Direct Mailing Services from Mailing Expert

Direct mail

Successful direct mail advertising campaigns can be a highly effective way of building an organisation and keeping customers, subscribers and donors loyal. The starting point for any marketing activity is to be clear about your key objectives.

• Is the goal to generate responses or build brand awareness?
• What are the measures of success?
• What is the forecast for enquiries/response rates/enquiries/orders/donations or other marketing KPIs?
• What is the cost/budget?

Careful campaign planning is an essential part of the process:

• What are the creative, print and production schedules?
• How many customers/prospects/donors are being mailed?
• What mailing lists are being used?
• How have recipients been selected?
• When will the mail be posted and when is it scheduled to arrive?
• Are resources in place to handle responses?
• Is there a deadline for responses?
• Are there any A/B tests to carry out?

Once the campaign goes live and when it has has finished, it needs to be accurately  evaluated.

• Was the quality of the creative and print as good as it should have been?
• Did the mail arrive on time and as expected?
• How did the campaign perform against the forecast?
• What were the test results (if any)?
• What were the key lessons learned from the campaign?

With our extensive experience working across multiple sectors, Mailing Expert can help you with all aspects of direct mail planning, execution and evaluation.

Personalised direct mail

Direct mail personalisation begins with the unique attributes of the customer or recipient. That could include name, postal address, email address and customer number. Depending on how you use data it might carry over to purchase or donation history, online behaviour, birthdays, in-store visits, customer service interactions, returned goods and much more.

In the world of big data, opportunities for marketing personalisation have increased beyond recognition. The key question is how you can personalise your communications effectively. It remains true that addressed mail will always get a better response than unaddressed door drops. But does using a first name in a salutation help? Is it helpful to mention the recipient's last purchase or donation? Does mentioning the nearest local store or office generate a response?

Testing the effectiveness of your personalised direct mail campaign can provide the answers to these questions, but there's also an argument for personalising content and offers if you're able to, because as a rule of thumb accurate personalisation will always lift response and engagement.

We always welcome talking through direct mail personalisation with our clients.

Postage discounts

Postage is often the most expensive element in direct mail campaigns, so it pays to take advantage of every every discount on offer. Royal Mail has a range of options depending on the service, volume, timing and format of your mailing. Our close relationship with Royal Mail mean we can put you in the picture on all the options available.

There are also discounts and different pricing structures on offer from other mail providers (known as downstream access providers). Essentially these are mail businesses who pick up your mail from us and deliver through their own postal depots to the Royal Mail's local offices. The Royal Mail then delivers your mail over the 'final mile' to individual homes and businesses.

We keep fully abreast of costs and incentives available from downstream access providers and will recommend using the best priced and most reliable services available.

Mailmark

If you're involved with direct mail you need to know about Mailmark. It's a service from Royal Mail which gives you a discount in exchange for using a Mailmark barcode on your mail. The barcode is printed by us, and your Royal Mail charge is adjusted accordingly.

The Mailmark discount can be sufficient to make the difference between deciding to go ahead with a mailing campaign or not. We'll show you the ins and outs of using MailMark so that you fully understand the advantages of following this route.

Postcard mailing

Postcards are the lowest cost form of posting addressed mail. They are often used for short, sharp messages and can be supremely cost effective if their purpose is clear and they are well executed. They can't carry as much information as a catalogue, but they can point customers to a website, store or office. As such they merit careful consideration.

High volume bulk mail

As the volume of mail goes up so does the challenge of production and scheduling, especially if you split data into multiple cells. In essence the need for detailed planning is paramount, but the prize for getting bulk mail campaigns right can be enormous.

Bulk direct mail campaigns can produce a surge in demand for products and services, so response handling and product availability needs to be in place prior to the launch of the campaign.

Handled correctly, bulk campaigns are a very serious option for giving your organisation a major marketing boost. You also benefit from lower unit production costs and potentially lower unit postage costs, so the financial dynamics of a bulk campaign become very different from smaller scale direct mail.

If you're undertaking a major marketing drive, make sure you make bulk mail campaigns a topic of discussion with us.

International direct mail

Overseas customers and donors can be worth significantly more than the average customer closer to home. Customers who don't have UK goods or services on their doorstep might be more likely to spend more than those living locally. A charity donor who has retired to the Mediterranean might be inclined to give more than one in the UK. Experience shows that international direct mail can be a very profitable activity.

International mail services are however a bit of a minefield because managing mail delivery from a distance is that much harder. Our close connections with Royal Mail and downstream access providers give us a clear view of the options and costs for working with overseas postal services. It does cost more to post overseas than within the UK; if you do have overseas donors or customers this is a great way of communicating with them.

Do you have overseas donors or customers? Let us know and we'll show you the choices you have for including them in your marketing plans.

Call Mailing Expert today on 01825 983 033 or email info@mailingexpert.co.uk.