In some marketing departments, Printed Direct Mail hasn’t got the best reputation: it is old school mass production, environmentally unsound, too hard to measure results, in short: junk mail.
But that’s not necessarily a realistic perception. Many studies show how the impact of well-planned direct mail campaigns exceeds electronic direct mail that is often discarded before reaching the target (consumers respond to mailed information 4.4% of the time, to emails only 0.12%), even for difficult to reach millennials. Compared to EDM and banner ads, there are no ad blockers and spam filters for printed direct mail. Even Google uses direct mail for marketing and verifies business listings via direct mail.
Click here and here if you would like to see more data about direct mail effectiveness.
So what makes physical direct mail successful?
Here are a few points to remember when planning a mailout:
- The message counts – without good, relevant messaging, no mail piece is going to get people to your site or store. Don’t forget a clear call to action, a special offer or access to a limited release and deliver value to the recipient. Some examples of good messaging and the effects can be found here.
- Extraordinary design of high impact mail – good design is key to make your message stand out and makes the difference whether your card ends up in the bin or on the fridge.
- Splitting up into tiers – It all depends on the quality of your data, but splitting mailings out into different tiers can certainly improve your targeting and increase return on investments. Here are some ideas for mailout of merchandise to groups in tiers. Sometimes a postcard can convey the right first message, but other times investing a little more is worthwhile and brings the right return, as in this example from a jewellery store in the US.
- High level of customisation and personalisation – again it’s all in the data. Production technology enables you to construct completely customised documents on the fly, whether you want to mail out hundreds or thousands of items. Postcards, letters, catalogues, even books can be printed with completely variable text, images and page counts, depending on the recipient.
Some very effective examples we have produced at SOS:
- a personalised book box and book cover for a launch by a major Australian publisher
- thousands of fully personalised catalogues for a wine distributor: if you like reds, we’ll offer you reds.
- A postcard using location data for a car manufacturer to launch a new model in the market. The location determined the image on the front as well as the direction to the nearest dealer in the call for action on the back.
At SOS we are able to offer the whole gamut of digital printing options, from highest quality Indigo presses to our high volume inkjet presses. We can procure promotional items and we have a kitting and distribution division that can compile and send out the most complex packs. We can also advise you on the use of properly sourced and environmentally accredited papers.
Let us know how we can assist.
