9 Perks for Businesses that Successfully Use Direct Mail

Digital marketing dominates the advertising industry, so how can physical advertising be relevant today?

Last week, we discussed the benefits companies gain from gifting useful promotional products to their clients. But what about direct mail? Are physical mailings worth the cost?

In an industry where nearly half of the emails sent each day are spam and customers are bombarded with over 60 display ads daily, direct mail can play an influential role in the market.

Successful companies should consider these 9 reasons for using direct mail in major marketing campaigns.

1. Personalized campaigns increase response rates

To make the most of your campaigns, it’s critical to personalize your mailings to catch the eye of your potential customers.

Nearly 80 percent of consumers are more likely to purchase from a company that personalizes their experience. Yet, only 22 percent of consumers feel satisfied with the level of personalization they receive.

To take advantage of this gap in personalized attention, consider how to make your campaigns customer-specific.

A staggering 91 percent of consumers are more likely to trust companies with their personal information, if the business explains how it will deliver a better personal experience. Aim your campaigns at your niche audience, and show them how your product or service will help them.

If we look at affluent stay-at-home-moms, we know an awful lot about this group of prospects already. They’re women with children who have some extra cash on hand. So how should we approach them?

Adding a first name to your direct mail piece can increase response rates by 135 percent. But why stop there?

Go a step further, and speak to the topics that motivate your potential customers. Your stay-at-home-moms are committed to providing the best care for their children, so your messaging should touch on common concerns for mothers. Where should you take your kids for daytime outings? How can you keep children healthy during flu season?

No matter the topic, speak to your prospect’s pain points, and then show how your product or service solves their problem better than any other.

With a personalized message, you build trust with your prospects. If they feel your company understands their struggles and your offer strikes a sense of urgency, the prospects will convert and become your next round of paying customers.

2. Physical mailings make your brand more trustworthy

Direct mail has more credibility than digital advertising.

56 percent of people believe that print advertising is the most trustworthy form of marketing. Since, popups and display ads are flashy and in-your-face, we’ve trained ourselves to ignore them. But direct mail has a level of credibility, since someone took the time to mail it and it can be opened at your leisure.

Direct mail also requires 21 percent less cognitive function than processing digital advertising. The recipient already understands the notion of sending and receiving mail, so they know what they’re getting when opening an envelope.

Luckily, consumers are more trusting of their mail--even if a letter turns out to be a sales pitch. And surprisingly, this holds true across all generations. The older generations are excited to open their mail and are the most trusting of what they read, but 70 percent of Millennials also report trusting direct mail.

With high levels of trust across all ages, physical mailings offers a great opportunity to build a connection between your potential customers and your brand. To make the most of your mailings, it’s critical to send personalized items that incentivize your audience and teach them about your brand vision.

3. Direct mail appeals to the senses

People are simply more interested in physical mail than digital advertising because it’s a more pleasurable experience. 55 percent of people even report looking forward to finding out what’s in their mailbox each day!

Since the total amount of posted mail has declined in recent years, consumers are more likely to take the time to sort through each item and consider its value.

It’s been proven that holding a piece of mail is a desirable experience, and this positive experience can often be associated with a company’s brand. A 2017 USPS study determined that our brains are 20 percent more engaged when they view print advertising than digital. Marketers should capitalize on this focused engagement and draw the reader in.

To make your direct mail engaging, it should appeal to the senses. Since mail is tangible and comes in a variety of shapes and sizes, don’t restrict your mailing to a simple letter in a white envelope. Create unconventional mailers with tactile coatings, 3-dimensional elements, and interactive items to grab your reader’s attention.

The size and weight of the envelope plays an important role in how the reader processes the information enclosed. According to a 2018 study by the Association of National Advertisers, oversized envelopes have the greatest return on investment (ROI) to house files at 59 percent. Letter-sized envelopes offer an ROI of 48 percent, and postcards return 34 percent. Evaluate options for size, weight, and material when determining how your prospects should interact with your message.

Incorporating exciting elements like handwritten notes, games, and small promotional gifts also improves the reader’s chance of engaging with your mailing.

Always capitalize on the greatest advantage of physical mail: the ability to hold it in your hands. The more interactive and exciting the letter seems, the more likely your prospect will become interested and convert to a sale.

When mailers are exciting and unusual, like a small package, the recipient is eager to discover what’s inside. A sales email could never match this level of intrigue. So even though email marketing is typically less expensive, winning direct mail campaigns can crush their digital counterparts and provide staggering returns.

4. Successful mailings compel readers to take action immediately

With email, marketers are constantly fighting for higher click through rates. But with direct mail recipients are engaged and motivated to take action.

Direct mail pieces boast a 20 percent higher motivation response than digital media.

When a consumer is correctly targeted and the message speaks to their needs or motivations, the prospect will be primed to engage right away. Direct mailings have a high rate of urgency with 79 percent of consumers acting on direct mail immediately.

To capitalize on this immediate need, incorporate winning methods of tracking responses to you direct mail campaigns. Personalized URLs (PURLs) are most successful for online tracking at a 53 percent response rate, followed by codes or coupons (45 percent) and call center or telephone lines (41 percent).

Choose a method of tracking responses that is easy for your team to monitor and quantify, but also easy for your target audience. Remember that demographics play a role in crafting customer responses, as well as initial targeting.

