directmaildoneright

How to lose 800,000 customers in 3 months.

2011-10-29T07:10:00.000-07:00

Want to know? Ask Reed Hastings, President and CEO of Netflix. In the third quarter of this year, the mass defection by 800,000 customers caused a 30% decrease in stock value despite increased revenue compared to the same quarter a year ago. Pretty serious numbers any way you slice it.

Hastings openly admits it was a disaster of his own making. First, he ordered a 60% subscription increase (from $10 per month to $16 per month) — a big pill to swallow. Then, almost immediately, he announced that Netflix would be divided into two companies. Qwikster would continue the mailed DVD business and NETFLIX would concentrate on providing streaming content on line.

He made two serious mistakes: First, not knowing that his customers did not want to deal with two separate companies for their entertainment and second, realizing that a price increase of such magnitude would be identified as out the question before it was rolled out.

What does that have to do with direct marketing or mailing? Nothing. But it does have everything to do with the importance of listening to and understanding your market.

Business types, like me, are always looking for ways to enhance the client experience and expand our product or service lines. To those ends, the listening part is the most important. Be quiet and listen to what your customers are saying by the way they are using your service or buying your products.

Our egos can lead us to make some very poor decisions. In the Hastings case, his hubris about knowing what was best lead to a huge downturn for his company that had been growing at a fantastic rate.

In retrospect, he learned that his customers loved their DVDs even if they didn’t watch them until they collected dust. Or, in fact, even if they were downloading movies or other content, they actually were comforted by having the physical disc in their possession. He also did not understand that NETFLIX subscribers enjoyed the task of returning the watched DVD and anticipating the arrival of their next selection.

What does that have to do with direct marketing or mailing? Again, nothing. But it does have to do with the human dimension. Granted we are talking about a very large company employing some very smart people and paying them handsomely for their expertise. They should have known better. One has to imagine that Hastings is a powerful personality, and his vision (right or wrong) was the prevailing one within the company. His “knowledge” of what was right had probably been challenged, but less than effectively, and he made the decisions that made sense to him.

So what am I trying to say in this limited space is be patient, be calm, listen to all the data, listen to the important people around you, but most of all listen to what your customers are telling you. If necessary, run your ideas past a core group, which should include actual customers or clients. Round out your opinion with a reality check.

Leave your ego at the door, keep your customers and your money.

Shhhhhhhhhhhh, I’m listening.

Been Around Awhile 2

2011-08-16T00:35:00.000-07:00

Big day here at the job. Newsday, Long Island's main newspaper published their profile of the company AND posted a video. Absolutely exciting to have this kind of coverage.

The phone rang all day with kidding and congratualtions from clients, friends and colleagues.

Once again, the proof is in the pudding..... Show up everyday, work hard and success is always possible.

Thanks to all... family, staff, clients and customers.

Been Around awhile

2011-08-03T12:51:00.000-07:00

The new suit was all pressed, the haircut just right, shoes shined and I was looking good. At least from the inside out I was 35 or 40 again and ready to handle whatever came my way. Unfortunately the mirror told the truth. Salt and pepper hair, a mustache that is probably a little too gray, tending to white. Plenty of sags and wrinkles in the face and elsewhere. But I was still ready.

Being around as long as I have does have certain perks. Along the way I have met more people then I can count who have one way or another become familiar with me, and I with them, to have name and face recognition. One of those is a reporter for Newsday, THE newspaper here on Long Islnad. I have know her for well over 10 years and we always converse at the various trade shows and networking meetings where our paths cross. The meetings are always genuinely pleasant with catching up and discussing the world of business. I have been called on by her many times to comment on stories and topics she is writing that have a business, direct mail or marketing slant. This instance started that way. A question regarding how businesses could still utilize the mail and save money.

Pretty great that only days before the USPS had instituted Every Door Direct Mail allowing mailers to forego addressing for upto 5,000 pieces delivered to a local Post Office for distrubtion to specific Career Routes in that zipcode. And the kicker, postage was only 14.2 cents. Quite frankly a very real savings for mailers that have to reach a concentrated locale.

I answered the few questions the reporter had and was then asked if she could use me and my companies for a full blown profile in the business section. Of course I answered in the affirmative. This is huge coverage in our market and it was FREE. This type of coverage couldn't be bought. We set the schedule for the lenghty interview and the following days' photo session.

During the interview I found myself talking about the exciting ride it has been. Taking a very small store front mailing operation through lots of different levels and changes to where it is one of the better known direct mail companies on Long Island. We talked about the "3's" and "D's" of the old days of sorting of mail using colored stickers on the bundles. We talked about the technology that is now required to stay current in the printing and mailing business. We talked about my history before getting into mailing - a career in the NYCPD, retiring after being awarded the Medal of Honor, followed by a stint in start a up Proxy mailing company owned by my brother. Mostly we talked about what it had taken to still be here, not withstanding that the company was in a growth mode once again.

