Is it Still Worth Marketing by Direct Mail?
As we head further into the year, marketing strategies should be at the top of your company agenda. In 2018, consumers expect more from businesses – especially with their buying habits and other purchasing information readily available. An email offering your products or services will no longer suffice, and you need to appeal to your prospect’s creativity and curiosity. Experts at Washington Direct Mail, a UK wide mailing house, share with CEO Today their thoughts on why you should incorporate direct mail into your marketing plan.
Direct mail marketing has emerged from the shadows of digital advertising. The traditional form of advertising is experiencing a resurgence due to the overwhelming nature of the digital age. A staggering 269 billion emails are sent each day, meaning your brand message and products must stand out in a sea of spam and junk email marketing. To further emphasise the point, the average office worker receives 121 emails a day, leaving you very little time to draw their eye.
The incredible stats highlight how digital advertising is over saturated, and companies need to think of new and innovative methods of speaking to their audience. For example, direct mail allows you to place your campaign directly into the hands of your consumers. Your products or services are not lost in their inbox but delivered straight to their door. It’s estimated that direct mailers are kept in the house for 17 days, and more than 66% of direct mail is read. Stats such as these cannot be ignored – particularly if your competitors begin utilising them.
Response rates have more than doubled for direct mail, and have seen an increase of 190%. This could be due to the technological advances within the industry – such as digital printing and UV spot printing – but also as consumers look for other ways to digest information than from a screen. Millennials are even turning to direct mail, with a significant 64% looking for information and discounts from brands via their mail.
There are many direct mail formats you can look into, including dimensional mailers. The dimensional mailers are vastly different to that of the standard ‘postcard’ or ‘letter’ you receive in the mail. They are creative and innovative, with some of the best brands injecting personality to their advertising using the format. For example, Smart, sent out cardboard that prospects could constructed into a recyclable helmet. From this genius stroke of marketing, they experienced improvements in responses, but also social media. For SMEs and start-up businesses without a large-scale budget, you could send cost-effective promotional packs to your audience, but encourage them to build it to find the ‘secret’ message.
While both digital advertising and direct mail have their benefits, we are seeing more multi-channel integration from brands. Combining both methods of advertising has proved wholly successful for certain companies, and is said to lift response rates by an impressive 118%. Multi-channel integration allows you to widely expand your reach, as you are not ignoring specific chunks of your target audience. Multi-channel integration can be easily achieved within your company budget. You could include a QR code for your consumers to scan, or even add specific landing pages and URLs for your prospects to visit and gain a reward for doing so. In turn, this enables you to measure the success of your marketing campaign by tracking the number of visitors.
Programmatic mail is a buzzword for our industry and an example of multi-channel integration. For example, a visitor to your site can be browsing and leave something in their basket, and within 12 hours receive direct mailing reminding them of the product in the basket. It’s easy for emails to get lost or ignored with a subtle reminder such as this, but you can’t ignore the message when it is pushed through your letterbox.
If you are looking into direct mailing as part of your company advertising (which we wholeheartedly recommend), always remember to personalise. Direct marketing addressed to the ‘homeowner’ will be disregarded – especially when you can gain access to their details. Personalised direct mail has proven results behind it and will continuously feature in our direct mail trends.
