It has been a while since the SeenOnTV Express blog looked at some of the famous faces of infomercial products.  Ron Popeil may have been the biggest name in infomercials for the previous generation, but more recently, Billy Mays was the name most people associated with As Seen On TV marketing.  However, Mays’s death in 2009 left DRTV marketing looking for a new spokesman, and Mays’s friend and colleague Anthony Sullivan quickly became a household name by selling As Seen On TV household products.

Born in 1969 in Devon, England, Anthony “Sully” Sullivan perfected his pitch on the streets of London, modeling his techniques after the street vendors of that famed city.  When he came to the United States in the 1990′s, he became a product demonstrator and pitchman for the product that would come to be known as the Smart Mop.  When Home Shopping Network (HSN) executives spied Sully, they quickly hired him and launched the Smart Mop into a top-selling As Seen On TV cleaning product.

Before long, Sully was so successful that HSN promoted him to prime time.  After he fulfilled his one-year contract as network show host, Sully realized that he was destined for greater things.  He left HSN to launch his own business, Sullivan Productions.  Sullivan Productions is the creator of commercials for some of the hottest selling infomercial products:

• Swivel Sweeper
• Kaboom
• OxiClean
• Aluma Wallet
• Jupiter Jack
• Heeltastic
• One Second Needle
• H20 Mop
• and more

In 2009, Sully co-starred in the Discovery Channel series Pitchmen, for which he was an Executive Producer, along with fellow infomercial star Billy Mays.  After Mays’s death, Sully continued the series alone in 2010 and 2011.  The series is now available on DVD.

Though Mays’s death left a void, Sully was quickly able to fill his friend’s shoes, becoming the new face of OxiClean, and in fact, the most recognizable face of infomercial products today.  Sully is the main spokesman for A.J. Khubani’s Telebrands, leader in direct response television marketing and creator of the “As Seen On TV” logo.

According to his website, Sully has “launched over twenty products, sold hundreds of millions of millions of dollars worth of merchandise and has been recognized a record breaking three times for making the best commercial of the year by the Electronic Retailing Association.”   He has appeared on The Late Show with Conan O’Brien, and he has been featured on NBC’s 20-20, ABC’s Nightline , CBS, USA Network , BBC, Fox News, Rachel Ray, and Access Hollywood.

In an industry that has recently been rocked by scandal (Vince Offer’s legal troubles and Don Lapre’s federal fraud charges and suicide, for example), Anthony “Sully” Sullivan offers a sense of trust and security.  Along with his reputation and charm, Sully’s personable quips have the audience loving him.  It seems like he’ll continue as one of the industry’s leading pitchmen for years to come.

After all, as Sully says, “Life’s a pitch, and then you buy.”

I’m intrigued by the Flex Seal commercial.  You know, the one where the guy makes a boat out of a screen door by sealing it with the  liquid rubber sealant?

httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hCKbowib9I4

I’m amazed.  Awestruck.  I totally want to get a screen door and see if I can make it float.

That’s one of the things I love about infomercial product demonstrations.  Not only do they point out the difficulties in every day tasks (“Why, now that you mention it, my blanket IS complicated.”), but they show you how effective a product is by using it for a purpose no one will ever need.  Like making a boat out of a screen door–which, now that I think of it, might be a good idea in case of flooding.  I wonder how Hurricane Irene would stand up to Flex Seal?

Intentional misuse of As Seen on TV products for demonstration purposes has been around as long as infomercials themselves.  The original Ginsu knife infomercial from 1978 shows the knife being abused in all sorts of ways.

httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=abLB7aTmnE4

Let’s see . . . I can use my Ginsu knife to:

1. Cut an aluminum can, because you never know when you might need slices of aluminum.
2. Slice bread so thin you can see through it, because who really wants bread interfering with their sandwich?
3. Chop wood, because using a knife is totally easier than using an ax.

You can even hammer your Ginsu knife.  What better way to take out kitchen aggression than hammering the handle of your utensils?

Ginsu may have started the Product Abuse as Demonstration, but they sure aren’t the only ones to effectively utilize this technique.

Krazy Glue takes job site safety to new . . . heights.

• Mighty Putty can pull an 80,000 pound tractor trailer.
• Miracle Blade III can slice a pineapple.  In mid-air.
• The Blendtec blender can pulverize your cell phone.
• The Oreck and Dyson vacuums can pick up a bowling ball.
• Speaking of bowling balls, you can drop one on a Simmons Beautyrest mattress without knocking over the pins.

And just watch the first few seconds of this Billy Mays OxiClean commercial:

httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2jkwQV_5Kb0

You can remove stains from a bowl of water.  A BOWL.  OF WATER.

Amazing.

You have to admit that these crazy testing methods are certainly attention-getting.  I mean, if I have to run over the same piece of popcorn fifteen times with my vacuum (before picking it up, inspecting it, and throwing it back on the floor for another couple of vacuum passes), then maybe I’d be more satisfied with a vacuum that could suction up a bowling ball.  And if my blender can puree my wireless communication device, just imagine what it could do for my smoothies.

