The Future of DRTV Continued

I am writing this blog from Amsterdam, and the global fundraising conference that is held there each year. Many of the 900 attendees use DRTV to recruit new donors, and there is much debate amongst delegates about falling levels of telephone response.

The world seems to have divided into two camps:-

- those who are just seeing falling phone response and despairing and
- those who are seeing phone response fall, but total response to DRTV rise

This latter group are integrating SMS and web response into their commercials. As a result they now typically see 30%+ of their income from DRTV come via web donations. SMS response can add 10%+ incremental response, and sometimes more than double response.

As media channels converge, and consumers spend more and more time consuming more than one channel simultaneously, measuring campaign results will become harder. DRTV plays a vital role on many clients’ schedules, reaching audiences that other media do not, and generating very cost effective response. It is vital that our measurement systems keep pace with changing consumer behaviour.

Mike Colling
Managing Director