For two hours she questioned and I talked. I don't know what the article or I will look or sound like in the newspaper but I do know that it has been quite a ride.

I could have done none of this without the support of my family, who are intergral parts of the company. God surely smiled on us.

Learn this everyone, show up everyday, work hard, care about your customers and you can't help but succeed.

facebook is in the house.

2011-06-01T07:07:00.000-07:00

A few short days ago I was riding high with the Google direct mail effort that reached my desk. So how come I am higher still today?……….....facebook

That’s right, facebook has dropped a direct mail marketing piece very similar to one from Google. In fact the presentations are very similar a #10 window envelope with a Standard indicia and a flyer carrying the offer.

I am sure you know the line about kicking a dead horse….. so I won’t belabor my previous comments about the DM horse being very much alive.

Suffice it to say, if the Google use of DM was unimpressive to any of you the addition of facebook to the mix sure ought to be. Lesson learned, case closed. Direct Mail is very very much alive.

Can Linkedin be next?

Google DM Offer Arrives

2011-05-12T12:21:00.000-07:00

Well, well, well. Vindication has never been so sweet. I have been preaching to the masses, to printers, designers, agency types, marketers in general and of course mailers, that direct mail was not dead. I could have just saved my breath and waited until today to be proved right. And right in a big way I might add.

Today's mail, yes, the US MAIL. Snail mail. Delivered by the faithful, if sometimes hapless US Postal Service. Right into my office. WHAT, you ask............ A big fat direct mail offer from none other than GOOGLE..............

So very reminscent of the old days when AOL kept rolling out it's Free miinutes offer what seemed every five days.

Can it be that all things old are new again. I think not, but I do think that corporate giants such as Google realize that they cannot reach everyone electronically, even with the size of their customer base. They knew that they had to reach out in a tangible way to business owners to drive them to the Google AdWords Offer.

We can all take a lesson and a little solice from today's mail and know that what I have been saying all along is correct. Direct Mail IS NOT, nor will it be anytime soon, DEAD.

What Five Day Delivery Means to You.

2010-05-03T13:58:00.000-07:00

Well, it seems that the US Postmaster if moving forward with the cost savings and containment plan that includes the end of Saturday mail delivery. If Congress does not interfere, the following explains what to expect upon implementation.

Why is five-day delivery needed?
The Postal Service is facing unprecedented volume declines and a projected $238 billion shortfall during the next decade. To ensure that America continues to have a viable Postal Service, the Postmaster General has introduced a comprehensive plan including cost cutting, increased productivity and seven legislative and regulatory changes that form the necessary foundation for a leaner, more flexible Postal Service
Five-day delivery is one of the fundamental changes that will help USPS compete more effectively in the marketplace and better respond to changing customer needs.

How will five-day delivery work?
Simply put, our five-day delivery plan calls for five days of delivery to street addresses and six days of service at Post Offices and P.O. Boxes.
Under five-day delivery, there will no longer be delivery of mail to street addresses — residences or businesses — on Saturday. Post Offices will remain open on Saturdays, continuing to provide normal customer services, including the sale of stamps and other postal products. Mail addressed to P.O. Boxes will continue to be available Saturday.

What will change?
 There will be no regular Saturday mail delivery to street addresses.
 Priority Mail for street addresses will be delivered Monday through Friday.
 There will be no scheduled collection of mail from blue collection boxes or retail offices on Saturday. Mail accepted across a retail counter will be processed on Monday.
 Street-addressed local firm holdout mail will be available for pickup Monday through Friday, but not Saturday.

What will stay the same?
 Express Mail will be delivered seven days a week, 365 days a year. Express Mail will be collected from dedicated Express Mail boxes on Saturday. Express Mail will continue to be processed on the day it is accepted, including Saturday and Sunday.
 Post Offices will remain open on Saturday. No Post Office will be closed as a result of the change to five-day delivery.
 P.O. Box-addressed mail will be delivered Saturday.
 Remittance mail addressed to P.O. boxes will be available for pickup seven days a week.
 Mailers can still drop-ship enter destinating or incoming mail at plants and delivery units.
 Service standard rules will remain the same.

When will five-day delivery happen?
The Postal Service must file a request for a non-binding advisory opinion from the Postal Regulatory Commission. If Congress does not enact legislation barring it from doing so, the Postal Service plans to implement five-day delivery in fiscal year 2011 (Oct. 1, 2010, to Sept. 30, 2011). More information on when five-day delivery will be implemented will be provided well in advance of the start of five-day delivery.
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Check back and as new developments occur I will spread the word. Thanks for stopping by.

