Deliver your marketing message to a precise audience with direct marketing.
"Direct marketing," "direct mail," "direct reponse": These terms are used confusingly in the trade. Direct marketing typically refers to marketing efforts by the manufacturer that are directed at the end-user when a retailer or distributor is in the middle. Direct-mail advertising uses the mail service to deliver your best sales effort directly to the mailbox of your prospect. Direct-response advertising is any advertising (print or broadcast ads, or direct-mail packages) that invites the recipient to contact you directly through an 800-number, a mailing address or a business reply card.
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When you identify a new market that you think is going to be very receptive to your product or service, the cost of advertising to this market may be difficult and expensive. The best publications are extremely expensive, and your ads may not appear for quite a while.
Direct marketing provides you with a way to conduct a test of this market relatively quickly, at a reasonable cost, and with convincing certitude. You'll know whether this is indeed the gold mine you hope it is.
Perhaps the most common use of a marketing database is to generate a target list for a direct-mail campaign. Of course, direct mail also works with purchased lists. Direct mail provides giant companies with the ability to target defined markets with specialized offers. Our mail production department at Jerry Lake Mailing Service, Inc. offers three types of InkJet addressing and barcoding applications which allow us to be versatile with each and every project. Our mechanical inserting department is flexible and has the capabilities to insert up 8 mail components in to a 9 x 12 envelope and up to 14 in #10 and 6 x 9 envelopes.
Whether you have a simple or complex kit fulfillment need, our hand assembly department is capable of handling anything from a few hundred pieces to thousands. Using direct mail has a number of attractive advantages. Some of which are:
1. You can target recipients very precisely.
2. Costs can be modest. Or, more accurately, you can create a campaign to fit large or small budgets.
3. Direct mail can happen fast. With a modest campaign to a known target audience, you can acquire a mailing list, develop mailing materials (including direct-mail letter, flier, reply card), launch a mailing and start to receive results in just a few months. This is faster than the typical advertising campaign-and a lot faster than waiting for the phone to ring.
4. You can test different appeals, called "offers" in the trade, to revel the most potent message. By making a different offer to randomly different portions of your mailing list, you can see which offer pulls best. Go with your best puller until you find a better draw. As you try different offers and different letters, you'll find one does better than another. Use the better one, than try to beat that in your next mailing. Eventually, you should get better and better response rates.
5. You can mail to the same list again with a slightly different mailing and still garner worthwhile results. Most direct-mail experts say that companies don't get enough usage out of their materials. Use them until they no longer pay their way.
6. You can never run out of prospects. Use your imagination to find new direct-mail markets for your products, whether retail or business-to-business. Your list broker or mailing consultant can suggest possible target markets that are worth trying.
With consumer products, you can often sell them right through the mail... or at least get customers to stop in. With business-to-business products, you usually face a two-step process. First, you get a response to your solicitation with an indication or interest (request for catalog, literature, report or sample). This is the lead-generation phase. Once you mail off the requested material, you then follow up with additional material or a phone call/fax/e-mail to use your skills at transforming the lead into a prospect.
