Tag Archive for: direct mail

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Direct Mail Marketing Personalization Statistics That Outweigh The Cost

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How do you improve through the competition on the very crowded internet? By utilizing personalized direct mail statistics, of course. Instead of a standard digital banner – why not personalize it to match an individual’s interest. If you’d like to get a better result for a lower price, direct mail can fill the bill. Statistics show that millennials like mail, with 75% looking forward to getting it and 63% responding to a mailed offer in the past three months.

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Data and Direct Mail: The Marketing Dynamic Duo

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Direct mail remains as one of the most rewarding marketing assets available for anyone’s multichannel strategy. Marketers today now have better data to inform them on their target audience, allowing them to make their direct mail copy more impactful and well timed. This is why I am calling these two the dynamic duo, for they will be able to help you win the marketing battle with your direct mail campaign.

With Data Comes Deeper Personalization

 

Data tells us all the things we want to know about our target audience: their preferences, what they are most interested in, and where they are located. Rather than blasting out general direct mail pieces, you can now incorporate this data so that you can achieve deeper personalization and connect with people more meaningfully than ever before.  In fact, according to a JWT report, “almost eight out of ten Millennials—the biggest segment of B-to-B buyers

—said print makes them feel more connected than digital.” Moreover, according to an Epsilon study, more than half of the US consumers prefer direct mail over email. It seems we have achieved a role reversal. Before, most mailboxes were cluttered, making it more difficult to stand out with direct mail. Now, as mail volume has declined and email has gone up, it has made it easier for someone to engage with a direct mail piece since it removes the delete button out of the equation.

 

Direct Mail Is More Likely to Get A Response

 

With consumer interest still high with direct mail, you can expect greater engagement with your materials as well as an increase in consumer response. Email is much easier to ignore than a piece of direct mail. Most of us would expect that people would just shred their unwanted mail or open it while standing over their kitchen trash bin. However, 70% to 80% of consumers actually open most of their mail, including the stuff they would label as “junk.” according to a 2014 poll by the DMA. But the big kicker is how direct mail is able to transcend demographics, especially with younger people who you would assume respond significantly more to digital marketing campaigns over direct mail. On the contrary,  another study found that 92% of young shoppers prefer direct mail for making purchasing decisions. By informing your copy with data, you can give these shoppers the information they want to better influence their next purchase.

 

If you haven’t heard it enough before then here it is again—print is not dead. Though we are in an ever growing digital age, this has only allowed us to make our direct mail campaigns more effective. Take advantage of the data your team gathers, and use it to help you make more impactful print advertising materials for your next multi channel marketing campaign—  sharpening the spear tip for your direct mail.

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Direct Mail: A Dominating Force for Political Campaigns

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Digital marketing is currently the hot ticket right now. Politicians on both sides have found their own creative ways of incorporating social media into their campaigns. However, direct mail still continues to be the main cornerstone of political campaigns. This is because direct mail is effective at micro-targeting voters and getting information in their hands.

Targeting By Age Groups

 

Although most social advertising can target by age groups, it doesn’t account for the 45 % of seniors that do not have internet service The only way to reach these voters is through direct mail. According to the DMA Statistical Fact Book for 2015, 42% of direct mail recipients either read or scan direct mail pieces. It also states that 14% of people 45-54 respond to direct mail, while everyone above the age of 54 sits at an average of 13.2%.

The older generations are not the only ones who have a high average of responding to direct mail. The Fact Book also found that people between the ages of 18-24 are more likely to respond to a direct mail piece with a rise from 4.1% in 2012 to 12.4% in 2013. But there is one statistic that affects every age group, and that is how much mail people are receiving. The average household receives 19.1 mail pieces each week. That is down from 24.7 in 2008. That means your pieces have a better chance of being noticed as people sift through the mail.

 

Getting it Into The Voter’s Hands

 

With non-physical methods of advertising, there is a digital barrier that the campaign message has to overcome. With direct mail, you can put the message you want right in the person’s hands. Television advertising has become more expensive, and more difficult at getting the message across to the campaign target voter base. Much of this stems from the rise in DVRs and internet video streams, which allow voters to fast forward through advertising, or not be served as often.

Politico shared a case study that shows how critical a direct mail is to a political campaign. According to their article, Walter Lukens, founder of The Lukens Co., whose clients include Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell and Tennessee GOP Sen. Lamar Alexander, used direct mail to compete against McConnell’s competition, Matt Bevin. The piece Politico used depicts Bevin on the front as a snake oil salesman which reads: “Genuine Bevin Brand Snake Oil: Behold the magical potion being spoon-fed to Kentucky Conservatives far and wide.” When you turn the piece over, the reader will see a picture of a bottle with “half-truths, resume inflation, and delusions of grandeur” listed as the ingredients. McConnell was successful at beating Bevin, winning by 25 points.

