Why Direct Mail Marketing is a Must for Enterprise Businesses

With many enterprise marketing strategies focused on aligning data, departments and digital platforms, traditional marketing channels are sometimes overlooked.

But a digital-only marketing strategy can have a negative impact on your brand–and your bottom line. Audiences are becoming increasingly immune and wary of digital advertising. The clutter, spam, and over-saturation of online ads have lessened the effectiveness of digital-only marketing strategies.

For example, when Nordstrom stopped using direct mail for their loyalty program, sales decreased by 3.3%. In a Q1 earnings call, Nordstrom co-president Erik Nordstrom confessed, “We eliminated paper notes, but later discovered that a segment of our customer base relies on receiving these notes by mail. As a result, we saw a reduction in traffic.”

Direct mail solves for the over-saturation of digital and allows enterprise marketers to convert more customers and build deeper relationships with existing ones by:

• Building trust and brand awareness.
• Seizing lucrative windows of opportunity before competitors.
• Helping sales win more deals.

Here’s how.

3 Ways Direct Mail Benefits Enterprise Businesses

The average open rate of direct mail is between 80-90% and response rates average 9%. To put those numbers in perspective, the average email open rate is 20% and average response rates for email, paid search and social media are just 1%.

The main reasons for the high open and response rate of direct mail are its tangibility and inherent trustworthiness. Other reasons include:

• Mailboxes aren’t as inundated as the inbox, especially when you consider the average person receives more than 100 emails per day.
• Ad blockers are used by nearly half of all internet users.
• Messages can’t get lost in a social media feed or ad-infested website.
• 70% of people believe direct mail is less intrusive and more personal than digital ads.
• 48% of people hold onto direct mail for future reference.

1. Build Trust and Brand Awareness

76% of consumers trust direct mail when they want to make a purchase decision, over digital channels. With consumer trust in big business and corporations at an all-time low, it’s critical for enterprise marketers to leverage the inherent trustworthiness of direct mail.

But direct mail campaigns with generic, one-size-fits-all content won’t cut it.

Consumers are more than twice as likely to view personalized offers and 52% expect offers always to be personalized.

Personalization can transform the perception of enterprise businesses so much so that 93% of businesses saw an increase in revenue when they focused on an advanced personalization strategy.

By addressing the specific challenges of target audiences–and providing a specific solution–your business will be perceived as genuine, authentic and trustworthy. With 84% of consumers stating they’re more likely to buy from brands that treat them like a person, not a number, personalized direct mail can differentiate your business from the competition.

And the sky’s the limit when it comes to personalization. Everything from taglines, logos, messages, offers, images, URLs, and QR codes can be tailored to address the specific needs, preferences and interests of specific groups or individuals.

Here’s how businesses from a variety of industries use personalized direct mail to build their brand and boost their bottom line:

• Banks and financial institutions personalize direct mail with loan payoff information, updated mortgage rates, and credit card offers specific to the individual recipient.
• SaaS businesses hyper-target companies based on industry or department, and include the prospects' logos to catch their eye.
• Manufacturers localize marketing efforts to speak to the needs and demographics of the community with content and images that resonate with the local population.
• Solar installers use images from homes in the recipient’s neighborhood to establish trust and showcase their work in the community.
• Home service businesses tailor offers to customers based on their last service date or maintenance plan.
• Car dealerships send customers unique upgrade, buyout, and maintenance offers based on the make, model and mileage of their vehicle.

The secret to personalized direct mail is variable data printing technology. Using information housed in your CRM, a state-of-the-art digital printing press dynamically inserts content into a pre-designed file prior to printing. In other words, hundreds of thousands of mail pieces can be tailored with content specific to individual recipients in the same amount of time it would take to print the same amount of non-personalized pieces. Even the envelope can be personalized to grab the attention of recipients and ensure the mail is opened.

In the example below, you can see how data is pulled from a file and then dynamically inserted into a mailer template.

Implementing a personalization strategy for direct mail campaigns is just as easy as it’s effective. The entire personalization process–including data processing, production, variable data printing, packaging and shipping–can all be outsourced to a marketing fulfillment partner.

>>>Related Resource: Learn more about the power of personalization.

2. Seize Opportunities and Enter New Markets Before Competitors 

Today’s business environment is in a constant state of change–but change brings opportunity. If your business is the first to offer a solution to a new challenge, you’ll benefit from increased revenue and a long-term strategic advantage over competitors.

A Harvard Business Review study found that “Firms who succeed in building durable first-mover advantages tend to dominate their product categories for many years, from a market’s infancy until well into its maturity.”

In order to seize lucrative windows of opportunity, your message needs to get out quickly and across all channels.

For instance, if you have an urgent or time-sensitive campaign, send an email out ASAP, then follow up with a letter or postcard communicating the information in more detail.

Pairing the speed of email and the high open rates of direct mail is key to ensuring your business gets in front of prospects and customers first.

In addition to boosting the visibility of your business, direct mail will ensure your business–and the solutions you provide–are remembered. People absorb information better when they read it in print rather than online and an analysis of 33 different studies confirmed that print is far superior to digital for conveying profound or complex messages.

>>>Related Resource: Get your business in front of customers first.

3. Help Sales Win More Deals

Marketing teams are all too familiar with last-minute, one-off design requests from sales reps who have a big meeting with a hot prospect.

A marketing portal allows enterprise marketing teams to house pre-approved, up-to-date, and ready-to-send marketing collateral in an easy-to-use web-based platform that’s accessible 24/7.

For example, after a sales rep meets with a prospect and learns more about their challenges, they can log into the portal to order, personalize and mail hyper-targeted marketing materials directly to the prospect, such as:

• A personalized letter thanking the prospect for their time.
• Brochures and sales collateral with images, messages and offers that address the specific needs and pain points of the prospect.

In addition to customized marketing materials, sales reps can also include pre-printed collateral, information kits, and promotional materials in the shipment, as well.

Don’t worry, enterprise marketing teams have full control of who can access the portal, what they can order, how much they can order, and what each user can and can’t customize. For additional control, marketing teams can adjust settings within the portal to require approvals for some or all users.

>>>Related Resource: What is a marketing portal?

Enterprise Direct Mail Marketing with Jet Mail

Since 1993, Jet Mail has specialized in providing fast, personalized and effective marketing fulfillment solutions. Our extensive list of in-house print, mail, fulfillment and shipping capabilities allows us to create customized solutions to meet the needs of enterprise businesses across the country.

Ready to add direct mail to your enterprise marketing strategy? Contact our team of marketing fulfillment experts today.