Five Weeks Later, One of My 'Promising Products' is Climbing the Charts
Chart Watch (Week 42)
Although I didn’t quite set it up that way, there’s a flow to my weekly updates. A product I write about in my end-of-week “Promising Products” roundup could end up appearing in my mid-week “Testing Now” update. Then, if the test is successful, it could also end up appearing for a final time in this update.
I’ve been speaking hypothetically, but that has already happened with my lead item in today’s report — and since only paid subscribers have access to two of the three updates I just mentioned, it seems like an appropriate time to drop this button 👇
Campaign: Eye Candy
Marketer: BulbHead (Telebrands)
As teased above, my paid subscribers learned of the potential for this product in my first Promising Products update on September 9. For you free subscribers, here’s what the writeup looked like:
Full Page Magnifier, MagniPros 3x. I always pause on these items because of a successful project I worked on back in 2010 (with Spark Innovators and Hutton-Miller) called Page Brite. Telebrands had also found success five years earlier (in 2005) with a wallet-size magnifier called the OWL. There hasn’t been a similar success since then. But thanks to an aging population, this is one of those problems that hasn’t gone away. Perhaps now is the right time?
Just one week later, paid subscribers learned1 that Telebrands was attempting to bring back the item. Now, it’s No. 20 on the DRMetrix chart2 after five weeks of airings and looks to have an upward trajectory. We’ll see if it continues to climb toward the top of the charts. Speaking of which…
Fun Fact: Last week, BeActive Plus was No. 1 again on the DRMetrix chart, marking the campaign’s sixth week on top since I wrote about it in early September.
Campaign: Air Whirl Crisper
Marketer: Allstar Products Group
Producer: Hutton Miller
Another week, another promising Allstar-Hutton Miller collaboration. This one represents a classic DRTV strategy: Take a successful high-cost item (air fryers) and make a value-priced version (once called the “poor man’s version”). What’s different is that this used to happen at the lower end. A $50+ long-form item would end up in short form for $15. But today, $50 can be a viable price point in short form, which opens up the opportunity to look at items such as $100+3 air fryers and come up with ways to simplify them. And that’s how you get smart projects like this one.
As for the commercial, it’s the little touches that impressed me. Most producers know by now that the secret to success with food is to make the viewer’s mouth water. It’s the ‘how’ that sets the best apart from the rest, such as breaking open your mozzarella sticks to show they’re gooey and steaming hot inside. Even something as seemingly simple as adding visual interest by shooting up at the product is the kind of attention to detail you only get from true masters of this art.
Although I do so see a Ninja Air Fryer at Walmart for $69, just $10 more than the Air Whirl. Maybe it’s the space savings that’s the most motivating?