Response Magazine

Hardware Market

search Institute (HIRI), total sales fell 2 percent to $306.7 billion. However, in the long run, the market will average a 6- percent growth annually during the next four years, reaching $381 billion in 2012.

Web Targeting New Homeowners

While a new generation of homeowners is always entering the market, the challenge for businesses today is meeting the needs of the digital-age savvy, first-time buyers. “Because this generation is digital, they will expect to gain skills, tips, product information and advice online,” says Wentworth.

She expects that digital DR, whether it is delivered via cell phones or the Internet, will play an important role in the purchasing process. Customers may walk into brick stores to feel and compare products, but what they learn online will greatly influence selections.

True Value launched into the digital world of viral marketing with a 2007 campaign known as the “ Do-It-Yourself All-Star Contest.” The idea was to give consumers a chance to enter a contest where they could show off a recent home improvement project and then get friends and families to vote for them online. Wentworth was extremely pleased with the results because they created a huge buzz and got many potential customers to the company’s Web site ( truevalue.com).

More than 80 percent of the entrants — 173 total — created True Value-branded micron badges (which could be sent via E-mail or networking sites like Facebook.com) to promote their contest entry to friends, and some took out ads in local newspapers. In the three-week timeframe, badges were passed on to almost 10,000 consumers, which is a 35-percent pass-along rate, and contestants received 4,339 votes total.

Professional Tool Manufacturing, an Ashland, Ore.-based company that makes shop tool sharpeners (page 50), is also heavily focusing on viral marketing. “Word of mouth is taking a new direction with online opportunities,” says Kevin

Blodgett, vice president of marketing, Pro Tool. “Pro Tool is tracking and encouraging online reviews and discussion about our products. In fact, the high-end Work Sharp 3000 has received a tremendously strong set of online reviews on bulletin boards, blogs and other tool sites.”

As more distributors move online, there will be more opportunities to conduct DR campaigns to drive sales both on and offline. Spaulding says that LENOX will be taking advantage of the Internet and viral marketing in 2008. “LENOX has slated 2008 as the experimental year to uncover the power of social and viral marketing activities,” says Spaulding. “We believe that the Internet is now one of the primary influencers of mainstream media. Campaigns start online and gain buzz in other traditional channels.”

LENOX kicked off 2007 with a DR mail buy-one-get-one-free campaign for snips and HVAC tools. Since the launch, the company has averaged 1,000 redemptions per month.

DRTV: A Necessary Tool

Print DR marketing is still a strong contributor to the success of the hardware industry. It’s a great way to reach consumers nationally and offer them coupons and buy-ins for local retail. But in order to really reach the mass market, experts say that television is a must.

“Tool guys are very suspect of the hype. Great demonstrations are what convert them over,” says Doug Garnett, president and CEO of Atomic Direct, a Portland, Ore.-based DRTV agency,

and a member of the Response Editorial Advisory Board. Garnett says marketers need to tell the customer what the product can do, realistically. “I continue to see advertising to DIYs that’s created by teams who have misguided fantasies about the rewards of building it yourself. You’ll succeed a lot faster and better when you reflect the DIY realities,” says Garnett.

What makes DRTV work? It’s the product demonstration, pure and simple. The demographic for those that buy hardware is extraordinarily varied and it’s hard to have targeted media opportunities that reach the audience well. Magazines and radio are often too small of an audience reach. “TV hits a broader audience at an excellent cost and is a great opportunity for hardware manufacturers to break through with their communication,” says

Garnett. “It may be the one place
where hardware manufacturers can
reach the total DIY market.”
Pro Tool’s product line includes
the Drill Doctor drill bit sharpener,
Darex industrial tool sharpeners
and the Work Sharp general tool
sharpener and wood tool sharpen-
ers. DRTV is a major component
in marketing for the company, and
the products are eventually sold in
home center stores, hardware stores
and professional channels.
“Given the subtlety of the im-
pact of sharpening and grinding
products, we need long-form to make this
branding meaningful,” says Blodgett. The
company also uses DRTV to reach the
range of groups buying hardware. In fact,
Blodgett says demographics are an inad-
equate way to describe the market.

“You have to look deeper at the other ways of segmenting markets,” he says. “For example, our Drill Doctor has sold to a very experienced DIY. On the other hand, the softer products — like the Sears hand tools sold in the 1990s — appeal to a broad base of less experienced DIYs. Therefore, when done right, DRTV has impact on a wide range of consumers.”