Direct Mail Personalisation, it's not as expensive as you think
We’ve spoken on previous blogs about the enormous benefits you can gain from Direct Mail and Direct Mail Personalisation. To recap, here’s some of the key advantages of Personalised Direct Mail:
You get a better response rate because:
- Your mail is targeted to the most receptive audiences
- By personalising, you get a warmer and more positive response from the recipient. They’re more likely to take action in response to your mail.
Remember – personalised direct mail isn’t simply a matter of using targeted names and addresses. It includes elements such as:
- Images
- Illustration
- Headline text
- Body text Offers and discount codes
Given the better return on investment to be gained from personalising your direct mail, why are some marketing campaigns still missing out on this winning step?
It could well be because that they’re worried about racking up additional costs. Here’s why they can get rid of those worries once and for all.
Personalisation won’t add costs to your direct mail campaign
Yes – I know it’s a headline in big, bold letters, but just in case you missed it: personalisation can be introduced to a direct mail campaign at no additional cost. It seems incredible, doesn’t it? You get all those extra benefits and a much more effective mailing campaign and yet it doesn’t cost any extra? How can that be? Let’s start by talking about digital printing.
Digital + data = great ROI
With digital printing, there’s no additional cost for overprinting onto a document. That means that once the information is correctly downloaded to the print technology, it makes no difference to the printing process whether every document is identical or if every single one is customised. The cost remains the same.
It’s all down to the data. Providing your mailing house has the individual data for each separate mailing, then they can simply apply that data to the print process. No matter how much or how little personalisation you require, the cost will be the same because the process and resources used are the same.
No extra cost is a biggie, but just to make it bigger and better, it’s worth pointing out that this applies across the board, to both images and text.
So, it’s not just a question of names and addresses and contact details. Images can change too, including logos and all illustration used, AT NO EXTRA COST!
Data check
It follows that clients with high-quality, accurate and detailed databases are well place to get the most out of personalised direct mail. Personalisation all depends on your data. The more accurate and clean your data, the more you can do with it.
If you’re not sure how to get your direct mailing data up to scratch then the best place to start is with a data health check. Here at The Mailing People, we can start your mailing campaign with data cleaning. It’s the first step to making your data work harder and more cost-effective for you.
Data content
The second part of the data game, once you’ve ensured that it’s up to date and accurate, is to look at the kind of information your data contains. There are so many different ways that you can gather and use data to ramp up the results from your direct mailing. They include:
- Locality of clients
- Age of recipient
- Special interests
- Previous purchases
- Industry sectors
- Job roles
…and that’s just the tip of the iceberg. Here at The Mailing People we love to give clients the benefit of our experience in coming up with ideas for the kind of data that drives customer engagement.
When it comes to direct mail personalisation, every campaign is different. Use as much or as little as your campaign needs but USE IT. Remember, personalisation makes your direct mail work harder and gives you better returns. How you do it depends on your audience and the action you want them to take.
Got questions? Looking for ideas? Give us a call on 02393 850408 or email The Mailing People at enquiries@themailingpeople.co.uk.
