Direct Mail – Making Your Campaign Effective

Direct mail is a great way to introduce your company, products, and services to a targeted audience of customers as well as prospects. To help make sure that your campaign is effective and providing the right results, follow the seven tips below to help make the most effective direct marketing campaign.

Start with a Strong Mailing List

Consider your mailing list your foundation. Without a strong foundation, the project will not get the return you desire. Mailing lists can be specifically targeted to reach your intended audience. You can choose your list based on such factors location, gender, profession, marital status, hobbies and interest, and household income. By spending the time to create a solid mailing list, you will limit the amount of waste and create an effective direct marketing campaign for your target audience.

Include an Offer or Follow-up Incentive

While the intent of a mailing piece is to get your company name in front of your target market, you also want to get the receiver to follow-up or interact with your business. One the best ways to do this is by creating an offer or incentive for the consumer to contact your company. This can include coupons, exclusive offers, or giveaways for signing up for regular marketing.

Make Your Piece Stand Out

With the amount of mail that is being processed each day the best way to create an effective direct marketing campaign is by standing out from the pack. You can make your price stand out by making the piece larger than average, include more standout graphics, or by utilizing a custom fold or die cut. Remember the more creative your piece, the more likely it is to catch their attention.

Plan Your Campaign Steps In Advance

An effective direct marketing campaign has a strategy. Typically, you will want to mail to your list multiple times to effectively get a response and turn prospects into customers. Make sure to plan each piece so that it complements the previous one, indicating a call to action to direct the consumer to contact your business. Be sure to time these intervals to help keep your company name fresh in their mind while not seeming too aggressive.

Make Your Message Clear

An effective direct marketing message, as well as your company’s information, should be clear to the customer and easily visible. Include headlines and bold information that you want your customer to focus on, as this may be the main information they look at. If you want to get a lot of information to your customers, break it up into a variety of pieces. Do not try and pack to much information onto a direct mailing piece as it may lose the reader’s attention. Stick to one idea and have it the focus of the piece and obvious from a quick once over.

Get Personal

With the availability of variable data, you can now personalize your direct mail pieces to customers on your mailing list. This bit of personalization does not add a significant cost and attracts the receiver to the piece and may entice them to read further. If you plan on personalizing, be sure you start with an accurate mailing list to avoid any misnamed pieces.

Track Your Campaign

The primary purpose of your mailing campaign is to attract new customers and entice them to purchase your products or services. The only way to be sure you have an effective direct marketing campaign is by tracking the data and response to the piece. This can be done by tracking offers and coupons using a code that is specific to each mailing campaign or inquiring on how a customer found out about the company when they sign up for an account.

This type of tracking will help you to determine if your target audience was achieved and if your mailing piece was effective or if another approach was necessary. This will also help you to create a new mailing list based on consumers who responded to previous offers.

To make the most of your next direct mail campaign, be sure to choose a printer that has reliable service and delivers a quality product. For high-quality printing on your next direct mail campaign, contact the experienced staff at Sheer Print Solutions for a quote today.

About The Author

 

Craig Sheer

Craig Sheer is the owner of Sheer Print Solutions, located in New York City & Portchester, NY. We are the proven leader for affordable, high-quality Digital and Offset, and Large Format Printing in NYC. Sheer Printing Solutions is your single source for solutions to all your printing, binding, warehousing and fulfillment needs.