Direct Response TV - When "FREE" doesn't really mean "free" and other bogus practices

There is a subset of marketing people, agencies and production companies that specialize in a unique form of American marketing collectively called DRTV (direct response TV).

These are those generally awful ads selling products you can't buy in stores but are only available through these "amazing" and "incredible" and "fantastic" tv offers. It's the closest marketing comes to the old wild west huckster selling magic elixir out of the back of his covered wagon.

Cable broadcasters air these DRTV ads when they have no real honest-to-goodness paying advertisers. So rather than fill commercial time with dead air or a barrage of network promos (neither of which generate any revenue for the broadcaster), cable networks assault us with these hard-sell intrusive long-form (usually 60 seconds or more) ads. They give away the air time for nothing. All you need to be in this business is a slick selling spot that gets gullible viewers to call that number and order that gizmo. Cable networks play along because if you're sucker enough to call those on-screen numbers and actually order something, the cable network shares in the revenue. Hey, it's better than earning nothing for that ad time. Right?

Wrong. And here's why.

Most of these ads use tried and true DRTV practices that are at best "unethical" and at worst "outright fraud." Here are some of the "Hall of Shame" tactics that are their standard tools.

1. "It's FREE". No it's not. Check out the shipping and handling fees. Those more than pay for the cost of the item and provide a profit margin to the seller, too.

2. "Act now and we'll double the offer." All that means is that the price they're charging is more than enough to give them comfortable margins even if they supply you with two instead of one, four instead of two...you get the idea.

3. "Not sold in any stores!" That's turning a negative into a positive. There's no place to take this back if you don't like it or it doesn't perform as advertised. And that number you called to order.... it's a call center. It's not any kind of company HQ. Good luck getting a refund if you call back with a complaint or because you're dissatisfied. And if they really were selling some sort of truly amazing product, why wouldn't they be selling it by the millions through conventional retail channels instead of one at a time over the TV?

The cable TV networks that broadcast these deceitful ads are valuing a few dollars of incremental revenue over their own ethical standards. As a paying advertiser, I certainly wouldn't want any of my spots anywhere near these sleazy DRTV ads. These ads tend to sully the reputation of all ads and all marketers. They aren't doing anything to enhance the image of the cable network airing the ads either.

I'd like to see the cable networks implement higher standards in determining which DRTV ads they agree to run. If they don't police themselves, it's time that the FCC get involved and put an end to these shamefully misleading ads. They don't entertain. They don't enlighten. They just try to trick you into ordering something that probably doesn't work.