Direct response copywriting - Using the "side-by-side" technique

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THE LEVISON LETTER
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Action Ideas For Better Direct Mail,
E-mail, Web Sites & Advertising

Published by
Ivan Levison, Direct Response Copywriting

February 2007
Volume: 22 Number: 2

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Direct response copywriting -
Keep on truckin'
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Think of pickup-truck advertising on TV and what comes to mind?

Macho guys heaving heavy loads onto truck beds.
Mud splattered pickups hurtling over bumpy ground. Everything is rough, tough, and buff.

This is image advertising that derives its power from imaginative identification. The emotional
logic is clear: if I buy one of these trucks, I join the club. I am no longer the fifteen-pounds-
overweight couch potato. I am the farm hand, the construction worker, the MAN.

This is nothing new. We've see it all before.

Yet, watching a recent football playoff game, I came across a truck commercial that
handled things very differently, and I think, beautifully. Here it is:

(SHOT OF HAND HOLDING BRAKE SHOE) ANNOUNCER VOICE OVER:
"For years the front brakes on many half tons were THIS big.

(CUT TO HAND HOLDING A MUCH BIGGER BRAKE SHOE NEXT TO THE
COMPETITOR'S.) You wanted brakes THIS big. Bingo! Standard on the all new
full-size Tundra.

Learn more at Toyota.com."

I urge you to check out the actual commercial at:
www.toyota.com/tundra/index.html?s_van=GM_TN_TUNDRA_INDEX

This commercial struck me as really quite unique in the category. Instead of settling for
showing the generic pickup slogging through the mud, it emphasizes a concrete, visible,
palpable difference between the Tundra and other pickups. It quite brilliantly retains the
macho appeal of the image ad, while differentiating the product.

To put it simply, the commercial gives the viewer an excellent REAL reason to consider
the pickup.(In other ads in the campaign, the Tundra engine and transmission are also
shown side by side against their puny competition.)

Bottom line? The copywriter, creating the spots for the Toyota Tundra, was thinking
outside the box. Instead of producing another "me too" truck commercial, the copywriter
used the old side-by-side comparison format, so beloved by packaged goods brands
like Pampers and Bounty, and beautifully adapts it to pickup-truck advertising.

What does this have to do with you and me?

A great deal, actually. Though we may never have to promote pickup trucks, as marketers
and, ultimately, as sales people, WE have to constantly think outside the box, just like the
copywriter on the truck commercial did. Our job is to rethink our marketing assumptions,
then apply our knowledge in creative and involving ways.

Only then can we make sure that profits keep on truckin'.

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How To Get In Touch
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Ivan Levison
Direct Response Copywriting
14 Los Cerros Drive
Greenbrae, CA 94904

Phone: (415) 461-0672
Fax: (415) 461-7738
E-mail: ivan@levison.com
Web Site: http://www.levison.com

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