Direct Mail is all about measurement. Unlike Space advertising or Radio or TV/Cable advertising, with direct mail you can and should know exactly how effective your marketing efforts are. The old axiom that 50% of my marketing works, I just don't know which 50% doesn't fly with direct mail. Why? Because direct mail is the measurable medium.
If you have a small direct mail marketing budget, you will need to pick and choose what variables you want to test. The basics are list(s), offer, and package. If you are doing postcard marketing, then you might have more than one variation of the postcard to test.
Here are 10 direct mail marketing criteria to consider if you want to maximize your direct mail campaigns.
1. Carefully Target your Audience.
It is rule number one to determine who your customers are, or will be. If you don't know who they are, how can you hope to replicate them in a mailing list to market to?
Questions to ask when determining target audience include:
For Consumers: Who is your buyer-Gender? What is the demographic make-up of your customers-Age, Household Income, Marital Status, Gender, Is there a seasonality to your customers? How do they buy-credit card, check, by phone, by fax, online?
For Businesses: Type of companies, size (either employees and/or sales volume) Job Function or Job Title of the person responsible for ordering, same for the person responsible for specifying and approving the purchase.
2. Buy Mailing Lists that are Relevant.
What are you trying to accomplish with your mailing? Are you looking to derive an outright sale? Are you looking to create store traffic-either on or off line? Are you looking to cultivate a relationship to convert to buyers down the road?
You need to have a goal in order to find the right list or lists to help you achieve your goal. For example, if you are trying to sell gym memberships, make sure you are targeting people who are exercise enthusiasts. Don't decide that a peripheral category like "Dieters" is who you want to reach if you are looking to build a base of long-term memberships. Dieters are notorious for joining but not following thru. While you might achieve a temporary spike in new joiners, people who are interested in exercise and fitness and enjoy working out are much better prospects.
3. Always Stress Benefits.
Concentrate on how your product or service will benefit the person reading your piece. Focus on how it will benefit the prospective customer from both a logical and an emotional level. The key is to have done your homework so you know what "hot" buttons to push. Some marketers do focus groups, other with tighter budgets ask friends and family to imagine they are your target audience and provide you with input.
Repeat your key benefits. If you're doing Postcard Marketing, mention the key benefits twice. If you are developing a letter or more substantial direct mail package, make sure to mention your key benefits in the beginning, in the middle and near the end of your letter or brochure.
4. Feature the Offer.
Everyone loves a good deal. Design an irresistible offer and make it a key focal point of your letter. A strong offer can be the difference between converting and not converting the "fence sitters". Make sure to state the offer at least twice in your letter or brochure. And make sure to list it on your order form or response vehicle.
For the remaining 6 Ways to Maximize your Direct Mail Campaign, simply download the free White Paper on the Home page of www.greatmailinglists.com.
One of the really cool things about Direct Marketing is its measurability. Run a space ad in a local paper, buy a radio spot, local cable TV...you need to look at the big picture to determine if it is working. Not so with Direct Marketing, and Direct Mail in particular. The results of a winning mailing can be exhilarating. Few things can compare with opening your mailbox-or Inbox if you're driving traffic/orders online-to find a bunch of emails or envelopes filled with orders! Imagine if you could "move the needle" and increase the response to your offer? Do so and a marginal mailing becomes a winner, and a winner a world champion!
So How do I "move the needle?"
Following are 15 Tips to consider when developing your next direct mail campaign. There are more...to be revealed in a subsequent post...So here are 15 excellent techniques to enable your mailings to pull a stronger response. (Lame disclaimer) Not all of these techniques will work for every mailing you create. Review the techniques whenever you're planning a mailing and incorporate the ones that apply to your situation.
1. Carefully target your audience.
Sale dollars can be directly connected to your ability to accurately identify your most likely customers. You might consider creating different versions of your package tailored to each specifically targeted audience.
2. Buy Mail Lists
Many experts I have read and listened to over the years assign the greatest importance to the actual mailing list chosen. Anywhere from 40% to 60% of the overall success rate of a direct mailing depends upon the quality of your business mailing list or consumer mailing list.
3. Focus on your Customer's Needs (and Solve their most irritating issue), not your product.
Customers have limited interest in your product or company. But they have unlimited interest in their needs, solutions to their problems, and making their lives better. Concentrate on fulfilling their needs through the use of your product or service. Remember, most customers don't buy products, but they do buy solutions to problems that plague them. If your product solves a critical problem, pull out all stops to let your customers know.
