Category: Marketing Insights

Let’s get Personal!

Posted On: Category: Custom Design & Printing, Marketing InsightsPosted By:

Personalization has long been a staple for marketers looking to increase response rates. Using variable data to make a piece truly unique is a time-tested and proven method. However, we took that one step further last year and introduced a line of dimensional direct mail pieces that can be printed digitally and personalized. So is this going to be a long and shameless plug? Well, some may see it that way, but I prefer to think of it as a wake up call!

When you combine a high-impact dimensional piece, which in its own right is a powerful ROI booster, with the benefits of personalization, you get amazing direct mail. Furthermore, if you have a good list you can really have some fun.

Personalization goes beyond seeing your name on a printed piece, although people love that. I don’t know what it is, but people like seeing their name and are always surprised by it. If you have the right data you can do so much more. What about sending a piece with geographically relevant images on it? For example, a recipient in New York can see the beautiful city sky line, while someone in Wyoming gets an image of a huge pasture with cattle grazing. They have cattle in Wyoming, right? Or, maybe a cruise line could send a piece to current customers featuring images from a cruise they have not been on yet. By the way, whenever I am fortunate enough to book a cruise we always receive brochures from other cruise lines all the way up to our sail date. What is the point of that?

Recently we offered a way to take personalization to the natural next step. Adding a personalized URL (PURL) to your piece adds a third element of engagement for the recipient. Several recent campaigns have used a personalized piece with a PURL and have seen great results. Let us combine all three of these elements along with a good list and compelling offer and well, you’ll have yourself a winner.

To learn more about BtoMe, our line of high-impact data-driven pieces click here.

Depending too much on volatile social networks

Posted On: Category: Marketing Insights, TechnologyPosted By:

There is no doubt that social networking sites like Facebook and Twitter offer unbelievable business opportunities. However, when businesses rely too much on the emerging medium, still in its infancy, there can be problems.

This week Twitter announced that it will no longer allow third-party applications to advertise in their live tweet streams. But guess what was announced last week? In-stream Twitter advertising platform, Ad.ly, just secured an additional five million dollars of angel funding. There is no word yet on how Ad.ly will deal with this, but it seems pretty bleak for the young startup. There entire business model will be obsolete when Facebook enacts this new restriction next month.

The folks who probably are affected most by sudden regulatory changes from the major social networks are developers. The rules for developers are constantly changing, especially on a major platform like Facebook. For example, Zynga, developers of Farmville and Mafia Wars, two of the most popular third-party apps on Facebook, face this same danger. What if Mark Zuckerberg, 26 year old CEO of Facebook, wakes up tomorrow with an itch in his throat and decides he doesn’t like cute little farm animals and doesn’t want them on his site?

Last year the enormously popular website Tr.im ceased operations. Tr.im was a service that allowed Twitter users to shorten long URLs to preserve space in their 140 character tweets. After offering the company for sale and failing to find a buyer, they had to shut down. A company representative said there was just no way to monetize their site traffic. Isn’t that something they should have thought of sooner? Anyway, all of the millions of people that used their shortened URLs now found them completely useless. Dead links everywhere!

Of course I am not advising that you drop your social networking efforts or cancel your Facebook account. We have seen lots of success driving new people to our brand through Facebook, YouTube and Twitter. But with companies increasing their online spending every year, you have to wonder if some of them are putting all of their eggs in one basket. Smart marketers are finding ways to utilize digital and traditional mediums through highly effective integrated campaigns. These campaigns take advantage of the best of both worlds, which makes a lot of sense given how volatile online networks seem to be.

How Apple nearly cost me $500 for something I didn’t need

Posted On: Category: Marketing Insights, TechnologyPosted By:

Regardless of how you feel about Apple products there is no denying they are genius marketers and communicators. They run a very tight ship and heavily control the flow of information from their organization to the public. That’s the only reason why the recent iPhone 4G leak scandal was even a scandal at all. But that’s only part of what makes the folks at Apple geniuses.