It’s important to think of all these contingent uses for your As Seen on TV products.  After all, you wouldn’t want to get stuck up a creek without a screen door.

There are all types of pitchmen in direct-response marketing.  Billy Mays, Anthony Sullivan, and even Vince Offer (better known as “The Sham-Wow Guy”) have all become celebrities in their own right, simply by virtue of being top infomercial pitchmen. Other pitchmen are famous for promoting their own products:  Ron Popeil, Jack LaLanne, Richard Simmons, Susan Powter, Matthew Lesko, and Richard Sherer (the Video Professor) take the airwaves to sell their own programs and inventions.   Infomercial exercise videos have launched their own field of stardom with fitness experts including Billy Blanks, Shaun T, and Chalean Johnson selling challenging exercise routines to devoted fans.

Long before pitchmen became famous simply for being the visible, personable face of an infomercial product, marketers knew the importance of using a famous face to endorse their products.  Before pitchmen became celebrities, celebrities became pitchmen.

Stardom sells, and the following lists includes some of the most famous faces to launch infomercial celebrity endorsements.

• Models – Cindy Crawford (Meaningful Beauty), Christie Brinkley (Total Gym), Daisy Fuentes (Winsor Pilates), Vanessa Williams (ProActiv), Elle Macpherson (ProActiv)
• Athletes – George Foreman (George Foreman Grill and Everyday and More Cleaner), Hulk Hogan (Hulk Hogan Ultimate Grill)
• MMA – Chuck Liddell (JackRack), Georges St. Pierre (Rip60), Randy Couture (Tower 200)
• Actors/Actresses – Chuck Norris (Total Gym), Mario Lopez (Ultraflex), Barry Williams/”Greg Brady” (TimeLife70′s Music Explosion), Susan Lucci (Malibu Pilates)
• Singers/Musicians – Jessica Simpson (ProActiv), Katy Perry (ProActiv), Justin Bieber (ProActiv)

As I look through this list, I’m noticing that ProActiv Acne Solution really seems to have a corner on the celebrity pitchman market.  I mean, who doesn’t sell this stuff?  Just for fun, I’ll go ahead and post a list of Celebrities with Formerly Bad Skin who’ve appeared in ProActiv commercials:

• Julianne Hough – Dancing with the Stars
• Jenna Fischer – The Office
• Alyssa Milano – Who’s the Boss, Charmed
• Vanessa Williams – singer, actress, model, disgraced former Miss America
• Justin Bieber – singer
• Jessica Simpson – singer
• Katy Perry – singer
• Alicia Keys – singer
• Mandy Moore – singer, actress
• Jennifer Love Hewitt – actress
• Kelly Clarkson – American Idol, singer
• Avril Lavigne – singer

Celebrity endorsements lend a familiar face to the infomercial pitch, giving television viewers a sense of trust and a brush with fame.  After all, infomercial products are designed to make our lives easier, and if it’s good enough for those accustomed to a life of luxury and the finer things, shouldn’t it be good enough for us?

Last week we looked at the influential copywriting of Arthur Schiff, who coined the phrase, “But wait, there’s more,” which was destined to become a classic line in  direct response marketing.  Schiff wrote these words as part of the Ginsu Knife infomercial, a television commercial that set the standard in how as seen on TV products are promoted.  No matter how persuasive the ad copywriting, however, an infomercial will be rendered ineffective without the proper delivery.

Enter the pitchman.

Originally used to identify a traveling salesman, a peddler, or a carnival barker, the term “pitchman” has grown to embrace salesmen of television infomercial products, particularly those who utilize aggressive and persuasive marketing strategies as part of the “pitch.”

The role of the pitchman has evolved from a faceless voice-over (as in the Ginsu infomercial) to that of pop culture icon.  While many as seen on TV products use celebrity endorsements as part of the pitch (for example, Chuck Norris and Christie Brinkley for Total Gym), other pitchmen have become celebrities in their own right.  Perhaps the best known pitchmen of all time include Ron Popeil, Billy Mays, and Anthony Sullivan.

Popeil has been appearing in infomercials longer, selling his own inventions, including the Showtime Rotisserie Oven.  Mays, however, perfected the art of the pitch.  In fact, Billy Mays got his start as a pitchman in the traditional sense, working as a traveling salesman and hawking the Washmatik portable washer on the boardwalk at Atlantic City before becoming spokesman for Orange Glo International.  Mays promoted Orange Glo, OxiClean, and Kaboom! using his energetic pitch, becoming one of the most widely known and highly demanded infomercial pitchmen to date.