Any successful political campaign will incorporate direct mail. Relying only on digital assets will cause you to leave out crucial voter age groups, miss opportunities to get in front of your overall voter base, and force a campaign to fight with one arm tied behind its back. Even with the rise of digital marketing, it is clear that direct mail is not going anywhere anytime soon.   

 

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Direct Mail Tracking Methods

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Often we judge an advertising campaign’s success by the amount of conversions, new customer acquisitions, or revenue. Without a definitive incentive or variety of direct mail tracking methods, it can be nearly impossible to tally the actual success of a campaign. Try to think of the last time a customer came into your business and without being asked gleefully said, “Hi! I just wanted to let you know I found you on Google or I came in because of ‘X’ marketing you did.” More than likely the experience is extremely rare if it has occurred. When tracking methods are implemented properly, the guesswork is eliminated and campaigns become more transparent through analytics.

Direct Mail Tracking Methods

The best use tracking methods will allow a company to understand the progress and success of an advertising campaign without reliance on the customer to take additional action.

Tracking Number

A tracking phone number can help understand conversion from cold prospect to a warm lead. With a dedicated tracking number, you can isolate the number of phone calls from one specific campaign. For example, Nick’s Pizza may use the tracking phone number (949) 555-5555 for his Direct Mail Marketing campaign only. The phone number (949) 777-7777 is used on a landing page tied to a Google AdWords campaign. Both phone numbers get forwarded to (949) 123-4567, the mainline for Nick’s Pizza. Nick can use the dashboard provided by his tracking service, Call Rail, to see how many calls are coming into each line. Nick is able to identify that in a 30 day period his pizza shop derived 327 orders as a result of sending out 2,000 Direct Mail Postcards.

Coupon

Cut out coupons are a great way to manually track offer redemptions. Tom’s Automotive is offering $10 off an oil change and $20 off a synthetic oil change to new customers. In addition, there are many great offers like a coupon for a completely free electronic diagnostic, a $60 value. In order to redeem the offers, the customer must cut out and present the coupon at Tom’s Automotive. At the end of the promotion, Tom is able to tally how many redemptions were made in addition to the total revenue spent by those customers and average customer spend. Tom is able to determine that offering a significant discount on an oil change allowed him to bring in 41 new customers and those customers spent $193 on average.

Reference Code

Companies trying to generate leads with Direct Mail Postcards or Mailer Letters can find great success and lead handling efficiency when using reference codes. Student Solutions, a student loan debt relief agency, has purchased a database of 100,000 individuals who have graduated college and are delinquent on their student loans. Their IT team has uploaded all prospect information into their CRM and attached a unique reference code to each prospect. Student Solutions utilizes Variable Data Printing to print letters that have the first and last name of each recipient alongside their unique reference code. Having a personally addressed letter created a higher conversion rate. The reference codes provide the Student Solutions employees a simple and non-intrusive method to bring up the prospects information when they call in for assistance. New sales can be filtered by all reference codes with the prefix PJ36. The company determines that mailing out 100,000 postcards created 3,000 new customers and generated $700,000 in gross profit.

Managing a successful direct marketing campaign requires knowing specific steps, including the most effective direct mail tracking methods. When it comes time to rely on a direct mail company with experience, contact One Stop Marketing for your printing, mailing list and delivery needs – call 602.962.5104 today.

 

This article is part 3 of a 3 part series covering:

The Advantages of Direct Marketing versus Branding
See These Irresistible Offer Examples to Help Entice Customers
Direct Mail Tracking Methods
Crafting a Successful Direct Mail Campaign

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The Advantages of Direct Marketing Versus Branding

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Anytime you’re creating a new marketing campaign, you may find yourself asking a slew of questions about the advantages of direct marketing and whether it matches your campaign goals. Will the objective of your campaign be to increase brand’s reach, acquire new customers, monetize your existing customer base or if you’re like most– are you unsure of what to expect? Understanding the difference and setting the correct expectations will infinitely improve mediocre advertising tactics and allow you to make the most of any campaign.

 

What’s the Objective?

 

If your marketing department functions like most, you’ve got an annual budget and department expectations that were established by upper management during the latter end of the previous year. We’re past the halfway mark and now the pressure is on, we need results. One of the most frequent questions we get is, what’s the difference between branding and are there specific advantages to direct marketing?

 

Brand Awareness – Think billboards. You’re driving on the freeway and see a catchy ad with cows telling you to eat more chicken. Some drivers familiar with the brand will get a laugh out of the billboard while others unfamiliar with the brand may connect the logo with a restaurant they see occasionally. The goal of this marketing method is to increase awareness and be visible to as many people as possible. Strictly defined sales goals are not to be expected of this method and more often than not, you won’t see strict tracking methods implemented with brand awareness campaigns.