When you see their advertisements, whether it be television, web, billboards (yes, there are Apple iPad billboards in Boston), or even those goofy highly-scripted spectacles that Steve Jobs puts on at a convention center every time they have a new product to announce; their marketing just makes you want to buy. Well, I should say “most of us want to buy” to be fair to those non-techy people like my wife who could care less about gadgets.  Apple’s marketing is very consistent. Images always have a clean white background with the product angled in a specific way and a nice reflection going through the top half. Their fonts are always bold, clean and crisp. You get the sense that the product is so special and so advanced it’s worth every penny of its usually high price tag. This could not have been more true for the recent release of the Apple iPad.

I watched the online video on Apple’s website where they take you through the iPad and talk about its functionality. The calm but dramatic voices of their engineers and product managers (the same people that appear on all Apple videos) just make the iPad seem magical. In fact, that’s how they describe the iPad, “magical”. Clearly, the iPad is not magical. It’s a series of wires and processors that form a really cool tablet. But despite the fact I had no practical use for the iPad, I really wanted one.

Later that week my wife and I were out and I asked her if we could take a stroll through Best Buy to checkout what all of the buzz is about regarding the recent iPad launch. She gave me a disapproving look and agreed on the condition that I would not buy anything. “Sure honey”, I agreed, “there is nothing I really need”.

I spent about 3 minutes playing with the demo iPad in the store when it suddenly hit me like a ton of bricks. I was disappointed to find that I really didn’t need or want the iPad. Yes, it was cool. Yes, it was slick looking and technologically advanced just like Mr. Jobs said, but I couldn’t find any reason to own one. It was then that I realized I was a victim of the brilliant marketing by Apple. Of course, no one will admit that marketing works on them. But in this case, Apple got me, hook line and sinker. Well, to be more accurate, they got me to the store, but they didn’t get my five hundred bucks.

So, is there a point to all this? Well, perhaps not a very compelling one, but there is a question. How can we as marketers sell our brand the way Apple sells theirs? I don’t mean be a follower or do what they do, because your brand is different. I mean, the kind of marketing that brings you to Best Buy on a typical Saturday afternoon for absolutely no reason.

What Gary Vaynerchuk teaches us about passion and social networks

Posted On: Category: Branding, Ideas & Inspiration, Marketing Insights, Shout-Outs, TechnologyPosted By:

If there is one thing social media is good for it’s showing off your passion. People use sites like Twitter, YouTube and Facebook to show off their passions for all types of things; politics, music, movies, etc. Businesses need to do the same thing with their social media efforts.

I just got finished reading the book “Crush It” by Gary Vaynerchuk, founder of WineLibrary.com and Wine Library TV. This guy is a bit crazy but there is a fine line between passion and crazy. He absolutely loves talking about wine and he uses YouTube, Twitter and Facebook to do it. The main theme of the book is that anyone can build a successful business or brand using social networks, as long as they have passion for what they’re doing. Honestly, I don’t care much for wine. I couldn’t tell you what goes well with a steak, or what wine to bring to a shwanky dinner party; but when I checked out Gary’s YouTube videos I was hypnotized. His passion explodes on camera and even though I had no interest in wine, I watched a bunch of his videos. It will come as no surprise that Gary has built his Wine business from a $2 million a year wine store in New Jersey, to an enormous online wine empire.

You may be asking yourself how you can make your business interesting enough for Twitter or YouTube. The truth is with all of the millions of users online there is bound to be a community of fans. Not everyone’s business is as sexy as fine wine, but once you begin to put quality content online people will listen.

Your customers and prospects are online right now. Some are browsing Facebook pages, some are twittering their hearts out and some are perusing YouTube videos. Oh and some are reading blogs!

Thanks for stopping by.

