What were you thinking?

Dear Marketing Commando,

I’m so sorry that your new marketing effort was not successful. No, let’s be real. I’m sorry it bombed.

I know that it was important to your organization. Yes, I’m sure it cost a lot of money.

And yes, I feel your panic. After all, you ran the program.

But that’s jumping ahead.

Three months ago you came to us and asked what we could suggest to boost your direct mail marketing. The old #10-with-an-indicia package was getting stale. You wanted professional help to revive your marketing, so you brought it to us.

We suggested that changing your package size and shape might improve response rates as it has for others. Using a larger invitation-style envelope and a “live” stamp would differentiate your package. An elegant calligraphy font would complete the invitation look.

So far so good. But that’s when things went horribly wrong.

You decided to do the job by yourself—to “Go Commando”—to save money. I cautioned that you’d probably pay more because you did not know the postal regulations and you did not have the production expertise we could provide. But nope, you were sure you could do it.

So with the self-confidence borne of years of inexperience, you skewered yourself.

Let me cut you a bit of slack. You were new at this job; you wanted to make a big impression on your boss. And boy, did you! I guess you’ve solved part of the problem because now you’re looking for a new boss, though I bet this effort won’t be featured on your new resume’. But that’s another story for another day.

Commando Newbie, you made errors that only years of production experience or listening to someone with years of production experience could have prevented. Since you preferred to go it alone, let me share a few of the finer points that you missed.

Bad call #1.
First you called the post office for guidance. After all, their advice was free; ours had a price. Sometimes you get what you pay for.

Anyway, the Post Office will give you good information if you ask the right question. Too bad you didn’t explain exactly what you were doing. So you asked a misleading question and got wrong information in return. Chalk that up to inexperience.

Following USPS addressing protocol is important. However, while using all caps may work with Times Roman or Arial, it makes no sense at all in an ornate calligraphy font. Bet you won’t make that mistake again, eh?

Pity the poor postmen. Your envelopes were almost unreadable, but you were in compliance with postal addressing regulations. You gotta feel good about that at least.

Bad call #2.
Then you turned to another expert—your younger sister’s boyfriend who is a sophomore graphics student at the university. He gave you good graphic advice: keep the font consistent throughout the package to help “brand” your message.

So he took your copy and converted it all into the elaborate calligraphy script. The result looked like medieval monks hyped up on caffeine had prepared your letters. You gotta thank the monks for their attention to the mail merge personalization details, though. It added a lovely time-travel quality to the letter.

By the way, did you really expect your audience to read two pages of calligraphy? Apparently you did. Maybe you should have tried to read it first, though.

One more thought on this subject: Sophomores got their reputation for being sophomoric for a reason. Understand why now? You were supposed to be smarter.

Bad call #3.
You asked your brother-in law, the printer, to print this package for you in his spare time. It was a great deal; he’d charge you for the paper only. Unfortunately for you, what should have taken days to print took weeks.

Granted, it cost you next to nothing to print. And that is what it ultimately produced: next to nothing. But that’s jumping ahead a bit.

Bad call #4.
You had never considered how you were going to assemble the packages. But by now you were in-for-a-penny, in-for-a-pound. So you called everybody you had ever met at church, at work, on the subway on the way to work, and the nice homeless men at the corner.

Your rag tag stuffing crew took another two weeks to get the piece folded, inserted, stamped, sealed and in the mail. Unfortunately, between the food you had to provide to keep them coming back night after night, and the minimum wage they required, their efforts cost a bundle.

Bad call #5.
You tried to send the mail out at a presorted rate, but that didn’t go your way, either. You couldn’t figure out postage rules, so you ended up mailing the job at First Class just to stop the pain.

As the accused often passively say, “mistakes were made.”

I don’t want to sound like a curmudgeon, but I warned you. Maybe direct mail is not as tricky as launching a military offensive, but there are a thousand details. Details that only years of hands-on experience can prepare you for. And quite frankly, you weren’t ready.

In a nutshell, the job failed because you, dear Commando Go-it-Alone, blew it. You grabbed defeat from the jaws of victory. You jumped into the abyss without guidance, without pre-planning, without a net. If you had listened to people who do this regularly, it might have been a better career choice.

Direct Response Vehicle

Direct Marketing Tip of the Day.

Direct Response Rule #1: Always provide a response vehicle.
But it isn’t always as straightforward as it seems.

Q: I saw a membership appeal from another organization recently. They used a #9 BRE. We always use a return envelope, but ask our donors to supply postage. Are we missing the boat? Does a BRE improve response rates significantly?

A: My answer is definitively “Maybe.”

First the obvious: Many neophyte marketers miss the boat by NOT including a response envelope, even if seeking a donation or hard copy response. Not including a reply envelope doesn’t save money; it costs money. Fewer people respond without that RE. That’s a fact.

