Since the great recession began in 2008, many marketers have been forced to get more bang for their marketing buck. Particularly, marketers that use direct mail as a marketing channel to reach their prospective customers now find themselves having to use more and more modern methods to elect a result from prospects. Here are a few tips to help you get your message in your future customers hands:
1. Invest in your mailing list. The most important factor in any direct mail campaigns’ success is the mailing list, the database, the who. Therefore, the first step you should take in launching your direct mail campaign is to match your message to the sound group of people (and if possible, the right group of people at just the right time). A great example of this is a new homeowner list, which as the name implies targets new homeowners. Statistically speaking, a new homeowner spends four times the amount of money as a regular homeowner in the first 3 months of home ownership, making them a very lucrative audience for many marketers.
2. Fine-tune the headline and make it “skimmable”. Direct mail pieces have only a brief moment to capture the reader’s attention. Often referred to as the “golden glimpse” — that moment when your postcard comes out of the mailbox and either lands on the desk or in the junk. Be sure to use a headline that states the primary benefit to the recipient followed by bullets to make the mail piece “skimmable”. If you are using construction leads, be sure to use images and relevant industry specific text (such as workers in hardhats with appropriate industry jargon).
3. Pass the Idiot Test. Don’t ever assume that people will understand your product or service as well as you do… they won’t. Trust me. Make sure your postcard marketing campaign has a message that is crystal clear and easy to understand (blatantly obvious if possible). If the recipient does not understand your message the first time around, they won’t give it another chance. Humanized images will often go a lot farther than words in getting your message across. For example, if you are using a new parent list, be sure to include images of babies and happy families to get the message across. You’re prospects will “get it” quicker and will pay more attention because they know the message is catered specific to them.
4. Use a strong call to action with a killer offering. The offer and call to action is the culmination of the direct mail postcard’s message. It’s what the entire postcard leads up to. It tells the reader what he or she should do next in order to learn more or take action and why. Be sure to use a relevant offer that reaches out and slaps the recipient in the face with a deal they can’t turn down, followed by a call to action that can’t be missed!
5. Track and measure your direct mail campaign’s success… constantly. Want to know the number one rule of direct marketing? TEST. Test the offer. Test the message. Test the mail piece size. Test the postage stamp. Like chemists in a research lab, you should constantly test and measure your results until you find the “formula” of direct mail marketing success.