Infomercials are invading prime-time TV as a consequence of America’s economic downturn. During previous recessions, poor advertising sales affected individual TV stations. During our current financial crisis, however, the problem has spread to entire networks.
The technical term for an informercial is a direct response television advertisement. DRTV ads are hard sells, usually with low artistic values. The difference between an infomercial and a typical ad is that customers must contact the advertiser directly to purchase the product because it is not available in stores.
Infomercials first flooded American television during the 1980s as cable television emerged. Many fledgling stations did not have sufficient commercials to fill the airtime and could not afford to create a full programming schedule.
Two sources of revenue appeared as financial rescuers: paid religious programming, like the Christian Children’s Fund, and infomercials.
Eventually, new sources of programming developed like Fox Broadcasting Co. and the WB Network, and a better schedule on cable brought in higher-paying advertisers.
Over the years, informercials have amazed and annoyed - from Ron Popeil’s slicing, dicing Veg-o-matic, still available today for $19.99, to the Magic Bullet Express Blender selling for $54.99.
In between, there has been Longines Symphonette records, Hair Club for Men, Chia Pet, Suzanne Somer’s Thigh Master, the Valley’s own Tae Bo Billy’s Bootcamp, Topsy Tail hair braider, Midnight Special DVDs, Seven Day Miracle Cleanse colonic, Shamwow instant towel, and Richard Simmon’s Sweating with the Oldies exercise tapes.Networks now are unable to pre-sell all the available ads for prime time; advance sales were the former norm. Advertisers have been canceling purchase commitments at the last minute. A networks or channel can choose to fill in with public service announcements or promotions for its own shows, but this brings in no revenue.
Just like the 1980s, infomercials are now helping broadcasters pay the bills. During two episodes of Saturday’s “48 Hours Mystery” in January, CBS aired an ad for the Time Warner DVD set, “The World at War.”
Advertisers say they can buy Saturday time for 5 percent of the cost of a weeknight spot. Other lengthy spots are running during CNN. Fox Broadcasting recently replaced two hours of its Saturday morning kids block with infomercials.
Viewers have choices. Unlike the 1970s, you can pause or fast-forward the TV’s DVR. You can turn off the TV. Even with the crazy products, obnoxious hard sells and bizarre hosts, you can choose to buy the product. The Magic Bullet really does make excellent guacamole in 10 seconds.
Infomercials might not feature good acting or elegant sets, but these ads make money on TV and at the moment, telecasters need the revenue.
Joan Giglione is a faculty member in the Marketing Deparment at California State University, Northridge.
She holds a doctorate in communications from the University of Texas at Austin.