“Viking is adding these new TV commercials to our marketing mix which includes branded trucks, billboards and direct mail campaigns that grab the attention of consumers in need of pest control services,” said Ed Bradbury, president of Viking. “We think that the visibility on cable TV will help generate awareness of the Viking Brand. Consumers have a lot of choices for pest control when they search through the Yellow Pages, so we hope that alternatively our commercials keep our name top-of-mind. We are pleased to tag the Redtown pest control commercials as our own and think they will make a real impact.”
The Viking Termite and Pest Control commercials use a humorous, attention-grabbing technique. For instance, the commercial “Termites?” begins in a dark basement of a castle on a stormy night, where a man with a wooden stake approaches a vampire’s coffin. At the crucial moment when the man strikes his wooden stake to slay the vampire, the stake instantly crumbles into a pile of sawdust. Suddenly, the vampire awakens, looks at the sawdust on his chest and in deadpan fashion asks the shaken man, “termites?” Termites indeed. The commercial segues into the Viking Termite & Pest Control, Inc. tag and then closes with a voiceover urging the man to hurry home and take care of his termite problem.
“Consumers are increasingly turning to online search engines, such as Yahoo and MapQuest, to locate vendors for pest control and other household repairs,” said Bill Hansen, CEO of Redtown Productions. “These search engines produce lengthy lists of options, so name recognition is critical to obtaining this new business. At Redtown we are excited to help Viking keep it’s name top-of-mind amongst prospective consumers. We know that syndicated advertising on cable TV is a viable option for independently owned pest control companies. Redtown provides an affordable alternative to compete with the large corporate owned companies that have more substantial budgets. And cable television is an important venue, as its viewership and innovative programming is expanding rapidly.”
Redtown leases a library of pest control commercials for PCOs across the country. They can be viewed at www.pestcontroladz.com.