 

Marketing – If the name doesn’t say it loud enough, direct-action result-based campaigns strive to provide a measurable increase in conversions. Whether the conversion metric is more newsletter signups or an X increase in new customers that translates into a Y increase in revenue, your campaign has set expectations and goals. Examples of these campaigns include coupons, limited time offers and opt-in campaigns.

 

The Purpose of Branding 

 

Increasing brand awareness may nearly impossible to correlate with monetization. For branding, reaching new, existing and potential customers is the objective. An example of an awareness through conversion cycle for a brand awareness campaign can look start with a direct mail postcard or billboard ad designed to peak your interest.

 

Fictitious pizza chain Chewy’s Pizza has been experiencing a slump in sales for nearly a decade. A focus group has revealed the brand’s image is struggling due to its low-quality pizza’s and sub-par taste. The pizza chain has decided to revamp its entire operation and will now use high-quality ingredients and focus on an artisan pizza rather than provide a bottom dollar product. The general perception of the brand needs to improve. Chewy’s Pizza runs radio ads, tv commercials and send postcard mailers to all homes within a 4-mile radius of a franchise in each market.

 

The advertisements emphasize a brand revitalization and commitment to top quality ingredients and taste. The messaging directs people to pizzamatters.com, a website the Chewy’s Pizza created to build value and modify existing perception of the brand. The company is monitoring campaign impact by keeping a close tab on the amount of unique and return visitors to the website. A conversion will be counted anytime an individual watches a video about the company’s new image or signs up for the mailing list.

 

The Advantages of Direct Marketing

 

For many SMB’s it is crucial to understand if a marketing effort is profitable, has the potential to become profitable or perhaps it’s a complete wash. Direct-action result-based campaigns strive to provide a short customer monetization cycle with a measurable value tied to each conversion. The ideal way to track campaign effectiveness is to use a variety of calls-to-action and tracking methods that will simplify how the results can be segmented.

 

Fictitious company Lazer manufactures computers and computer peripherals. The company has 50,000 addresses of previous customers but is having a difficult time engaging its fan base through emails and social media. Robert, Lazers sales director, has been tasked with spearheading a sale in an effort move stagnant inventory and make room for upcoming new products. The company decides to mail a scratch to win postcard to all previous customers. The direct mail marketing postcard offers vary with incentives ranging from 5%-50% discounts and a select few postcards have online-store gift cards or free item redemption codes.

 

The offer codes needed to redeem the incentives will allow Lazer to track how many customers redeemed offers, the campaign participants’ average spend if individuals purchased additional products and additional data to determine lifetime customer value and the potential for future monetization. Data shows Lazer that the campaign was able to provide a significant increase in revenue and was able to re-engage previous customers who had not made purchases in a long period of time.

Check out our helpful article for more information about building a great direct marketing mail campaign.

 

Which Do I Use?

 

Although branding and marketing can function in tandem, it is important to understand the difference in order to craft a successful advertising campaign. If your goal is to spread the word far and wide, branding could be the best solution to your advertising woes. Marketing campaigns have the benefit of being incentive based and allow time constraints to increase urgency. Next week we will discuss the difference between good offer and a fantastic one.

In the meantime, if you’re looking to get results on a direct mail marketing campaign, turn to experts with many years of direct mail experience. One Stop Mail can help you achieve your objectives — give us a call at 602.962.5104 or reach out to us here.

 

This article is part 2 of a 4 part series covering:

The Advantages of Direct Marketing Versus Branding?

Learn to Entice Customers with these Irresistible Offer Examples

Direct Mail Tracking Methods

Crafting a Successful Direct Mail Campaign

Portfolio Sample of Direct Mail Marketing Postcard from One Stop Mail for Dobson Academy with dolphin and small child with glasses and book

Variable Data Printing VDP Brings The Best Of Both Worlds To Direct Mail Marketing

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Even though your direct mail marketing campaign may be offline, you can still benefit from the personalization of online marketing! After all, online shoppers and those who see most of their ads online are becoming spoiled. Nearly all the ads they see are custom-tailored for them, either in terms of the product offered, or openly using elements of their personal information to craft a pitch designed for them specifically. While some buyers still find this approach “creepy,” on the whole most consumers seem to appreciate the customization. You can achieve the same level of customization in direct mail marketing with  variable data printing VDP.

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Top Graphic Design Trends 2015

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Is your graphic design style with the times?

Trends in advertising and design are changing even more quickly than ever before, “thanks” to the digital revolution and the rapid spread of new design paradigms across the world.  Everyone is fighting to stand out on store shelves and in mailboxes, which means there’s a near-constant evolution of design ideas.

