The Reply Card: Art or Afterthought?

The sales letter, lift letter, and brochure tucked inside your direct mail package all share one purpose – to compel the reader to complete and return the reply card. While most cards may never be returned, every card that is returned represents an interested prospect. The value far outweighs the cost of printing and insertion. When you look at it this way, you begin to view this thin, rectangular piece not as an afterthought, but as an integral component of your direct mail strategy.

Creating an effective reply card is an art. Within the defined space of a few inches, you must capture interest and summarize your selling proposition while leaving room for the respondent’s contact information, your return address, and postage. Graphics should be subtle to avoid confusing or distracting the reader. Coated cardstock won’t work because the respondent needs to write on the piece.

Well-conceived reply cards have several things in common:

• They get straight to the point about what is being offered and what the reader needs to do.
• Checkboxes are included with a positive call to action and often an incentive as well: “YES! I accept your free trial offer!”
• Additional avenues for responding are featured prominently, such as a toll-free telephone number, QR Code, and links to social media.
• An expiration date is included to create a sense of urgency.

Studies have shown that response rates can be greatly increased when response devices are personalized. In this age of identity theft, however, you must be sensitive to the amount of information that is traveling through the mail on a postcard. If your business requires personal data like date of birth or a credit card number, be sure to include a reply envelope. Whatever approach you take, make sure your piece meets U.S. Postal Service standards for cost-effective processing. 

A reply card is arguably the most important piece inside your direct mail package. Rethink the role this seemingly simple piece plays in your overall direct mail plan.

Ways Color Makes You MoneyWhen we think about color in print marketing and direct mail, we think about stunning images and eye-catching graphics. But color packs a punch in letters, product brochures, and other text-heavy documents, too. What makes color so powerful? Here are just a few of the benefits that color provides: • Increases recall dramatically. Studies show that color increases recalls in the 80% range. • Gets attention. People are about 40% more likely to select or read materials when they are in color. • Helps readers find information more easily. This is great for insurance policies, contracts, and other lengthy documents. • Reduces errors. Highlight instructions or account information to help people get it right the first time. • Slashes payment time. Highlight the amount owed and the due date with color and watch your invoices get paid faster! • Increase the ability of readers to understand and retain information. This is great news for your sales presentations. When you want to draw your readers’ attention to something or when you need to draw out an immediate response, you can’t beat the use of color. Make phone numbers or payment information stand out in a letter. Highlight discounts in a brightly colored starburst. Use arrows or colored bullets to focus attention on key points in a brochure. Looking for ways to incorporate more color into your direct mail or marketing collateral? Contact us. We can help!

When we think about color in print marketing and direct mail, we think about stunning images and eye-catching graphics. But color packs a punch in letters, product brochures, and other text-heavy documents, too. What makes color so powerful?

Here are just a few of the benefits that color provides:

• Increases recall dramatically. Studies show that color increases recalls in the 80% range.
• Gets attention. People are about 40% more likely to select or read materials when they are in color.
• Helps readers find information more easily. This is great for insurance policies, contracts, and other lengthy documents.
• Reduces errors. Highlight instructions or account information to help people get it right the first time.

·      Slashes payment time. Highlight the amount owed and the due date with color and watch your invoices get paid faster!

·      Increase the ability of readers to understand and retain information. This is great news for your sales presentations.

When you want to draw your readers’ attention to something or when you need to draw out an immediate response, you can’t beat the use of color. Make phone numbers or payment information stand out in a letter. Highlight discounts in a brightly colored starburst. Use arrows or colored bullets to focus attention on key points in a brochure.

Looking for ways to incorporate more color into your direct mail or marketing collateral? Contact us. We can help!

Have You “Touched” Your Customers Recently?

How often do you reach out and “touch” your customers with some kind of marketing contact? Only when you are selling something? Or when it’s time to send a bill? If so, then you need to rethink your strategy. Successful marketers have regular contact with their customers, whether they are selling something or not. Let’s look at three examples of reaching out in ways that go beyond the direct sale:

• At the holidays, one software manufacturer sends each customer a personalized greeting card to demonstrate its cross-media capabilities and stay top of mind. To stay top of mind year round, it sends a personalized wall calendar with extensive personalized imagery.
• Using an automated system, medical and dental practices send automated, personalized appointment reminders using their customers’ preferred method of contact—personalized e-mail, text, or postcard.
• To nurture customer loyalty, one manufacturer launched a quarterly, personalized customer newsletter. It segments the newsletter by vertical market and uses personalized URLs to track which articles customers read. This gives the manufacturer invaluable insight into its customers’ business needs.

These are just three examples, but there are many others. Consider the benefits of customer surveys, open house invitations, birthday cards, company announcements, and more.

Notice that these campaigns contain personalization, and yours should, too. Customers are used to seeing personalized communications, and their contacts from you should be no exception. You should personalize your direct mail and e-mail communications, even if it’s simply greeting the person by name. Your competitors and their other business partners are personalizing. You want to stand out for what you are doing instead of what you are not.

So reach out and “touch” your customers. Do it regularly. Do it often. When you do, be sure to personalize it!

Boost Customer Loyalty with Surveys

One of the best uses of your marketing dollars is to protect your existing customer base. You’ve worked hard to earn their loyalty. Now you want to keep it. Consider the benefits of utilizing customer surveys.

Let’s look at an example. A regional grocery store chain was experiencing increased competition from a large national chain and wanted to preserve its most valuable customer relationships. The chain sent two personalized surveys to its top 400 customers: one in the fall and one in the spring.

The first survey included six personalized questions and a letter addressed to the shopper, signed by the store manager of the location they frequented most. In the second, questions were designed to see how well the chain had addressed the issues raised in the first survey. Recipients also received a personalized cover letter from the store manager.

