Four Reasons Why Direct Mail is Still the Undefeated Hero

Some people are under the impression that direct mail is last year’s marketing plan.

Nothing could be further from the truth.

Direct mail is practically the class and quintessential modern marketing plan (and integrating social media and digital marketing only makes a marketing plan exponentially better).

In this post, we will examine exactly why direct mail is so powerful and still so relevant.

Direct mail has shelf-life

Not all advertising mail is discarded and thrown away. Coupons, special promotions, and “save the date” mailings are often placed on the refrigerator or coffee table to be used in the near future.

We can’t send tracking devices with each individual mailing to know and understand exactly what happens to it once it lands in a prospective client’s mailbox, but it is common for these people to arrive, mailing in hand, and ready to make a purchase.

Monitor direct mail response

Coupons are an excellent way of knowing if your direct mail campaign is working.

As you already probably aware, a unique call to action on the mailing can be directly linked to its mailing campaign. Source codes and priority codes are effective ways to see which lists are providing the best responses.

One of the most effective ways of measuring a direct mail campaign’s success is by looking at the bottom line – when business increases there is a way to know the direct mail campaign is working.

Deliver consumers to your website and Facebook page

Some skeptics today say that the internet will eventually phase out direct mail. In the past, we have already discussed why direct mail and social media are not just not enemies, but that they actually complement each other in highly successful ways.

Of course, people do go online to find the information they are looking for.

Websites and Facebook pages have largely become the “store front” for many businesses by giving access to consumers about everything from store hours to store inventory. However, there has to be a reason for someone to visit your website, and direct mail can be the catalyst that sends them there.

Effective advertising

On the first day of marketing school you learned this tip: Anything you can do to keep your name in front of your customers is important to retention of those customers.

Whether a business is just starting off building brand name awareness or they are reminding existing clients that they are ready to serve them, direct mail campaigns makes it happen

Compared to radio, television or newsprint, direct mail is still the best value in advertising.

When are you going to start your next direct mail campaign?

From social to print, we are going to take you places. Contact us to get started today.

Accomplishing Effective and Successful Email Marketing Plans

If you’ve seen our Facebook page lately, you know we’ve been sharing articles on the popularity and importance of email marketing – and how to do it right.

This blog post will serve to help those of you who are excited about this marketing strategy but from a unique angle: let’s take a look at some of the mistakes we can make as email marketers so we know to avoid them in the future.

Without any further ado, what are some mistakes you can make in your email marketing plans?

Just do the following:

Be too focused on incremental tactics 

Sure you can tweak the subject lines all you want, but it won't improve your overall program. Focus most of your time on the big support efforts that will drive major revenue growth. It sounds obvious once we verbalize it, but remember: Taking care of the big things should always be done before the small thing.

Forget to integrate

Remember our blog post about integrating social with print?

Good, because the same is true with email marketing. Email drives subscribers to visit your website, visit your stores, phone your call center, and engage with your social media pages. It also pulls in web and mobile behavior, consumer reviews, catalog assets, and so much more.

Don’t test your tactics

What should you really be doing? Rather than organizing testing as an alternating tactic, use it as a strategic process. Take a progressive approach by testing types of variables that you can leverage and build on for successive testing. But if you want your plan to fail, of course you won’t do this.

Miss the easy stuff 

This is a big one. There are a lot of great avenues to go down, but if you’re looking to have an ineffective campaign, then definitely forget where they are.

See, a "Happy Birthday" email is would have been great and yet too many B2C marketers don't send these messages. "We don't have subscribers' birth dates" is a common excuse. Our solution? Start capturing them. Get a program that helps you capture them so you can start generating revenue.

Avoid the big picture 

Jump straight into redoing your email templates with a responsive design even though your website is not mobile friendly, especially if most of your conversions are happening on desktops, and you ignore the fact that mobile is really about context and content.

From social to print, we are going to take you places. Contact us to get started today.

Important Answers to Critical Postcard Design Questions

We know just as well as you that direct mail is not dead. Well, the Huffington Post agrees with us in a new article published just last month.

With all of that said, let’s discuss postcard design that actually gets results.

Postcard design should not be just taking a larger print, cutting out some copy, and shrinking it down. We aren’t saying that is ineffective, but we are saying you can do a lot better.

Often, postcards can be produced quicker and lower production costs, so they’re easier to get in the mail faster. Messages should be simple, easy to digest, and easy to remember. They allow you to reach your best prospects in their homes, and you can personalize your offer for relatively little additional expense.   
  

In this post, we are going to look at postcard design and ask some fundamental questions. These questions are common and simple, but their answers are often ignored.

Should you use a theme on your postcards?

