Marketing World StikBot TV takeover announced Brainstorm continues to invest heavily in the successful StikBot range with its most intensive TV campaign to date. As well as advertising across all major kids TV sales houses during Q4, StikBot will also be sponsoring CITV Breakfast every weekday morning throughout the whole of November and December. Aimed at driving awareness and sales pre-Christmas, the sponsorship will include 16 sponsorship idents per day on the popular children’s channel, totalling 640 idents which will appear before, during and after programmes. Targeting 4-9 year-old boys, reach is projected to be over 20% during these time slots. Debra Tiffany, marketing manager at Brainstorm said: “StikBot continues to be one of our best-selling lines and it’s important that we show our commitment to the brand with support throughout the year, particularly during the crucial fourth quarter. Sponsoring CITVB is a brand-new initiative for us and we cannot wait to see the reaction to the campaign and, consequently, a spike in sales for our retailers.”
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Global Media offers bespoke direct response advertising strategy Toy World spoke to advertising doyen Michael Penfold of Global Media about a new direct marketing opportunity he is offering toy companies
Can you tell us about your new advertising imitative? I have been planning and buying air-time for toy companies for over 40 years, so I think it’s fair to say that I understand how the TV business works. With a number of retailers struggling or disappearing, some toy companies will be finding it a challenge to maintain the distribution levels that they have been used to. The concept we have developed allows suppliers to trial a different strategy - direct response advertising. Suppliers can put a package of product together which is different to what is available at retail, so they won’t upset their existing customer base. One challenge with direct response advertising is that although toy companies have fantastic websites, they tend to be trade focused and not transactional. We will plan and buy a direct response TV campaign and produce a 60-second TV commercial. To produce a TV commercial, set up a two-page website and run a four-week TV campaign will only cost around £35,000. We will also offer fulfilment as part of the package. Post Box Products Ltd will handle the debit and credit card transactions, and will also be responsible for sending out the products, usually within 24 hours. We will ask the toy companies concerned to supply us a certain amount of product at the start for us to keep in stock; once that has gone, we would get in touch to replenish stock levels. Once we have built up a respectable database and mailing list, I can envisage that we could have 60,000 – 100,000 customers, who we could email with special offers and information companies want to communicate to the people who have purchased products from them in the past. My philosophy has always been buying the right air-time at the right price at the right time of the day, to reach the appropriate target market. TVRs don’t automatically mean sales - the right TVRs mean sales. When it comes to a 60 second DR TV commercial, we will offer the best return in terms of enquiry and sales. We will be able to tell clients each day what their sales are, because we’ll be able to see exactly what orders have been placed. We’re offering a great package for an affordable price: the campaign will appear on mainline children’s channels, where we will secure air-time against the appropriate target market and also secure strong rating for ABC1 housewives 25-34. This is a unique proposition which I believe could start a trend in the toy market. We’re offering suppliers a great opportunity to test the water and have this direct sales operation running alongside their traditional retail business, so they have the best of both worlds.
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