Many companies invest heavily in digital marketing, but that doesn’t mean direct mail should be put on the back burner. When combined with a digital strategy, direct mail is highly effective. For small businesses, it can boost your current marketing efforts and help you connect with customers on a more personal level. Here are nine reasons why direct mail is important for small businesses.
1. Direct Mail Cuts Through the Clutter
People aren’t as inundated with direct mail as they are with pop-up, banner, and display ads online. Because they’re less overwhelmed by their physical mailbox contents, your customers will be more inclined to take notice of what shows up at home.
2. Mail Can Garner an Emotional Response
In recent years, nostalgia has been at the forefront of many brands’ marketing campaigns. That’s because consumers, especially millennials, like products and brands that remind them of the past. With text messaging, emails, and social media, receiving a personalized note in the mail has a nostalgic and emotional appeal that resonates with people today.
3. Direct Mailers Are Useful and Engaging
Using direct mail is beneficial to small businesses because it puts physical marketing materials right into your customers’ hands. You’re sending them something unique, personalized, and branded. They’ll be able to engage with your mailer and open it when they want to.
4. Your Collateral Gets In Front of More Eyes
Sure, the internet gives you access to millions of people, but what about those who don’t have an online presence? With direct mail, you’re not limited to people who have access to the internet. You can reach customers who don’t have social media profiles or open their emails regularly.
5. You Don’t Have to Compete as Hard
If you have ever run a pay-per-click campaign, you know how competitive ranking for your business’s keywords can be. Fewer companies are using direct mail as part of their overall marketing strategies, so you’ll have less competition when it comes to grabbing your customer’s attention.
6. Direct Mail Offers Additional Value
Sometimes you might perform a direct mail campaign for brand awareness, like announcing a grand opening or a move. Other times, you’ll want to drive your customers to perform a specific action, like purchasing a product or calling for more information about a service. You can offer customers an incentive—coupons, rebates, special discounts—to go through with that call to action. These incentives are especially helpful if you’re trying to get people in your door. Your customers won’t have to worry about printing out a coupon or scrolling through their inbox to find emails with the codes.
7. Direct Mail Is Budget-Friendly and Easily Measurable
One of the best things about direct mail is its cost-effectiveness. You can spend as little or as much as you want on your campaign and still yield substantial results. Additionally, you can easily measure and track your campaign. For example, if you send out a certain number of coupons for your customers to redeem, you’ll know how successful the campaign was by how many people use it.
8. Your Collateral Has a Longer Lifespan
Depending on what you’re mailing, a piece of direct mail can last a lot longer than an email. Maybe you’re sending a calendar of events or monthly coupons. Your customers will be less likely to throw them away since they’re relevant for weeks, whereas an email may be opened in a second and forgotten about just as quickly. It can also get buried in the inbox if your customer doesn’t save it or file it in a special folder.
9. It Allows You to Think Outside the Box
The type of mailer you choose can come in many different formats, like postcards, brochures, or booklets. But these examples are the standard. If you have room in your budget, think outside the box. Send a gift or a tangible item along with your information. Make sure the gift aligns with your brand and messaging; otherwise, it won’t make any sense.
Once you’ve decided to add direct mail to your marketing strategy, you’ll need to create a direct mail mailing list. If you’re an established business, you may already have a list of your customer’s addresses. That makes it simple. You can send your mailers to the customers who know your brand and have interacted with you previously. If you’re opening a brand new business or want to reach an even broader audience, you can purchase high-quality lists that feature potential customers in your target market.
Whether you’re an e-commerce business, nonprofit organization, or startup, direct mail is an essential part of any successful marketing strategy.
