Direct mail - Marketing⁺

Direct mail – Marketing⁺ a collection of papers from PlannedSites for SME's

“If you make a product good enough, even though you live in the depths of the forest, the public will make a path to your door, says the philosopher. But if you want the public in sufficient numbers, you’d better construct a highway.” – William Randolph Hearst

Direct mail is scientific, precise, measurable, capable of being accurately targeted and tested and it gives us space to explain ourselves more fully. But it can be deemed as crass. That’s because the sort of direct mail we’re talking about (a personal letter sent first class in a tasteful plain envelope) is bracketed with the garish, screaming, unaddressed circulars from local pizza parlours and so called junk mail. If you use the right approach you will be differentiated.

The other hang-up – “It doesn’t work” – exists because of our own habits. We usually throw it away. But:

• If everyone threw all of it away all of the time (which would have to happen if
it doesn’t work) would business still continue to use it?
• We probably only need 1% (perhaps less) to respond for direct mail to pay for
itself. (see measuring in the “Testing and measuring” paper.) The glass may
be only 0.5% full and 99.5% empty but that could well be good enough.

Mailing to existing clients

Let’s get this out of the way first. Mailing to existing clients isn't a necessity.  Especially as emailing to existing clients is now a more common solution.  However, you may be an organisation that doesn't really have a product or service that gives you the capacity to upsell, cross sell or generate any other kind of sales.  But aside from sales the mailing may:

• make clients feel better about you after you’ve sent them a letter and that can
only be good, particularly if they are attracting overtures from competitors
• give you the opportunity to offer incentives to your clients
• give you the chance to send out quality company based literature which can be an extension of the website
• stimulate clients to recommend you – “they really look after me.”

Mailing to prospects

Once you’ve found a formula direct mail could produce the steady stream of new clients your practice is looking for in a cost-effective and efficient manner. It’s worth sticking with to get it right.

Simplify matters by settling for the aim of lead generation. In other words, expect no more than inquiries or even just additions to your Newsletter mailing list. Don’t expect those to whom you’ve written to reply asking for you to act for them. (If they do, of course, that’s a bonus.)
Before you start ensure you:

• have calculated the value of a new client in various categories
• can measure the results of your campaign
• are able to test permutations

All these have been covered in other papers (“Value of a client” and “Testing and Measuring”). If you are unsure you should review them.

Essentials

• Mailing list. These are bought or hired from brokers.  It’s best to find lists that are guaranteed up-to-date (in other words regularly checked so you don’t end up with lots of “gone-aways”) and include names and telephone numbers.
• A good selling letter – see “Writing good copy”.
• A quality envelope. Trying to save money by using cheap brown envelopes is an obvious mistake.
• Address the letter personally. (Microsoft’s Word’s Mail-Merge facility is a must-do in direct mail. If your office has not used it before ensure someone spends a couple of hours with it first to learn how it works and gain an overview of its features.)
• Freebies – see “Give, give, give”.

Considerations

• Freepost card for replies. See the Royal Mail website.
• Addressing the envelope. Nowadays (good quality) window envelopes are no longer cheap and nasty so the address need only appear on the letter. It’s probably best to avoid using labels as they are often used in mass mailings. Window envelopes also guarantee there will be no addressing mistakes.
• It’s preferable to sign each letter and definitely don’t use “pp”.
• First class post.