Integrated Campaigns and the Goldilocks Theory

Posted On: Category: Marketing InsightsPosted By:

Long gone are the days of huge marketing campaigns with ginormous budgets and low expectations. Marketers today have to stretch their budgets and insist on higher returns. This has been obvious since 2008, when everything began to dramatically slow down. However, in our business this slow down has given rise to the opportunities in integrated campaigns. An integrated campaign is all about finding that sweet spot between too little and too much.

The Goldilocks Theory was originally applied by NASA to describe the distance from the Sun that a planet needs to be in order to have the right temperatures to support life. Venus sits in front of that zone between the Earth and the Sun and has an average temperature of 900 degrees. By contrast, Mars sits beyond the Goldilocks zone and has an average temperature of negative 100 degrees. Not surprisingly, Earth sits comfortably within the zone and well, I don’t have to tell you how nice the weather is here.

The same theory can apply to integrated campaigns. Too little, and your ROI will be gut-wrenchingly cold. Too much, and you’ll be burned by an over bloated budget.

The key to finding the goldilocks zone in your integrated campaign is to keep a few basic principals in mind.

1. Prioritize your channels: You can’t do everything in the campaign so figure out what channels tend to yield the best response rates and start there.

2. Remain consistent: Your creative, messaging and overall theme must be consistent throughout the various channels. If your direct mail piece drives them to a landing page, then be sure the landing page has a similar look and message as the direct mail piece.

3. Follow your targets: Understanding what channel your targets responded too is important for obvious reasons. The channels you use in your next communication are going to be determined by the outcome of this campaign. Don’t get stuck not knowing what worked and what didn’t at the end of a campaign.

4. Ask your targets: Be sure to ask your targets how they prefer to be communicated with. This can be done on a landing page or in an email, but it is important information to have for your future communications. I recently received an email from Sirius Satellite Radio telling me that they never hear from me and asking how I would like to be communicated with. I receive about two emails a month from Sirius and I have never responded to any of them until that one arrived.

Applying these principals to your integrated campaign will help yield the greatest results. Of course, understanding your targets and prioritizing your channels is marketing 101, but when it comes to integrated campaigns the rules change a bit and finding the goldilocks zone in your efforts is the difference between too hot and too cold.

Great article on making email and direct mail work together

Posted On: Category: Custom Design & Printing, Direct Mail Marketing, Marketing Insights, TechnologyPosted By:

Greg Grdodian, EVP of ePostDirect, recently wrote a terrific article about the ROI benefits of combining direct mail with e-mail.  He states that response increases across the board when direct mail and e-mail are combined in a multichannel campaign, and if executed correctly, response can be double!  Here is a link to the article as well as 5 key tips to executing an integrated campaign successfuly.

Poll finds most OK with 5-day mail service.

Posted On: Category: Custom Design & Printing, Direct Mail Marketing, Marketing InsightsPosted By:

A recent USA TODAY/Gallup poll finds most americans are ok with 5-day mail. The results were based on telephone interviews with 999 adults ages 18 to over 55. The study found that younger americans use the Postal Service less than older Americans, but they also are less supportive of cutting a day of service. 73% of adults aged 55 and over were in favor of a 5-day mail service. To read the full article, click here.

Integrated campaigns are growing in popularity

Posted On: Category: Custom Design & Printing, Direct Mail Marketing, Marketing Insights, Technology, Webkeys / QR CodesPosted By:

More and more businesses are utilizing new online marketing opportunities, social networks and even mobile phone apps. However, Twitter, Facebook and iPhone apps aren’t silver bullets and they are more often being combined with traditional offline forms of marketing. Integrated campaigns represent a growing trend amongst marketers to take advantage of the best aspects that each channel has to offer.

The US Census Bureau is running a $133 million dollar campaign created by Draftfcb that includes a microsite, search ads and social networking. These all drive people to the direct mail component of the campaign, the actual census survey. This is the first year the Census Bureau has used an integrated campaign, however during the last census in 2000, they did try search ads which helped reverse the 30 year trend of declining response.