Now the more subtle: Does the type of RE (return envelope) impact returns? Consider the options as there are financial and philosophical considerations for each.

BRE vs CRE vs SRE. Let the discussion begin.

BREs (business reply envelopes) are pre-addressed to your organization and you pick up the postage. The donor/member doesn't have to pay for postage, and they like not having to pay. A BRE will probably pick up a few fence-sitters who might not respond if it cost them 44 cents.

Upsides:
a) you encourage more responses and
b) you only pay postage on the responses.
c) good approach for subscription renewals, donations, surveys, etc.
d) encourages prompt response

Downsides:
a) there is an annual fee at the USPS for having a BRM account;

b) there is the hassle of keeping money in the kitty to pay for the response mail

c) BRM postage is more expensive than first class because it is first class + a USPS handling fee. So even though you're paying for fewer pieces coming back, you're paying more per piece. You may be able to ameliorate the extra cost by asking the donor to put his 44-cent stamp on the piece to defray the cost, but you'll still pay the handling fee.

d) There are wackos out there who may want to harm you, and misusing a BRE is an easy way to do it. (see downside [b] above). Extreme case in point: in the 1960 Presidential election, some diehard anti-Catholics taped Kennedy for President BREs to bricks and mailed them back to the campaign. It almost bankrupted the campaign before the USPS recognized and stopped the abuse.

CREs (courtesy reply envelopes) meet the minimum requirement for DM Rule #1: supplying a return vehicle. CREs are pre-addressed to your organization. Typically they have a box where the postage would go, warning “Place postage here” or some similar reminder to the responder to fork over his 44 cents.

Upsides:
a) you're providing a pre-addressed envelope to respond to your offer;
b) the donor/member must pay the postage, so you're off the hook on that expense.

Downsides:
a) you'll get fewer responses because people won't/can't find the postage.
b) you’ll eliminate some marginally committed people.
c) may delay responses as people look for a stamp. Misplace the piece,
then finally mail it.

SREs. (Stamped Reply Envelopes) Here you ante up a 44-cent stamp on each reply envelope before it hits the mail.

Upsides:
a) a donor has no excuse for not responding, as you have made it easy for him to do so.
b) you increase your response rate.
c) You may want to reserve use of SREs for long-time or high-dollar donor/ constituents or for special emergency appeals as it is expensive.

Downsides:
a) expense. 44 cents x the number of pieces you are mailing can be very costly.

Those are the facts. So what's right for YOU?

The question that got this conversation going may be better phrased as “What size a boat are we missing? How many donors/subscribers/constituents have left port without us?”

If you don’t know the answer, then you’re not alone. One option may cost more in absolute dollars out-of-pocket, but what if it generates a great response rate and more dollars? One option may cost less, but it may depress response rates and dollars. Which is best for your organization?

You gotta know! But help is at hand. Direct Mail is an amazingly testable tool, and can generate statistical analysis you can take to the bank. Use those analytics to see what works best for you. And by “best” I mean optimizing returns and minimizing expense.

Here's how: Assume you mail 30,000 identical letter packages, but you’re dividing the mail into three “splits.” In all respects the letters are identical except for the return envelope. The copy is the same. The envelope is the same. Even the class of mail and how the postage is affixed is the same. But one group has a BRE, one has a CRE and one has an SRE.

Most critically, divide your data into 3 equal “splits.” Be sure the data demographics are the same for all the splits. You can inadvertently stack the deck if you load all your big donors into one of the test modules. Doing so will skew your results, won't give you a fair analysis, and will have voided this effort as a fair test.

Mail 10,000 with a BRE; mail 10,000 with a CRE; mail 10,000 with an SRE. Be sure to code each split on the reply card so you can track response rates. After all, the reply card gets separated from its envelope early in the response counting process.

Track responses for percent returned and dollars generated vs cost to generate that response. If one test split produces significantly better (or worse!) results, then you have your answer.

Ta dah! Irrefutable scientific logic wins the day.

The next time you launch a direct response effort, you won’t have to worry about missing the boat. You’ll already have your boarding pass.

10 tips for great copywriting

I read something not too long ago—written by a world-class copywriter, no doubt—that said “copywriting is the single most important element of any successful campaign.”

Other than being slightly self-serving, he was right.

Copy happens before graphics, before design, before anything. Copy drives the campaign. It is the heart and soul of your presentation.



So why do so many promotions fail?

Speaking frankly, Crappy copy.

What can you do to make your copy more compelling?

Here are a few time-tested ideas to help you improve your direct marketing presentation.

1- Throw out the longwinded intro. Nobody cares about your corporate history or how happy you are to write to them. It’s a brutal reality. File 13 it.

2- Remember you’re addressing human beings. Talk to them in plain, simple English. Cut the techno babble and industry-specific jargon. It’s not talking down to your audience. It’s knowing your audience.

