Frequently Asked Questions

What are the strengths of Direct Mail?
When designing a mailing program, it's helpful to keep the medium's unique capabilities utmost in mind. That way, you're likely to take advantage of everything that it has to offer. Consider mail's five special strengths, and how you can make them work most effectively for you:

° Targetability: When you use mail, you select exactly whom you want to talk to. You speak to people in their own language and about their individual needs. You can target many different ways, such as geographically, demographically, and combine approaches for still greater selectivity. You can even time your efforts to coincide with a critical point in a customer's buying cycle.

° Measurability: There's no guesswork when it comes to the results of a mail campaign, and virtually no waiting. If you've got a winner worth rolling out, you know right away. By allowing you to rapidly compare the merits of various strategies, mail provides the kind of knowledge that will help you in every aspect of marketing.

° Accountability: Because you can prove that mail works, it becomes its own justification. As responses pour in, the value of your program speaks for itself. This high level of accountability enables you to proceed with a high level of confidence.

° Efficiency: With mail, you know that every dollar you spend is being directed at people who are genuine prospects for your product or service. Instead of paying for circulation or viewership that may not be relevant to your needs, your budget is working all-out where it really matters.

° Flexibility: Mail can handle a wide variety of advertising or marketing tasks. Mail can sell directly,
of course. But it's also the medium that can deliver a sample right to the consumer, bring back the information you need to build a database, or develop a dialogue that helps to create a lifetime customer.

How does Direct Mail relate to other advertising media?
Many marketers have found that a mailing's response will be higher when it's part of an integrated campaign, which also includes advertising in the print or broadcast media. The resulting "recognition factor" can work in favor of a mailing and bolster its results.

How does Direct Mail's cost-per-thousand (CPM) compare the other advertising media?
For mail, the CPM is greater than those of the print and broadcast media. However, mail's cost per response and in many cases its cost per sale is in fact the lowest of any advertising medium. Recall that, by definition, the CPM figure refers to the cost per thousand people reached. Most broadcast and print vehicles include a considerable amount of "waste circulation," bringing your message to thousands or even millions who are simply not interested in your product or service. But with mail's precision targeting, a marketer can zero in directly on the right people, and not spend money reaching large numbers of the wrong people. With mail, you pay to contact fewer individuals, and every one of them really matters so the result is the industry's hardest-working advertising dollar.

How important is the list in a Direct Mail effort?
Important indeed. In fact, most Direct Mail professionals regard list choice as the single most critical element in determining the success of a mailing. A good list can pull ten times as many responses as a poor list. No matter how well crafted your mailing may be in other respects, if it isn't reaching the right people, your product or service results will suffer.

How can the success of a Direct Mail campaign be measured?
It depends on what you want your campaign to do for you. Ask yourself some questions. Are you selling directly and looking for cost-per-order that provides a certain profit margin? Are you trying to build in-store traffic? Are you attempting to create long-term customer loyalty? Do you want to generate requests for information at a certain cost-per-inquiry? Are you willing to settle for a break-even response rate if it means garnering a list of names that you can continue to sell to in the future? In other words, the measure of your success is in the mastery of your goals.

When I send out a mailing, how long should it take for responses to start coming in,
and when can I be fairly certain that responses have run their course?
Response time will depend on whether you mailed First-Class or Standard Mail A. First-Class packages reach their destinations sooner, and so naturally bring back a faster response. If you chart responses against time elapsed, you'll generally see the classic "bell-shaped" curve.

Should I follow up with a phone call?
You can enhance your mailing efforts with a telemarketing program. Most mailing lists have phone numbers available as well. This is a good tool to use as a follow up to a direct marketing campaign to remind the consumer of your product or service.