At the time of his death, Billy Mays was working closely with fellow television pitchman Anthony Sullivan.  The two not only made frequent infomercial appearances selling a variety of as seen on TV products, but also starred in the Discovery Channel program PitchMen, in which inventors would present their products to Mays and Sullivan, who would create infomercials for the products and pitch them in test markets.  After the death of Billy Mays,  Anthony Sullivan continued the show and the search for the perfect pitch.  In a recent episode, “Sully” reminisced about his friend and marked his absence at an infomercial convention:

PitchMen was not the only show to highlight the importance of aggressive, persuasive sales techniques and the salespeople who utilized them.  In 1999, a documentary film Pitch People was released that described “the art of the pitch” and spotlighted pitchmen who sold products through visual demonstration and direct response marketing.  The film, starring Ed McMahon, bills itself as “the true story of the world’s second oldest profession.”  View the Pitch People trailer here.

Perhaps the art of the pitch can best be summed up in the words of old-time pitchman Harry Mathison:

“It’s not what you sell, it’s how you tell them the price.”

It has been nearly ten months since Seen on TV Express began bringing you the Way Back Wednesday series, in which we look back at vintage infomercials and the products they marketed to television viewers.  In that time, we have looked at hair products, kitchen products, exercise equipment, fitness videos, and a slew of gizmos and gadgets designed to simplify your life.  We have even paid homage to a couple of the heroes of direct response marketing and infomercial innovations:  Billy Mays and Jack LaLanne.  We have failed, however, to bring you the origin of perhaps the most frequently used sound bite in as seen on TV marketing . . . “But wait!  There’s more!”

This ubiquitous catch phrase got its start with the iconic Ginsu knife, one of the earliest products sold through infomercial marketing. The commercial for Ginsu knives first aired in 1978, and it pulled out all the stops, setting the tone for virtually every other infomercial since.  Ad copywriter Arthur Schiff coined the classic phrase when writing the Ginsu commercial, one of the 1,800 long form commercials he wrote in a career that spanned more than thirty years.  Watch the original Ginsu commercial here, and note how many techniques and phrases are still utilized today by pitchmen including Anthony Sullivan:

Here are just a few I noticed:

• “Cultural” significance of the product (although it should be noted that Ginsu knives were made in the United States and that “Ginsu” is not a Japanese word at all, but rather one invented by Arthur Schiff–allegedly in his sleep)
• Inability to perform simple tasks without the product (of course, karate chopping a tomato is rarely effective, but note our post devoted to “doing it wrong” in infomercials.
• Using the product in ways no one would ever initially attempt (until they got the idea to chop wood with a kitchen knife from the commercial itself)
• More for less (“You get all this for only $9.99)
• And of course, “But wait!  There’s more!”

Marketing consultant John Witek, author of Response Television: Combat Advertising of the 1980s, sums it up this way:   “Ginsu had humor, demonstration, and a precisely structured series of premium offers I call ‘the lots-for-a-little approach.”  Arthur Schiff was really on to something when he wrote the Ginsu commercial.  For more than thirty years, direct response marketing has followed his model for infomercial sales techniques.

While this doesn’t go “Way Back,” we here at Seen On TV Express would be remiss if we failed to acknowledge the first anniversary of the death of Billy Mays, one of the leading pitchmen for infomercials and as seen on TV products.  Monday, June 28, 2010, marked one year since the passing of arguably the best television pitchman of this generation.

Billy Mays is perhaps best known for promoting Orange Glo International’s line of cleaning products, which includes Orange Glo, OxiClean, and Kaboom!  After he began selling their products, Orange Glo International saw a marked increase in sales, despite his loud, abrasive technique (which led one Chicago Tribune writer to proclaim the anniversary of his death “ALL CAPS DAY”).  Because of his success, Mays became highly requested as a pitchman for as seen on TV products such as Mighty Putty.  He was so successful that he became founder and CEO of Mays Promotions, Inc.

At the time of his death, Billy Mays was starring with his colleague Andy Sullivan in the Discovery Channel series PitchMen, which chronicled their efforts at direct-response marketing.  Originally titled But Wait . . . There’s More, the series aired a special tribute to Billy Mays after his death.  The series was renewed for a second season with Billy Mays III stepping in for his famous father.

Mays was found dead in his home on June 28, 2009, at the age of 51.  Early speculation tied his sudden death to a head injury Mays suffered during a flight, but the autopsy results concluded his cause of death to be hypertensive heart disease.  Although the initial autopsy found evidence of cocaine in his system, a subsequent autopsy ruled that cocaine was “not a significant contributing factor” in his death.  The release of the toxicology report disappointed Mays’ family and friends.  According to his longtime friend AJ Khubani, CEO of Telebrands,  Mays was “the model of a responsible citizen.”  Pallbearers at his funeral wore khaki pants and blue shirts to mimic the “uniform” Mays was known for wearing during his infomercial sales pitches.

Despite the controversy surrounding his death, Billy Mays will always be remembered for his boisterous personality and energetic sales technique as one of the greatest television pitchmen of our time.