4. Always stress Benefits.
Always concentrate on how your product will benefit your customers-both logically and emotionally. Repeat your key benefits (3 seems to be the magic number for me...unless it's my wife telling me to take out the garbage...lol) in the beginning, middle, and end of your email, letter or brochure. Tell your readers once, tell them again, and then tell them one more time. Remember, people buy benefits, not products.
5. Immediately Seize the reader's attention! Use an Impactful headline or first sentence.
Some letters benefit from a headline. Either the headline or first sentence must be very powerful in order to convince your prospects that your letter is worth reading. Don't waste space building up to your blockbuster points. Start with them. You have only a few sentences to convince your prospects to keep reading your letter. Give them what they need to make sure they continue.
6. Never end a sentence at the bottom of a page in a sales letter.
Always use a broken sentence to carry your reader forward onto the next page of your letter. Kind if tricky, but it works.
7. Share some "inside" information.
Direct mail affords a perfect opportunity to appeal to a person's vanity-a need to feel special. An ideal way to do this is to share some exclusive information. Make it clear that this offer is being made only to them.
8. Feature the offer.
Everyone loves a good deal. Make it a key focal point of your letter. A strong offer can often be the extra incentive that will convert your "maybes" to buyers.
9. Give something away for FREE or Run a contest.
Free samples, trials, demonstrations, consultations, or information are all super ways of getting customers to give your product or service a hands-on try. Sometimes that is all it takes to close the sale. Give away a free enrollment in your seminar, a free subscription to your newsletter, or anything else that appeals to your buyers.
10. Use a special "before the price increases" offer.
If you plan to raise your prices, make your regular customers a special offer at the old price for a limited time.
11. Make a time-limited offer.
Offer a special deal for a limited period of time. And do just that-legally you can't continue a time-limited offer indefinitely.
12. Base your offer on a limited supply.
A close-out of your inventory can create strong demand. A limited supply offer can be used to designate exclusivity and prestige.
13. Offer a special deal to the first 100 people who order.
The key is to keep it to a meaningful limit as an incentive for customers to act quickly.
14. Make a "last chance" offer.
Last chance at this price, inventory close-outs, and last chance before a model change can all be used to successfully win more orders.
15. "Buy 1 get 1 FREE" always out pulls "2 for the price of 1."
Although the savings are precisely the same, the first format sounds like the customer is getting a better bargain.
As mentioned in the beginning, not all of these techniques will work for every mailing you create. The key is to review the techniques whenever you're planning a mailing. Pick the ones that best apply to your situation and put them to work. Always remember the most important three words in direct marketing...test, test, and test!
After William Caxton started littering the Streets of London with his various and sundry handbills in the 1480's, direct marketing took off. While the good folk of the 15
th Century didn't have to contend with Adult websites and genital enhancement email spam, they did have to contend with Real Estate "opportunities" distributed through this budding new media.
William Penn--Direct Land Sales Pioneer
The first American direct advertisement, according to the Philadelphia Public Ledger, was a pamphlet published in 1681 by William Penn. It should be noted that Printing had not yet made its way across the pond, so Penn's, land scheme was imported from England, where it was printed to stimulate emigration to Pennsylvania.
Good direct advertiser that he was, Penn followed up his first piece with seven other pieces (maybe he should have invented postcards for direct marketing) between 1681 and 1690. He also took a small portion of the first pamphlet and published it as a "broadside" whatever that was...?
Following his arrival in Pennsylvania, Penn published a second pamphlet entitled: "Letter from William Penn, Proprietary and Governor of Pennsylvania in America, to the Committee of the Free Society of Traders, of that Province, residing in London." Ok, so he violated every rule of direct marketing (oops, they hadn't been invented yet) with his incredibly long title. What is noteworthy is that this pamphlet was the first to use a map to help sell. Picture is worth a 1,000 words, right?.
Unfair rumors having been spread abroad in England about Penn's Woods, in 1687 Penn published another-pamphlet, the purpose of which was to offset these rumors. Here is the first instance of using a buyer testimonial to endorse a product-in this case-a land sale.
So not only did William Penn become the first successful direct marketer in The US, but he was the first to be reported to the BBB.
In our next installment we meet Ben Franklin.