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During the Covid pandemic leading marketeers & even the government turned back to direct mail not only to drive new sales & important national communication, but to amplify & support their digital marketing initiatives, strengthening & driving brand awareness. The old perceptions of physical mail being ‘slow lane’ marketing were dispelled & a new dawn for direct mail arrived!

Digital marketing is of course inexpensive, instant & here to stay, but what shrewd marketeers are realising is that by including direct mail as part of their campaign mix, they can help boost brand awareness, improve engagement & ultimately increase ROI. A single direct mail drop will have limited success, but when combined with engaging social media posts, text messaging & email touch points, suddenly you have a powerful multi-demographic vehicle to engage with your prospective customers. With an engaging brand, a clear message & a killer ‘call to action’, direct mail is proven to trigger a response, be it immediate or delayed; you may not need that window cleaner today, but rest assured when the time comes, you'll remember their name & with any luck still find the postcard stored on the kitchen worktop!

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"As an industry, we were told that printed matter was dead a decade ago, yet, without doubt, direct mail is still one of the most effective ways we can get our message and offering to potential clients. Direct mail still remains one of the most effective marketing tools in our armoury"  
Peter Hossacks, Director, GL & Co.

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Tried & Trusted

With consumers being exposed to thousands of marketing emails every day, making yourself heard above the digital ‘white noise’ is a challenge for any business. Cutting through this noise requires innovation, a creative approach & some clever thinking to ensure that you’re pressing the right buttons, for the right people at the right time. This is not an easy task but combining a ‘physical’ approach with your digital marketing strategy just might make the difference.  

Direct mail is a unique marketing channel because of its potential to engage with an entire household upon arrival. On average a piece of direct mail will be interacted with around 4.5 times* during its life cycle & remain in a household for on average 17 days* With a majority of physical mail being delivered by Royal Mail, direct mail is thought of as ‘trusted’ with an open rate of over 95%*, a rate that digital marketeers can only dream of!

Source JICMAIL

Making your campaign work smarter

In the past it’s been very difficult to measure the effectiveness of a direct mail campaign. The ‘can I ask you where you heard about us?’ was about the best that you could do.

With the re-emergence of QR codes (one of the only positives from the pandemic!), marketeers can now merge the physical & digital worlds (we call this ‘phygital’). By creating trackable QR codes, marketeers can monitor engagement within their analytics in real-time. You can link to any media such as a document, image, or video in just a few clicks, and by creating a bespoke URL, you can easily track the start of the customer journey from a physical leaflet or brochure. To do this isn't rocket science and one way is with the Google Campaign URL Builder. By adding a few bits of info into the UTM/Source/Campaign fields, Google creates a unique URL for you to copy and paste into your design allowing you to track in your website analytics. If you want to be even smarter, copy and paste this link into our BrandHub system and we will auto-create a QR for you!

Whilst QR codes are certainly here to for now, new forms of phygital customer engagement are already heading our way. Augmented Reality (AR) is already with us allowing a customer to be part of an immersive web experience from just scanning an image or part of a page. This takes the customer engagement journey to a whole new level. You can already take a 360 video tour of a house, but imagine being able to visualise and virtually walk around the local area, interacting with local services, absorbing the look and feel of everything around it. Well you may not have to wait too long as the Metaverse (as Facebook call it) is on its way!

Direct mail is cost effective

Direct mail is definitely worth another look & used sensibly & in a targeted way, it can add value & not cost the earth. As an example, sending 5000 postcards with the Royal Mail Door to Door services would only cost in the region of 10p + VAT per address to print & deliver. Whilst bulk doorstep distribution is certainly the most economical route to market, this often has to be planned many weeks ahead with little or no control on the target demographic. If speed is of the essence & you would like to be more targeted with your audience, think about a partially addressed mailing option which would cost around 56p+VAT per address. Partially addressed mail is more expensive, but you can send much lower quantities (as little as 1) and be more specific in terms of property style, homeownership, value etc allowing you to manage your budget & react quicker to local market pressures. With either option, think of your own hourly rate when you consider delivering these yourself!

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"In an age where we rely so heavily on technology, it is still vital that we utilise all other methods of marketing and communication and direct mail has proven to play a huge part in our success"
Jessica Hartnell, Marketing Manager, Caldwells Estate Agents

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Your experienced direct mail partner

besley & copp can offer a whole range of direct mail services both online & offline. Whether you are looking at a blanket mail drop into your local postcode area or you would like to discuss a more targeted approach with a defined demographic audience, we can help you achieve your objectives, managing everything from start to finish.

Our BrandHub platform has over 30+Million residential addresses ready to use, or using our Mail My Database feature, we can give you the ability to use your own B2C or B2B customer or prospect lists at the touch of a button. If you are looking to build your list, we are also an approved reseller of one of the UK’s leading mailing list providers giving you access to Experian’s trusted national database.

To see how we can help you use direct mail effectively or to request a quote, just contact us for a no-obligation chat to see how we can help.