If you’re still using marketing materials from a couple years ago, you will almost certainly see a major boost in interest if you update them to more modern styles.  And if your competition hasn’t updated theirs, your materials will definitely stand out among all the rest.

So, we wanted to highlight some of the major design trends that became prominent in 2015.  These are the directions you should be looking with your art design in the months to come.

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OSM Direct Marketing Tips Blog

Direct Marketing Tips for Writing Sensational Copy

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When it comes to direct marketing tips, writing plays a big part. In virtually any direct marketing materials, the written copy is the base upon which everything else rests. While it’s nice to have eye-catching graphics, charts, and photographs, the copy is what’s going to sell your product/service and truly determine whether your marketing materials are effective. 

So today, let’s get back to the basics: How to write effective marketing materials. Some of this may sound too basic, but remember that many decades-old copywriting techniques are still relevant today.  

Direct Marketing Tips: Four Ways To Create Great Copy Every Time 

 1. Write for your specific audience. 

It’s no secret that different groups of people speak or write in different ways, and those differences have only widened in recent decades. Buyers (especially home consumers) are more influenced by materials that have direct relevance to their lifestyle, interests, hobbies, etc. Use this tool to design your buyer persona. This will help you narrow down the people you’re trying to reach and then work through the language that will connect best with that audience.  

These days, most consumers can quickly spot generic marketing materials that didn’t utilize proven direct marketing tips and were written for the widest possible audience. Narrow targeting and a deliberate attempt to engage specific groups on a personal level will work better because it avoids the trap of seeming generic. 

 2. Have a problem, a solution, and a reason. 

direct marketing tips woman opening letterThis is Marketing 101 stuff, but it bears repeating: Virtually all successful marketing is based on presenting a problem and demonstrating how your product is a solution to it. This means you need to do your research! The best marketing copy comes straight from your audience’s mouth. This is the copy that keeps people reading, nodding along, and hopefully converting.  

  • Capture your audience’s attention 
  • Illustrate a pain point 
  • Present a valuable, solution-driven call to action. 

Backing up your solution with solid evidence has become even more important in our digital era of online reviews and comparisons. 95% of shoppers read reviews before making a purchase. 98% of consumers use reviews to search for local services. Make sure your marketing writing matches up with the data and validates what your audience is already thinking.  

3. Make a connection.

Purchases aren’t necessarily driven by logic. They hinge on emotion, whether it’s good or bad. Well-written copy won’t work if it doesn’t push readers to action. Describe the benefits of your product or service in a way that gets people excited! What stories can you tell about your product? What challenges did you have to overcome? And how can it benefit your intended user?  

This blog post has eight psychological hooks you can use in your writing to invoke positive emotions in people. These are all great direct marketing tips to think about, even if you’re not writing an entire campaign or website.  

Focus your copy on the reader. Use the word you more often than your brand and product names. When speaking directly to the reader, active and energetic verbs are more likely to lead to connection. Words and phrases like Imagine, Improve, Discover, Explore, Take Hold, Protect, Compete, Dominate are among the most compelling words you can put in your copy. 

4. Have a killer headline. 

Direct Marketing Tips osm bookletsA viewer won’t read your copy if you haven’t grabbed their attention, and that’s exactly what the headline is for.  A well-written headline creates the interest needed to get them excited for the rest of the copy. As a few basic guidelines: 

  • Keep it short and to the point, preferably less than 70 characters. 
  • Make it directly relevant to the materials – no bait and switch. 
  • Include “loaded” emotional words that suggest a mindset to the reader. 
  • Be a little controversial, when appropriate. 
  • Use a subheading if your headline feels too long.  It keeps the eyes moving downward. 

Sell It! 

Every word in every piece of direct marketing you produce should be written with the intent to sell. The more attention you pay to your copy, the more likely it is to pay off!  

Not sure how to find your target audience? We can offer mailing list services to get your campaign out to the right people. 

Learn more by calling (602) 223-3003 or  send a request for more information. We’re on-call for any of your marketing needs!  

 

Updated 10.12.2021

 

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Every Door Direct Mail – New Expanded Features!

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If your company currently uses direct mail, the US Postal Service has a great tool to increase the effectiveness of your campaigns. Or if you’re not currently doing mail campaigns, this may give you an added incentive to give direct mail a try.

It’s called Every Door Direct Mail (EDDM) and it adds significant ability to research and customize your mail delivery before even finalizing the mailer.  And the best part is, it’s totally free to use, aside from the standard postal fees, of course.

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Postcards Are Still One Of The Most Cost-Effective Methods Of Outreach

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There are so many different ways of reaching out to customers these days that it’s hard to even settle on which methods to use.  Plus, the rush of technology means there’s always potential to deploy the latest-and-greatest gimmicks to grab people’s attention.

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