In January FedEx launched their first truly integrated campaign, “We Understand”. The entire campaign is centered around a microsite. All online and offline channels drive people to that site. The campaign which will last the entire year includes email, television, search marketing and direct mail.

According to a recent DMA study, more than 42% of interested direct mail recipients prefer to respond online to a direct mail campaign. Offering these multiple channels of response will simply help increase response. It’s a great example of the symbiotic relationship between online and offline channels.

An increasingly popular component to integrated campaigns is the use of a PURL (personalized URL). A PURL is a database-driven microsite that allows you to personalize the experience for the user. For example, you can setup a custom URL for each one of the prospects on your list: www.example.com/john-doe.  It’s an extremely effective way to learn more about your customers and helps you as a marketer tailor your message to exactly what they are interested in.

So what’s the point of all this? Yes, that was rhetorical as the answer is obvious; starting a conversation with your customers. Through the use of an integrated campaign you can find your customers wherever they are hiding, whether it’s in the mailbox, on twitter or facebook, or directly on their mobile phone. Just don’t forget to make it impactful, relevant and engaging.

A Tale of Two Mailings and the Importance of a List

Posted On: Category: Custom Design & Printing, Direct Mail Marketing, Marketing InsightsPosted By:

I don’t have to convince any marketers why a good list is important to a mailing. However, I doubt I am the only one that has received a completely irrelevant piece of mail from time to time.

Recently my family booked a cruise with a major cruise line. No sooner did the charge clear on my credit card that I began to receive brochures from several major cruise lines. That seems to be relevant since I am obviously a person who will go on cruises. But perhaps they should have started the mailings a few months or even a year after my cruise. I couldn’t understand why they were trying to sell me a cruise after I just booked one. What was even stranger was that some of mailers came directly from the same cruise line with whom I had just booked!

The motivation for this blog posting came last week when I received five copies of a letter from a major technology company. All of the letters said the exact same thing. This is a large company with a large budget and even they fall victim to a bad list (or bad mailing house.)

What’s ironic about all this is that I receive local mailings and postcards from small companies that are always completely relevant. For example, after we listed our house on the market I received a dozen or so mailers from local moving companies. When my wife first got pregnant and starting seeing a local doctor we started receiving mailings about parenting, insurance, and other adult stuff. Come to think of it, that’s a bit creepy. But it was relevant none the less.

In our business advertisers are making a significant investment in marketing materials that are designed to break through the clutter and get opened. These advertisers are relying on the mailer to perform better than expected because it’s usually something the receiver is not used to seeing; perhaps it’s our ExtendoTM or FlapperTM design; maybe it’s a mailer that makes a noise or has a scent; or maybe it’s a box that pops open and demands attention! Either way, its performance will always be dependant on the strength of the marketer’s list.

Here are some tips for insuring your list is as clean as possible before your mailing:

  1. Use address verification software, or insure that your mailing provider uses it. This will help update addresses and fix common address errors, such as using “road” instead of “drive.”
  2. Make sure to include a way for the recipient to update their information or opt out of your mailings; perhaps a special web-based form or a BRC.
  3. If you don’t already, start to classify your in-house list by interests and ability to buy; 80% of your sales will come from 20% of your customers, so be sure you know who those folks are.
  4. If renting a list, try using an industry publication or association list instead of a general broker. You’ll find those lists may be a bit more expensive, but at least you’ll know the names are relevant to your business.
  5. Always use the option “Address Service Requested” for your mailings. If you are using bulk mail you will be charged at the First Class rate for each piece of mail that is returned to you. Isn’t it worth $.44 to know that someone on your list is no longer there?

Your ability to reach and motivate your target audience will always depend on your offer and, of course, the mailer. However your list is the building block of your campaign and without it, the tower will fall. As for the recent direct mail mishaps that landed at my doorstep, I am sure there is a perfectly reasonable explanation for the mix up. Maybe the five letters was intentional. It not only broke through the clutter, it was the clutter.

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