Traditional Advertising Not Cutting It For Product Launches

Although ad spending rose to $285 billion last year, advertising isn't doing a great job of catching and keeping consumer attention. In fact, 81 percent of consumers could not name a single one of the top 50 new products launched in 2006, according to a recent study by marketing communications firm Schneider Associates and Stagnito, a food and beverage magazine publisher.

"Relying on advertising alone for new product launches simply isn't working," says Joan Schneider, president of the Boston, Massachusetts-based marketing communications firm. "To capture consumer attention requires using an array of launch tactics that create multiple touchstones for consumers to build recognition for your new product."

When the study looked at how people learned about new products and what influenced them to purchase, 66 percent said free samples did the trick, followed by coupons (55 percent) and recommendations by family and friends and television commercials or infomercials tied for third (46 percent). When asked the likelihood of buying a new product after sampling, 96 percent said they were very or somewhat likely to buy a product they sampled.

In contrast to the 81 percent of consumers who can't recall a single new product launch, a majority of business travelers (71 percent) randomly surveyed at DFW Airport reported receiving a promotional product in the last 12 months, according to a recent PPAI study. Plus, 76 percent of those respondents could recall the name of the advertiser on that product, while only 53 percent could recall the name of an advertiser they read in a newspaper or magazine in the past week.

"Having a promotional item given with a new product can only enhance the chances of it being remembered,". "That's the basis of our industry--creating memories for products, services and businesses."