It's All in the Mix

2010-03-02T09:10:00.000-08:00

Hoping to find the silver bullet that would spell marketing success with one shot is like investing in the Lotto retirement plan. Most likely, neither will happen.
The new routes to customers via the internet with its e-mail blast engines, blogs, Facebook, Twitter, Linkedin and other social networking sites are currently driving the communications revolution. Each new channel attracts an army of proponents who sing its praises, exalting the “new reach.” Early jumpers, who over rate the value of these new vehicles, soon realize that they might have been a tad too hasty in casting aside the some of the more traditional techniques that have always worked.

While digital marketing is certainly an incredibly powerful selling tool, it is not the only — or even the best — approach for every audience or business. The are many demographic groups, and they all respond differently to the diverse forms of marketing. The willingness to embrace digital channels is a positive, forward thinking approach to selling, but it shouldn’t happen in a vacuum or to the detriment of other proven techniques. Truly, for the best results, it’s all in the mix.

A recent Wall Street Journal (WSJ) article chronicled several businesses that had made the leap to e-commerce and abandoned their traditional direct mail efforts. Each reported a negative effect on overall sales. One comment attributed to Alicia Settle, President of Per Annun, Inc., in New York says it all: “We realized we had made a huge mistake.” She quickly sent a direct mail “reminder,” which recouped the 25% loss the company had incurred.

The article also quotes Professor Eric Anderson of Northwestern University’s Kellogg School of Management: “The introduction of new media has forced [business owners] to go back and revisit the whole playbook on what’s the best way to communicate with customers.”

The strongest statistics point to the fact that a combination of direct mail and digital activity demonstrates the need to embrace a wide array of marketing channels:
• A consumer study by England’s Royal Mail revealed that 55% of web users prefer to be contacted by a combination of direct and digital mail. Nearly two thirds of those surveyed said they often ignored emails due to the huge amount of spam, and over half believed that direct mail creates a more professional impression. Most important, 84% said there’s a place for both media in today’s marketing environment.
• A Household Diary Study showed that 82% of direct mail recipients “do read or scan” their direct mail, while the average click and open rate is about 5%.
• Six in 10 agreed that they would prefer a company to approach them first by mail rather than email.
• Eight in 10 believed that email is best for communicating brief messages, while 66% preferred to receive detailed information by direct mail.

Take a look at these comments recently posted on blog.nextmark.com. They certainly underscore the statistics:
“I personally never used to pay much attention to direct mail offers, but with the proliferation of email marketing, my attitude has changed and I’ve responded to a few postal offers this year.” –Jeff Veesenmeyer, December 17, 2009
“I LIVE on my computer 8-10 hours/day…I now look forward to mail delivery (again) and opening traditional envelopes and reading traditional postcards. Beyond the visual impact — it’s tactile and it’s (now) DIFFERENT! … I own a business that needs to make decisions on which medium to use, and based on this personal experience, I continue to use at least color postcard mailings in my mix…backed up by a duplicate digital mailing.” – Chris DeMartine, December 17, 2009.
“Many people get loads of unsolicited email messages…I usually delete 95% of them without reading…Direct mail is much less threatening and can lay on the kitchen counter for days, but eventually it gets opened.” – Jane, December 18, 2009.
William Kapas, President of J.C. Kapas Real Estate Co, Rochelle Park, New Jersey, quoted in the WSJ article says, “I think it’s easier to delete the electronic junk mail without taking a second look.”
So, what’s the answer to successful marketing? There is no one answer. Understand who your customers are, recognize the specific and different benefits of online, email and direct mail, and mix it up.

Tough Times call for Smart Marketing

2010-01-19T13:57:00.000-08:00

How your business reacts to the “great recession” makes all the difference between failing and thriving. Creative entrepreneurs do not simply curl up, hunker down and wait until an economic downturn passes. They use the slowdown to market smarter, regarding tight circumstances as an opportunity to out-think competitors and turn adversity into advantage. In fact, genius marketer Sam Walton — founder of Wal-Mart — believed that when times are good, you should market your products and services, and when times are bad, you must market them.
Historically, companies maintaining or increasing marketing efforts through troubled times increase sales and market share during and after the slowdown. What’s more, businesses that regard marketing costs as investments rather than expenses enjoy higher long-term dividends.
Although everyone seems focused on cost when business slows, value should be your real concern. Because tough times mean restricted budgets, it is important to explore creative ways to make marketing more cost-effective. Direct mail continues to be the workhorse that drives many marketing programs, including today’s multi-channel campaigns.