If you’re mailing to Millenial or Gen-X moms, they’ll probably feel comfortable using a PURL. However, if you’re targeting retirees, perhaps you should include a telephone response line, so they can speak with a live representative to place their order.

The goal is simply to make it as simple as possible for your reader to engage. Compel your readers to place their order the moment they finish reading your mailing, and make it quick and easy for them to follow through.

5. Brand recall is higher for direct mailings

Though 79 percent of direct mail recipients take immediate action, that still leaves the other 21 percent of prospects who weren’t quite motivated to buy.

Some prospects are simply unlikely to engage, if it’s their first experience of your brand. 60 percent of consumers say they prefer to buy products from brands they’re already familiar with.

Physical mailings can give these cautious prospects the soft touches they need to begin engaging with your brand.

A piece of direct mail has many sensory elements for your reader to experience. The prospect can interact with tangible elements of the mailing and see visual descriptions of your product, all while contemplating your offer. During this process, your prospect internalizes your message and engages with your brand.

Brand recall is 70 percent higher when customers experience direct mail, as opposed to digital advertising. Since physical mailings provide a visceral and memorable experience, prospects are more likely to recall your brand at a later date.

Luckily, your marketing team can schedule follow-up advertisements that target your prospects with digital ads.

6. Direct mail pairs well with digital advertising

To achieve higher response rates for your advertising campaigns, send direct mailings in conjunction with digital advertising, such as email or display ads. Mail paired with digital ads produces an average of 28 percent higher conversion rates, than solely relying on one method or the other.

With a greater amount of advertising campaigns using cross-channel promotions, companies have an exciting opportunity to integrate direct mail into their brand experience.

When sending a direct mail piece, follow it up with an email campaign or display ad. Using direct mail in tandem with other advertising has been shown to boost responses for digital channels by 450 percent!

Since direct mail receives focused attention and has the highest emotional impact, it works as a great activation point for your omni-channel marketing.

Raise a consumer’s brand awareness by sending them a personalized direct mailing. Your prospects will then be primed to engage with your company the next time they see one of your emails or ads online.

7. Direct mail is most effective for customer acquisition and retention

Unlike other forms of digital advertising, direct mail is the most effective for not only getting new customers, but to keep them coming back.

When sending out direct mail campaigns you can mail to prospect lists or house lists.

A prospect list is a detailed, targeted list of potential customers you believe would buy from you. Prospect lists are compiled from information sources like census data, phone books, government data, and others. They can be further segmented by demographics such as age, income, ethnicity, household makeup, and additional identifiers.

With a detailed prospect list, the average response rate to direct mail campaigns in 2018 was 4.9 percent.

Though this may seem like a low rate of response, consider that the average click-through rate for an ad below first position is only 2 percent. And that’s just to get the visitor to your site! That doesn’t mean they’ll convert after clicking the ad.

Instead, direct mail prospect lists offer a nearly 5 percent response rate that leads directly to conversions and sales.

Mailing to house lists provides an even better opportunity for direct mail. House lists are the customers who’ve purchased from you in the past. These are your most important lists because you’ve already established a relationship with these customers.

Sending direct mailings to your house lists will keep your customers excited about your new products, and your best customers will purchase from you again and again.

In 2018, house lists boasted a 9 percent response rate, so treat these customers well and always keep your lists up to date!

8. Targeted lists can reach a wide (or narrow) audience

As with any advertising campaign, success is based on the quality of your list. For direct marketing, the rule of 40/40/20 states that 40 percent of the campaign’s success is due to the list quality, 40 percent relies on the offer, and 20 percent hinges on the creative.

With 40 percent of your advertising dollars riding on your marketing list, it’s important to zero in on your prime customers who are the most excited by your product or service.

As we discussed above, prospect lists are typically built from statistical data, but marketers can also leverage self-reported data to target ideal prospects. Through customer surveys, buying activity, and social demographics, specific characteristics can be narrowed down to households and individuals. Then, Artificial Intelligence (AI) can be used as predictive modeling to evaluate the existing data and guide future decisions and targeting.

With this information, your target group could be as narrow and specific as affluent stay-at-home-moms in the Bay Area or elderly retirees on Social Security in Florida.

Having this niche audience allows you to zero in on the perfect list of prospects, while also crafting your message in a way that speaks directly to them.

9. Mail doesn’t have to fight through the clutter

The typical person receives an overwhelming amount of email. In a 12 hour span we usually receive a few important work emails, a couple personal emails, and dozens--if not hundreds--of junk emails. With all this clutter, our attention usually lasts an average of 1.1 minutes per email.

Yet, the average person only receives about 2 pieces of physical mail a day.

Since 2006, the total amount of mail sent has declined by nearly 30 percent, meaning there are far fewer pieces of mail stuffing your prospects mailboxes.

Rather than fighting against every flashy email your prospect receives, direct mail pieces have a chance to not only reach your prospect, but be opened, read, and acted upon.

So is direct mail still relevant today?

Absolutely.

Direct mail is tangible, memorable, and persuasive. It connects with your target audience and creates an emotional response that drives them to engage with your brand.

But direct mail doesn’t exist in a silo. When you pair the emotional response of a physical mailing with your digital advertising campaign, you’ll have a recipe for a winning marketing strategy.

Our team at WebbMason Marketing works with clients to develop engaging, omni-channel marketing campaigns.

Contact us today to start building direct mail into your current advertising strategy.