Teeth Whitener (2017) and Miracle Back (2017).
Sticking with tactical flashlights, here’s an example of how Amazon employs the anchoring effect.
See that crossed out “list price” below the actual price (and for that matter the “-27%”)? That’s a type of anchoring. Unfortunately, it is unlikely to have any effect on the prospect. All he has to do is search the category and Amazon’s own algorithm will serve him this competitor listing right next to the one he just saw:
Not the same, but close enough. It’s a dynamic value comparison that completely undermines the anchoring effect of that “list price.” In the controlled environment of your own advertisement, you could use the ‘crossed-out price’ trick more effectively. We often do. However, as illustrated in the TacLight example, it is much better to show than to tell — if you can.
The Formula for Scripts That Sell
Start with a painful problem
(Article: Ask the ‘Skeptic's Question’ to Check & Fix Your Opening Pitch)Introduce the product and describe it
(Article: Answer These 3 Questions Before Prospects Lose Interest)Explain how the product solves the opening problem
(Article: Pay Off the Problem Opening to Powerfully Position Your Product)Describe the product’s key features and benefits
(Article: Don't Be Misled By the Order of Things)Briefly list all of the key uses for the product
(Article: This Space Intentionally Left Blank)Explain how the product works
(Article: Here’s How 'Here’s How it Works' Works)Set up a value comparison and introduce the offer
(Article: The Incomparable Value Comparison)Introduce a bonus and describe it
(Article: Instantly Boost Sales by Leveraging the ‘Mooch Factor’)Recap the entire offer
(Article: The Department of Redundancy Department)Create a sense of urgency and ask for the order
(Article: The Simple Secret to Closing More Sales)