3 Ways to Win at Direct Mail Campaigns with Effective Design
Many marketers think of direct mail as an outdated strategy but that’s far from true. In fact, its response rate has been increasing for the last several years.
If you want to break through the noise your target market likely gets online, direct mail campaigns are a great way to do it. Let’s look at 3 ways to improve your mailings’ design.
1. Personalized Design
The first step to getting results from direct mail is getting people to open the envelope to look at what’s inside. If you personalize the envelope and its contents for the reader, you’ll have a much higher chance of them reading it.
Handwritten direct mail has a better chance of getting opened. That doesn’t mean you have to write them all by hand though. You can read more about direct mail marketing automation to handwrite envelopes.
Make sure the greeting and your letter’s P.S. are both personalized as well. The headline and P.S. are two of the most-read parts of any direct mail letter so it’s critical you grab the reader’s attention there.
2. Keep It Simple and Easy to Read
Modern technology makes it easy to over-engineer your mailing with lots of fonts, flashy graphics, images, and anything else you want to add. Too much of that type of content will turn people off though.
In most cases, less is more. Keep your mailings simple and easy to read. Include lots of white space around the text and keep your paragraphs short and punchy.
If your reader sees a wall of text when they open your letter, it’s probably going straight into the trash.
3. Watch the Weight and Size
Postage is one of the biggest components of the cost of direct mail. This is one of the reasons email has taken over for so many businesses — there’s little or no marginal cost to send an email to many more recipients.
That stumbling block is one of the reasons direct mail is so effective. Many businesses overlook it because of the cost.
Keeping your costs down means you can break even at a lower response rate and improves your ROI once the mailing starts turning a profit. The best way to do that is to be careful that you stay within the size and weight requirements of the USPS.
A small difference in the size of your mailing can make a big difference in the cost of sending it out. Keep that in mind when you’re in the design stage so you won’t have any surprises when it’s time to mail.
Use These Tips to Increase the ROI of Your Direct Mail Campaigns
Implementing these tips will help your direct mail campaigns bring in a better ROI whether the goal is lead generation, sales, or anything else. Don’t fall into the trap of thinking physical mail is an outdated medium.
Check out the Business category on our blog for more helpful tips and tricks for generating more business.