There is no objective answer to this. Sometimes themes work; other times they fail horribly. Remember, if you must use a theme, at least focus the theme on a product and offer. A “theme” doesn’t benefit consumers, but a product and offer does.

Does your postcard design have an easily identifiable product?

Prospects won’t hunt for the product, so it needs to be in their face without any guesswork involved. Make sure your prospects don’t have to read a hundred words to know what is being offered. If you have no special rate, no incentive, no giveaway, then you have nothing.

Does your postcard feature a definitive call to action?

Adding your basic contact info (phone, web address, etc.) is good, but it’s not a call to action. You need to tell readers precisely what to do next and repeat the offer, like this: “To learn more about our special 10% discount on Product X for all new clients, call us at XXX or visit our website at XXX.” 

Additionally, make sure your postcards includes a method or mechanism to track its ROI. If the CEO asked the marketing department how many loans a postcard has generated, make sure you are able to track that and have an answer.

Do you have a postcard question and answer you think is important? Please share it with us in a comment.

From social to print, we are going to take you places. Contact us to get started today.

The Tray Way: Cross-Channel Marketing - The Online Catalog

To complete our May blog series on cross-channel marketing, we wanted to close the month with a product we have been heralded for as of late: The Online Catalog

Whether it is for B2B or B2C purposes, the online catalog offers a number of benefits 

• Create a more automated system 
• Reduce inventory 
• Improve turnaround times
• Make your brand seem more "tech-savvy"
• And, when combined with a website, social media channels or even print marketing, develop a cross-channel marketing workflow that allows for greater reach.

At Tray, the creation, development and implementation of online catalogs has been a perfect supplement and evolution to the work we have been known for. Our work with DoubleTree by Hilton helped revolutionize their internal communications abilities. According to their press release:

Prior to 2011, when a DoubleTree property wanted to order customized printed collateral or branded on-property materials for their hotel, they were faced with many different procedures. They envisioned a comprehensive toolkit where all promotional materials could be ordered from one place including on-demand digital, offset, large format and specialty items

We are extremely proud of our work on that project, but that work is quite elaborate and involved a number of moving-parts and approvals. While it was literally award-winning, we understand that not all businesses have the time, energy, budget and desire to be praised nationally. They want something that is functional, appealing to the eye, easy to use and affordable. For this reason, one of our favorite case studies is our work with Gator Athletics. We worked on creating an online catalog that they could promote and share through all their channels. It aligns with all their branding and criteria, despite not having the revenues of a multinational hotel chain.

Are you considering creating or improving an online catalog for your business? What are the most important features you are looking?
 





The Tray PML Way is the blog for Tray, experts in the printing, mailing, logistics and promotional products. You can learn more about our capabilities by visiting our website, as well as our Facebook and Twitter pages. For information about the company and its successes, visit www.traypml.com

The Tray Way: The Business of Being "Green"

If you watch shows like The Office, The Tonight Show and The Biggest Loser, this you will like see the traditional NBC peacock dyed green in honor of "#Greenweek". According to the company:

We are focused on bringing an environmental perspective to everything we do, informing and entertaining the audience while driving more sustainable practices into our own operations. As one of the world’s largest media and entertainment companies, we want to participate in and help lead one of the most important dialogues of our time—and build a stronger business and a more sustainable world in the process.

While this movement on NBC Universal exudes social responsibility, the inevitable follow-up question is whether it is good for business. NBC is the weakest of the television networks, however, according to the Triple Pundit:

NBC’s Green Week has attracted upwards of $100 million in ad revenue for the network from companies who want to be associated with all things green. Subaru has been sponsoring Green Week since 2008, and for last year’s ads alone, they are rumored to have spent $10 million. Their investment paid off heavily: NBC’s numbers show that viewers who saw last year’s Subaru’s ads were a whopping 64% more likely to remember the ads if viewed on NBC during Green Week versus another channel. The associative link indicates that consistent messaging of Subaru’s green credentials with NBC’s explicit green programming had a profound impact on the minds of viewers.

Many a multi-national organization has recognized an opportunity to be successful by being socially responsible. This isn't new, but it almost feels unnatural to support a for-profit business that is doing something positive that also happens to be lucrative. At Tray, we pride our self on being "green" in an industry sector that has difficulty maintaining that standard. We do it because we feel it is the right thing to do, but admittedly, it also sets us apart from our competitors, and if that makes good "business sense", then we see it as a win-win for everyone involved.

So, this week, if you are enjoying any television on the NBCU family of networks, look at the green logo and the environmentally-friendly content and appreciate that the organization is trying to do good at the same time as they are trying to do better.

---





The Tray PML Way is the blog for Tray, experts in the printing, mailing, logistics and promotional products. You can learn more about our organization's capabilities by visiting our website, as well as our Facebook and Twitter pages.