Direct Mail Essentials

Most of my clients find direct mail challenging because it’s difficult to get a strong, measurable response. This month’s topic covers the direct mail essentials that we have found work very well in B2B marketing at EDA.  Direct mail is a staple in EDA’s marketing program, and by following the essentials listed below, we achieve an average response rate of about 20%. This month’s newsletter is longer than normal to deliver a complete treatment on this topic.

If you’ve tried direct mail before and came up disappointed, take a close look to see if all the elements below were present. In our experience all of these essentials are needed for success:

Essential #1:  Keep it simple.  Set a simple goal for the direct mail and ensure that everything about the mailer focuses on the goal.  Likely your goal is to book a meeting to discuss and sell your product.  You can’t expect an order from the direct mail, so that won’t be your objective.  Therefore, you’ll want to entice a response to learn more after reading the mailer for about 10 seconds.  If you present too much information, you’ll lose them before they even get started.  Tell them the main benefit that you’ll deliver, quantify it, and then ask them to take the next step.

Essential #2:  Focused list.  Ensure that your list has only proven buyers.  If you ‘spray and pray’ to a list of recipients, you’ll drastically dilute your results.  You’ll tend to minimize your expense per mailer rather than maximize your effectiveness because your direct mail is doing double duty as a qualification mechanism.  Ensure that you want to earn the business of every recipient.  Creating a focused list is often the toughest and most time-intensive part of direct mail.  Avoid SIC-based lists as these are often too broad to allow for effective direct mail.

Essential #3:  Strong call-to-action (CTA).  The CTA is the recipient’s reason to respond solely to your direct mail regardless of what they already know about your company.  There are those directed at the company, such as a “20% off coupon” or “free productivity analysis,” and those benefiting the receiving person, such as an iPod or chance to win a plasma TV.  In the B2B realm, I see most companies offering company benefits; however offering personal benefits is usually more effective and far less costly.  A $50 premium item for the recipient is much less to offer than a 10% discount on a $50,000 ($5000 offer) sale, plus a recipient-targeted CTA embraces the WIIFM (What’s in it for me?) principle.

When it comes to promotional items, you’ll also benefit from limiting the terms for receiving them.  You’ll typically want to limit premiums to one per company, only the recipient you name in the mailer, and only offer them while supplies last.  If you’re concerned about freeloaders, that issue is primarily solved when you ensure a focused list of recipients containing only pre-screened recipients.  Regardless, there will always be a few individuals interested in nothing other than your promotional items, but they will be minimal and if properly handled won’t even make a measurable dent in the ROI of your mail campaign.

Essential #4:  Easy response.  Include phone and email contact information so the recipient can directly respond to you.  If you have different offices to call depending on the geography, show only the contact information for the recipient’s area.  Do not rely on your recipient to visit a web site to determine the phone number to call.  Make sure the phone number works, and there is voice mail if not monitored constantly.  You can also have a service provider create pURLs (personalized URLs) for your mailer so that you can get in the driver’s seat through custom web response (let me know if you want more information about pURLs because this topic is beyond the scope of this newsletter).

Essential #5:  Make it personal.  Address the recipient by name and company in the mail piece to let them know it was created just for them.  Do everything you can to let the recipient know the offer is matched to their needs.  For example, the mailer can include information from the UCC-1 record about their equipment.  For example, the front of your envelope can state “John, congratulations on your recent purchase of a [brand x].”  Referencing the equipment tells the recipient the mailer pertains to their equipment.  If the list is small enough, consider handwriting the address and even a short note. Have you ever thrown out a handwritten note without reading it?

Essential #6:  Invest adequately.  Ensure that you invest enough per mailer to get the desired result.  How serious do you feel about a company when you get a poorly printed post card?  How about if they mail you a handwritten letter asking if you are experiencing a specific trouble with your model of machining center?  The parameter to consider when deciding what to invest in your mailer is the expected outcome.  For example, if you gain just one customer from the mailer, what income does that bring?  If you sell a $50,000 item with a 20% margin, then one new customer would mean $12,000.  If you invest just half this amount ($6,000) in a direct mailer to 500 recipients, then you invest $30 per piece.  This might be drastically more than you would have previously considered on a per piece basis, and shows how thinking about desired outcome rather than watching per piece cost can lead to a totally different course of action.  Plus this action requires minimal response rate, which you’ll likely exceed when you invest adequately per mailer.

Essential #7:  Measure results.  You must track the generated leads all the way to conclusion.  Have any party receiving the calls or emails from the mailer report them to you right away.  Be sure to get buy-in from your front line so that they will report the activity to you.  Then follow up on these responses after one to three months to determine their outcome.  You don’t have to measure the exact ROI – just measure enough to know if the ROI was worth the effort.  Some response methods, such as pURLs (see Essential #4), can automate much of the measurement.

Other recommendations:

• Among all UCC-1 filing-based applications, sending direct mail to the buyers shown in the UCC-1 record database is one of the most rewarding.  When creating a mail list using your EDA subscription, export your records from Catapult using a DPV filter (See “Address quality” in the “Data processing” section) to minimize return mail. 

• If you sell the products directly tracked by EDA, you can use EDA’s new EventWatch feature within Catapult to monitor the finance activity of the buyers in your list.  EventWatch will automatically help you track the ROI of your mailer.

• If you have an internal list that you ’ll use, have this scrubbed using an address quality service like www.melissadata.com. 

• The mailer can be time-sensitive relative to an event at the company.   If you trigger your mailing based on new UCC-1 records, it will follow an important event at the recipient’s company.  The proximity to the event, plus writing it on the face of your mailer, will help get the recipient’s attention.

• Ensure adequate frequency.  Usually sending a mail piece several times helps the response rate. For some recipients, it takes two or more messages before you believe someone is making a serious offer and is credible.

• Use dimensional mail to differentiate yourself in the inbox.  If the recipient grabs all their perceived junk mail and heads for the trash can, will your mailer stand out in some way?  Aside from the de facto tri-folded standard size envelope, consider flat full-page envelopes.  3D mail, such as a box, gets even more attention. 

• Hire a marketing professional to design your direct mail and coordinate the essentials listed above.  Get the best possible image and response rate for your company, product, and service this way.  Let me know if you’re looking for an experienced marketing firm to help you.

• Use A/B testing.  Create two versions of your direct mail and send each to half of your recipients.  You can vary the mail piece and CTA in each to see how it affects results.  The insights are invaluable.  I have been totally surprised at what things make a big difference and what is inconsequential.

David Austin is the Machine Tool Product Manager for EDA
daustin@edadata.com | 704-845-2971