How Snail Mail Can Be Valuable Tool For Your Business?
Marketing through email is one of the easiest options for small business owners since it is cheap and can be done by them, with little experience. But, according to Chris Dunn, Vice President of Marketing for Dun & Bradstreet, direct mail pieces are more likely to gain one's customer's attention.
With the fast-paced lifestyles that most of us lead, people tend to just skim their inbox and delete the emails or direct it to spam folder without even looking at them, which barely takes a second of their time. However with direct mail you can easily grab their attention for a solid few seconds, and maybe more, when you send relevant, interesting offers right to their homes or offices.
Direct Marketing Association's Statistical Fact Book 2014 has revealed that 80%of consumers act immediately to direct mail and only 45% say they will respond to marketing emails. This can be easily attributed to the fact that people go through their mails everyday even if for a few minutes but tend to completely ignore emails from businesses. DMA states that consumers prefer direct mail from local businesses (51%) and banks (49%) while they prefer emails regarding local events and competitions (50% each). This undoubtedly gets you a strong return on investment from direct mails.
DMA has also stated that 41% of marketers have seen a positive return on investments when using data-related marketing and that 66% of them are of the opinion that data-drivenmarketing has made a positive impact on their businesses. This is proof that the data is the key to any successful marketing strategy.
It is essential that direct mails pieces be developed with an understanding of who your customer is and what he/she needs most from you so that it feels personalized and relevant when the consumer opens their mail. This further enforces the importance of data. According to Dunn, "It really comes down to hitting the right person, with the right offer, at the right time."
It is important that you send the right offer at the right time because without it, there is a very good chance that you won't receive a response from your potential consumers. While receiving multiple emails can be a turn-off for some consumers, multiple direct mails or a combined approach of mails and emails are more easily forgiven. Remembering that your consumers are individuals like yourself can help you avoid marketing that can aggravate them.
In the words of Dunn, "You need to speak to them in a relevant way that mean something to them, captures their attention or adds value to their lives." Value adding mails don't frustrate your audience and hence can be sent in more numbers.
The United States Postal Service has extremely beneficial tools through which you can personalize your mailing list and pick out specific customers who come under your business radius. You can find them based on address, age group, income level and the size of their household. You can also buy mailing lists from companies, based on precise details like whether they are new homeowners, new parents, health enthusiast, renters, etc.
Analyse the attributes and preferences of how your typical customer and target your marketing to people like them. Come up with a detailed descriptive of your typical customer and find a company that sells lists of people exactly like your description. These descriptions can include their age, income level, marital status, interests, etc which can be the criteria based on which the relevance of your products may depend. RR Donnelley offers you tools that assist you to decide on sample size, response rates and statistical implications. You can measure your direct marketing campaign through such tools.
Conclusion
Direct mail marketing works just as well as email marketing or maybe even better. All it needs is the right technique to make it work for you. According to Dunn, if it isn't working for you, you need to follow the best practices or test different processes to find the one that works best for you. Direct mail might be slow and seem outdated but it has enormous potential as a marketing tool. So don't underestimate its potential.
Techno Data Group is therefore your one stop shop that could cater your email marketing needs just perfectly!
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Techno Data Group is b2b marketing firm in Wilmington, Delaware focusing on business success. We can help you targeting key accounts using real time verified data; we can identify your buying personas, analyze your existing database and fill in the missing information.
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