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Are you afraid to run a direct marketing campaign because you don’t know how to measure it? When you use the digital channel it appears easy to find the conversion path of a visitor from a website, and understand the impact of the campaign, but how does offline measurement work?
Written by Nilda Cerna, Marketing Manager, Romax.
With the recent re-birth of printed communication, launching a direct mail campaign is a must. This statement is not because we’ve producing direct marketing for 20 years, it is because there are studies that confirm that the impact of printed communication increases the overall campaign ROI up to 20%.
But it’s not only about the responses and facts, it’s about the engagement also. A recent survey from Bauer Media US shows that “87 of readers said they found themselves more engaged when reading a print magazine”. Moreover, print material left a deeper footprint on the brain, involved more emotional processing and produce more brain responses connected to our internal feelings, suggesting we “internalise” adverts, giving them greater resonance.
How can you persuade your Head of Marketing to include a DM campaign? Or your agency client? The answer is: with facts.
Including certain ways for your clients to communicate with you, that you only include in your printed communication, such as a specific link to a landing page that it’s different from other channels: an email or telephone number different to your other campaign so you can measure calls, including a code that your client can mention or use on your website is a good practice also. Using a different code for every type of customer helps you to track the impact in your communication across each data segment.
Using the technology as an ally, include a QR code to redirect to your website quickly.
With these techniques you will have the metrics for website visitors, actions are taken on your landing page, email or telephone calls received, and calculate the conversion rate for your direct mail piece.
If you are targeting your client database, you can send your print communication to a group of them and compare the response rate of whom haven’t received. You can track a third group who have received both email and mail also.
For a higher Direct Mail result, we recommend including a personalised communication. Sending the same communication template but changing text or image depending on your client’s profile or purchase behaviours; such as past purchase or personal income. The data management gives your database socio-demographic profile and helps to reduce the printing cost.
Digital marketers are used to developing exclusive online campaigns, such as launching a new product that so that it sells on the website only, why you don’t incorporate this philosophy into direct marketing. Creating a unique offer that your customers can receive only by the printed communication will give you the exact response to the piece that you have sent. You can re-launch a product, sell a group of products or services or offer a discount.
If you would like to include the direct mail in your campaign, you can create a particular offer to recipients via the letter or postcard, why not add a free shipment for those quoting a specific code mentioned on the DM?
In both, you can track the response to the number of enquiries received or products sold, the amount of the purchase.
Direct mail has a collateral impact on your brand. At a time when online channels are losing credibility thanks to “fake” news, printing is playing a vital role giving brands the “trust” factor. Consider the qualitative ways to measure your direct marketing campaign and their impact in the long-term.
Reference: PrintPower Magazine, Spring 2017.
Romax Marketing & Distribution, a Greenwich-London based company, provides a wide range of services in Direct Marketing for B2B and B2C, Direct Mail, Data Management, Printing, Discount Postage and Membership Communication Services and Consultancy.
Contact us: hello@romax.co.uk, +44 (0) 20 8293 8550.
