You can only go to the well so many times. Even the greatest campaign for the best product, with the most attractive offer and creative collateral, will fall flat if you’re not reaching high quality, new business prospects. If you’re seeing a decrease in response and an increase in opt-outs, your lists are probably oversaturated. You know you need fresh ammunition. What should you do?

1. Identify suitable brokers. Find brokers who manage files that match your desired target audience in terms of company size, industry, geography, desired type of contact, job title, function and purchasing authority of influence. Obtain counts from your identified brokers to determine if their counts support the mass volume your b-to-b marketing program requires. Match rental options, including email, direct mail and phone, to your go-to-market strategy. Determine how the brokers’ lists are collected.

2. Test their lists. Tell the data list manager upfront that you intend to run competitive tests before agreeing to a long-term purchase agreement. Agree to terms, and then select three lists that match your criteria. Provide the broker with a list of the types of people you do not want in your target audience.

3. Measure results. Remember that even respondents who aren’t interested are valuable. If your list does contain the right people, you may just need to reach them in a different way or with a different business offer.

4. Select your vendor. Once you’ve aggregated the data, you’ll have a solid foundation for making your selection. Monitor your ongoing response rates to gauge how effectively the list company invests in continuously cleaning its files. If you see diminishing returns from your list purchase, I recommend 
repeating tests and your selection process annually.

From the June 01, 2011 Issue of Direct Marketing News

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The US Postal Service literally guaranteed the effectiveness of integrating direct mail into marketing campaigns when it launched a postage-back assurance program in mid-May to attract the business of large marketers. The USPS is conducting the “Mail Works Guarantee” to convert large advertisers into direct mail marketers and to counter the large yearly drops it is seeing in First Class mail.

“Direct mail is the most effective and measurable way to get a message to consumers, and we know it won’t automatically go to a spam folder,” said Susan Plonkey, VP of sales at the USPS. “Of course, a direct mail piece is only as good as its offer and targeting.”

The USPS will use its experience to advise brands on how to effectively include mail in their marketing mix but will not assist with metrics or branding advice, she adds.

“We assume companies will already have very solid metrics in place to determine success. What we believe we can do is improve the performance of that campaign with direct mail. We also assume companies have determined the right brand message,” said Plonkey. “With our years of experience, and our vast amount of data on the effectiveness of direct mail and our knowledge of how to improve the read and response rate of direct mail, we believe we are uniquely positioned to help companies incorporate direct mail into their advertising mix.”

The USPS has declined to name the large brands that are participating in the program, but the program’s parameters say each must spend at least $25 million annually on advertising and mail between 500,000 and 1 million pieces of Standard or First Class mail yearly. The Postal Service will refund up to $250,000 in postage costs if their mail campaigns don’t meet agreed-upon expectations.

Industry experts say direct mail still adds a vital element to most campaigns, despite the fact that many brands have moved a significant amount of their spending to digital.

“In many cases, there’s only a 20% click rate with digital,” says Russell Kern, founder and president of The Kern Organization, a direct marketing agency. “What about the other 80%? Digital is faster and less expensive, but single-channel marketing isn’t effective for any brand. When you lose mail, you close a door.”

However, Jeff Hassemer, VP of product strategy for the data management services group at Experian, notes that the integration of marketing campaigns has hurt direct mail in recent years as brands have moved spending to other areas. For that reason, the initiative will likely not turn many major advertisers into direct mailers, he adds.

“They have not reduced volumes because direct mail on the whole was not working for them, they reduced mail volumes because they are achieving a greater return on investment from the combination of direct mail and additional marketing channels,” says Hassemer. “In the end, a company will maximize its marketing investment across all channels. Direct mail was king of this for quite some time, but marketers are now focused on maximizing budgets across all marketing channels based on return alone.”

Even with the rise of social media marketing, more conventional techniques like direct mail are unlikely to go away, but B2B data and business mailing lists could be vital to campaign success.

Speaking to Marketing Week, Annabel Venner, marketing director at niche business insurer Hiscox, described the varied mix of media the firm uses in its promotional activity.

When asked whether modern elements such as social marketing would ever replace traditional techniques like direct mail, Ms Venner argued that a variety of media was necessary.

“I cannot see direct mail going away, but you need to make sure that you are targeting the right people. This means data is massively important,” she told the journal.

Firms marketing their products and services to other companies may therefore be encouraged to use business mailing lists to ensure they are reaching the right prospects.

Earlier this week, Phil Kingsland, site director at knowthenet.org.uk, suggested that smaller firms do not need to become entirely digital to benefit from the internet.

He said that on and offline operations can coexist and support one another, perhaps through a mix of B2B email marketing and direct mail strategies.

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Originally posted on ThomasLocal.com

Very few things in life are ever perfect the first time around, and this is even more so the case when it comes to marketing – there are always little tweaks that can be made to generate more exposure and close sales. As Bigger Pockets recently suggested, small business owners should always be looking to improve on their direct mail marketing initiatives.

The best way to this is through split testing, which in the case of direct mail means splitting a list into two and then sending different components to each list. For example, if an entrepreneur wanted to experiment with different calls to action, he or she could send one postcard to the first group and another to the second group. Whichever gets more responses should be the one the company uses.

“In the end, it really doesn’t matter how you track your results, but never again, should you send out a letter without tracking the response. If you start to do this today, in just a few months you should be able to determine the best letter in your ‘arsenal’ and increase the number of deals you do very quickly,” the website explains.

There is no limit to what a company tests – different ad copy, images and print materials are all good places to start. Once the company finds a strategy that makes a return on investment, then they should switch to that format.

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Originally posted by Mark Haslan on overnightprints.com