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Industry secrets to a more effective direct mail piece

Direct mail is a unique, battle-tested marketing strategy that should be a part of any serious advertising campaign. However, in recent years, digital mediums have changed how businesses reach out to new and existing audiences. The days of large, generic mailers designed for broad appeal are over. What customers are looking for now is personalization. Marketers are designing targeted campaigns to reach specific demographics. Direct mail can be a valuable resource in this new market, but only if companies are utilizing the medium correctly.

Here are four secrets for crafting the perfect mail piece:

1. Give it depth to improve open rate
The most glaring hurdle for direct mail marketers is the initial challenge of getting recipients to open the mailer. One surefire way to pique a potential customer's interest is by giving the package depth, or make it lumpy. When people see the bumps in the envelope suggesting the contents are more than a typical coupon, they become curious. Barry Gibson, director of ticket marketing for the Atlanta Hawks, told LumpyMail.com that by using the strategy, his direct mail efforts resulted in an impressive 50 percent response rate. In the marketing world, it can't really get any better.

2. Don't be afraid to spend money to personalize it
In previous years, marketers hedged their bets on inexpensive bulk mail pieces that were just as likely to be sent to an aging war veteran as they would be a bubbling 20-something. When the competition has similar pitches in magazines and on radio and television, quantity over quality made sense. However, more sophisticated digital mediums have shifted the market from generic to personalization, and mailing software is tool to help you achieve this.  If direct mail marketers don't keep up, they could be out of a job, which is why it's worth it to spend a little extra cash sprucing up a mail piece. In the long-term the return on investment will be worth the short-term loss.

3. Use the reader's name or "you"
Customers want to be acknowledged as people, rather than walking wallets. Including the word "you" in mailer content, while not the more groundbreaking inclusion, is enough to help lighten the tone of a promotional message. Instead of feeling like they're reading the words of a salesman, Life Health Pro claims adding "you" attracts customers to the message as it's tied to self interest. 

4. Keep up-to-date data
Every year millions of shoppers move addresses and change their names, and if marketers aren't catching these changes as they happen, businesses could be losing thousands in needless postage and returned mailers. It's already proven to be a significant problem amongst direct mail marketers, according to a past study cited by Ecommerce Junkie. More than 95 percent of retailers admit to wasting budget space on inaccurate contact data, which makes up 12 percent of customer databases on average. Making manual corrections can be exceedingly cumbersome - hence the rampant inaccuracies – but by adopting address correction software, marketers can easily ensure the integrity of data as it's enter. With several automated features, business can cut costs while improving productivity.