3- Make the obscure obvious. If your new techno gizmo is built to withstand all the abuse that a 3-year old can bestow—dropping it, spilling milk on it, letting the dog chew on it—Say so! All that engineering folderol that went into the production of your gizmo is background noise. Focus on benefits, not the technology that ensures those benefits.

4- Use white space. Write flush left and unjustified right; it’s easier to read. Lots of space between paragraphs is good. So are bullets. And short text.

5- Use dashes (--) and ellipses (…) between phrases. The eye—and the mind—need time to digest information. Those visual pauses help provide that breather. See what I mean?

6- Simplify. Go back and reread item #2 above. Then read your copy one more time, ruthlessly whacking jargon that slipped in again. Keep sentences short. Research shows that sentences longer than 25 words flummox most people. Even college graduates (non-English majors, probably) have trouble with sentences longer than 15 words.

7- Shorten. No one except the patent office wants to puzzle through “Wireless manual auditory assistance device.” “Cell phone” is much more direct. Plain speak says volumes.

8- Mix it up. Good writing establishes a rhythm. An endless stream of long, complex sentences can lull a reader to sleep. Wake them up occasionally with short, snappy phrases. Got it?

9- Wrap it up neatly. In the last paragraph reintroduce the thought you had in paragraph one to make a nice “copy sandwich.”

James Michener once responded to a reporter’s flattery that no, he was not the world’s greatest writer. He was the world’s greatest rewriter. Which brings up the final tip:


10- Edit and then re-edit yourself. If your letter is important enough to send, it is important enough to write right. If you can’t be totally honest with your own prose, ask a colleague to look at it. If you’re waffling over wording, get rid of it. It’s not strong enough. When in doubt, throw it out.

From logos and brochures to html emails and web sites, we've got you covered.

We can design, write and produce your entire mail package so that it stands out from the clutter.






Paul & Partners Direct Marketing
43670 Trade Center Place,
Suite 150, Dulles, VA 20166
Phone: 703.996.0800
Fax: 703.996.0888
1.866.365.2858
www.paulandpartners.net
sales@paulandpartners

Why do I like direct mail?

As a marketer, I like direct mail because it is a proven marketing technique that’s been around for years. Yes, it’s a bit old fashioned. But that’s not always a bad thing. You can get hurt on a cutting edge. It’s all perspective.

I like the preparation and planning that goes into a mailing. The thousand and one decisions that can make or break the campaign. The copy. The graphics. List segmentation. Proofs and press checks. Deadlines and re-dos. The stress and the pressure. The teamwork. And the feeling when it’s all over that “We got it right.”

If, as my wise Grandmother used to say, “Anticipation is half the fun of getting there” then that time waiting for the mail to hit is indeed a delicious pins-and-needles pleasure. But much like Alaskans who wager on the day and hour when the frozen river will break up in spring, we wait anxiously for the day when the mail hits.

Watching early returns come in is like a game of expanding geography. First the areas closest to our mailing point come in, then spreading farther afield, moving from East Coast to West Coast in a predictable pattern validating our pre-launch planning.

As a user of direct mail, I know it works. I see responses come in, building housefiles, making sales and providing information we can use to make our next campaign even better. Every response is validates the planning process and ultimate execution. Our team rocks!

I value how targetable direct marketing is. I know that by pinpointing our message to each audience in our universe, we can make our approach more personal and generate more response. Manipulative? Maybe a little. Marketing magic? Absolutely!

I appreciate how statistically quantifiable direct mail marketing is. No other media allows us to know exactly how many people received our message, how many opted to respond, and at what level of commitment. It proffers verifiable, concrete proof of performance.

On the other hand, as a recipient, I like direct mail because it lets me choose who/what to let into my home, my head, my wallet. It’s polite and gracious, allowing me to respond as I deem appropriate.
I like direct mail for its “keeper” value. I can act on it immediately, or I can store it away for action later. I go back to it when or if I want to, on my time, at my convenience. I keep catalogs so I can see fashion trends on the horizon—and confirm just how truly hopeless I am.

I like direct mail because it has tactile value. I can hold it in my hand. It has physical heft and reality.

I like direct mail because it has a wonderful freshly printed smell that is faintly reminiscent of my Father’s beloved workshop.

My bottom line: I like direct mail because it works. On so many levels.

Need help with your direct mail marketing? Consult a professional like Paul&Partners. We’ll help you navigate the postal regulations to ensure you get the best postage rate available to you. We’ll help you design a package that is the right one for you and your budget.

Check us out at www.PaulandPartners.net. Let us know how we can help make your next marketing program more successful.

43670 Trade Center Place, Suite 150, Dulles, VA 20166

Phone: 703.996.0800 Fax: 703.996.0888 1.866.365.2858

www.paulandpartners.net sales@paulandpartners