The surveys received a 52% response rate. While specific data on customer retention was not provided, a research study conducted by Rice University and published in Harvard Business Review found that, over the course of a year, customers who received similar customer surveys were twice as likely to continue their relationship with the company than those who did not.[1]

There are no surprises here. Once people have made a purchase from you, they are your customers to lose. Show them that you care what they think, that their opinions are valuable, and you will act on information they share with you. They will reward you with their loyalty.

Why not talk to us about incorporating a customer survey into your next mailing?

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[1] “Sending out a Survey to Customers Can Double Sales,” by Vivek Bhaskaran, www.questionpro.com.

Can Boosting Response Rates Be This Simple?

When marketers think about successful 1:1 campaigns, they think about factors such as the creative, the offer, the mailing list, and the selection of 1:1 variables. But there is another, even simpler step that you can take to boost response rates.

Provide multiple response mechanisms. Yes, it’s that simple. Give people options. Not everyone wants to respond to your marketing campaign in the same way. One person might feel very comfortable responding by email. Another might prefer to respond by phone. Yet another might prefer to respond to a personalized URL.

Consider your audience. A twenty-something sipping coffee in Starbucks might not respond to a tear-out form, but she might be willing to pick up her phone (which is probably sitting right next to her coffee) and scan a QR Code, taking her to a mobile website. But if you’re marketing to retirees, you might want to include a tear-out form and an 800 number instead, even if you’re primarily hoping they’ll go to the Web.

Testing different response mechanisms is a great opportunity to learn about the different demographic groups in your database, too. One marketer got a surprise when it offered recipients the opportunity to respond to the survey using a personalized URL or by filling out a tear-out card. It thought tear-out cards had become outdated, but it found a surprisingly high percentage of the cards returned, many of them from older recipients who were not comfortable giving out certain information online.

So when you are planning your campaign, include detailed consideration of the response mechanisms you provide. Test different methods with different demographic groups. Once people respond, add this as a variable in your database and capitalize on this knowledge the next time around.

Need help? Give us a call!

5 Direct Mail “Must Dos”

Want to ensure that your direct mail is in line with today’s best practices? Here are 5 items that should be on every marketer’s “must do” list. 

1. Focus on relevance, not volume: Marketers are moving away from commoditized, undifferentiated direct mail. They are leveraging customer demographics, purchase patterns, and preferences to increase response rates and drive revenue growth. According to a March 2014 study from Adobe, “personalization” ranked #1 on marketers’ lists of priorities this year. 

2. Sometimes less is more: By focus on creating relevance, not volume, this often means smaller, more targeted mailings. Only with personalized, relevance-based marketing can you mail less and get more.

3. Think efficiency: Better data cleansing and updating of mailing lists (eliminating UAA, or “undeliverable as addressed” mail) not only increases marketing efficiency, but it saves on postage, too. 

4. Use triggered mail: Marketing effectiveness increases when you are mailing at the very time the customer is ready to buy. “Triggered” messaging does just that. Take an automotive manufacturer that sends out 1:1 mailers to alert customers when their vehicles are due for scheduled maintenance based on their last service call. Or a florist that advertises discounts to customers with family members with birthdays or anniversaries that week. Triggered mail magnifies the impact of personalization.

5. Be willing to stretch yourself: Don’t get stuck in a rut. In the same Adobe study, 54% of marketers said they believe the ideal marketer should take more risks and 45% hope to take more risks themselves. How will you know what works best for you if you don’t stretch yourself by trying something new once in awhile? 

Talk to us about new ideas and new techniques for personalizing, using triggers, and increasing the relevance of your campaigns to boost your results. 

¹ “Digital Roadblock: Marketers Struggle to Reinvent Themselves” (Adobe, March 2014)

Some Customers Still Hard to Reach by Email

Did you know that, even in today’s multichannel media environment, some customer segments are more difficult to reach by email than others? For example . . . 

• 41% of U.S. consumers aged 65+ still do not have Internet access. 
• 53% of U.S. consumers in this group do not have broadband. 
• 18% of these consumers do not have smartphones. 

Particularly for older retirees in lower income households, print remains a critical part of the multichannel mix. For many, it may be the only way to reach them. Even those who do go online may require text-only emails rather than the HTML versions many marketers are geared up to send. 

But before you write off U.S. retirees as non-email-reading, non-Internet using consumers, remember that not all consumer segments look the same. In fact, among younger, more affluent, and more educated retirees, 90% have Internet access and 82% have broadband. 

That’s higher than the U.S. adult population overall. For this segment, email is an important tool for marketing communication, both as a primary means of messaging or as a follow-up to print communications. 

So before you reach out, know your audience, their media use, and their channel preferences. It can have a critical impact on your multichannel mix.

Need help figuring it out? Give us a call. 

Want Better Results? Get Scientific!

When it comes to marketing spend, there is value in trusting your gut. But more and more marketers are looking to the numbers. 

According to a new survey by Adobe, marketers are increasingly relying on data and analytics to guide their decisions. Creativity is critical, but that creativity needs to be guided by hard numbers that tell you what looks great and what is actually working. 

Among the findings from the survey: 

• 51% of marketers rely more on data and analytics to guide their creative decisions. 
• 74% say capturing and applying data to inform and drive marketing activities is the new reality. 
• 67% say data (metrics from digital ads, campaigns, website, etc.) is informative in evolving my company's marketing creative.

When it comes to your creative direction, don’t be shooting in the dark. Let us help you develop metrics for your print campaigns so you know not just what folks in your office think is spectacular but what is actually getting results.

¹ “Digital Roadblock: Marketers Struggle to Reinvent Themselves” (Adobe, March 2014)