Use of direct mail in today’s marketplace will be more effective if you incorporate some of the following ideas:
Create targeted campaigns. Focus on your audience. Aim only at prospects with the highest potential. It is more effective to send frequent, smaller mailings to qualified prospects than it is to send one large mailing to unqualified customers. By capturing data more agressively, you can pinpoint recipients based on any of the elements in your database. Some obvious and valuable data to have on hand include: “customer since,” “last purchase date,” “last item purchased,” “responded to XXXX promotion,” and any other demographic information that can enhance your list-building efforts.
Sharpen your copy. Distill your message into essential copy points that best convey your product/service and offer. Remember to stress benefits, not features. A cold beer is refreshing (benefit). It comes in handy 12 ounce cans (feature).
Evaluate design. Take a hard look at whether or not you really need to send a package or an envelope with an insert. Use of envelopes is not always necessary. Investigate the possibility of doing a self-mailer or even a card. Self-mailers and cards get into readers’ hands immediately. With self-mailers, you do not need to worry about how to get them to open an envelope.
Assess printing. Do you really need a full-color piece? Less colors when used creatively, can produce an upscale look. Sometimes, you can even get away with printing an attractive piece that does the job in one color. Just make sure that the text, look and the offer work well together.
Save on lettershop services. By simplifying your mail piece, you can reduce production time and labor costs in the mailhouse. Consult before you commit.
Investigate the possibility of postage savings. Again, consulting with your mailer can produce significant savings. Maximizing postal discounts could be very beneficial to your budget.

Remember, companies that remain aggressive during a downturn seize market share from their more timid competitors. And when competitors cut back, marketing efforts by companies that ride the downturn appear even more outstanding. Additionally, more active enterprises project corporate confidence, strength and stability. If a company’s market presence diminishes, so goes the number of its customers, and everyone knows that the cost of regaining lost ground is much higher than the amount saved by slashing the marketing budget.
Smart business people regard hard times as a challenge and an opportunity to increase customer loyalty, solidify market share and even attract new customers. You can meet the challenge by using direct mail — a time-tested marketing approach that could improve your bottom line while your competitors continue to do little but curl up, hunker down and worry about what is coming down the pike.

Can the USPS regulate itself into good health?

2009-08-17T09:43:00.000-07:00

The Domestic Mail Manual is the USPS bible. Once upon a time, it was written in “postalese,” understood by only a handful of postal career types. Today, it’s written in English, but it’s still tedious to digest. The real issue is that the rules keep changing —and not to the end users’ benefit. Three of the latest changes necessitate graphic redesigns, technology upgrades and production line reconfiguration — more about those later.

Any company or organization that must deal with a regulatory agency understands the economic impact of massive rule changes. First, someone needs to fully understand and grasp the new rules. Second, a corporate response strategy must be researched, and clients need to be educated and brought up to speed about how the changes will affect them and any modifications they must make. Third, all additional costs must be analyzed and planned for going forward. The questions that usually follow rule changes are: Can we absorb the extra costs? How much will these changes delay the process? Will our customers stand for us passing along some, or all, of the extra costs? OK, this seems like fairly normal business thinking, but not as far as the postal mindset is concerned.

The powers that be at the USPS seem to have their own unique sense of logic, which is, at best, illogical. Here’s how they think: “The economy is bad, so let’s raise our postage rates…Our sorting machines can’t sort the mail fast enough, so let’s force our clients to produce only mail that we can run faster…Our letter carriers must have everything facing the same direction, so let’s make our customers redesign their catalogs to accommodate our carriers…We haven’t figured out how to keep track of our mail, so let’s create a whole new system and force everyone to use it.”

Even a novice business person can recognize that this way of thinking is a prescription for failure. In case you haven’t noticed, the USPS is controlled by executives who clearly don’t get it. When the government made the USPS a “quasi” agency, they were told to become profitable — or at least make themselves self supporting. How in good faith could that ever possibly happen when they can’t do business without the approval of Congress?

The USPS cannot operate effectively in both the governmental and private sectors simultaneously because whenever it suits them, the federal government can manipulate the business dealings of the USPS through the Postal Rate Commission. For example, the USPS is the only agency, “quasi” or not, that is required to prepay retirement benefits for its employees. Return that money to the bottom line and, voila, the financial picture of the USPS changes for the better. The following is from the August 6, 2009 testimony of David C. Williams, Inspector General, United States Postal Service before Congress: “The first 6 months of this year’s payment to the Postal Service Retiree Health Benefits Fund was $2.7 billion. If not for this payment, the Postal Service would have made $400 million instead of losing $2.3 billion in the first half of 2009”. Legislation is now moving slowly through Congress that would at least give the USPS partial relief from the payment.

We all understand the universal delivery mandate that the Post Office has: If it has an address, the mail piece gets delivered to it – period. But, delivery to some of those addresses is far more costly than it is to others for a host of reasons. Should there be a premium for those deliveries, similar to the UPS’ up charge for residential addresses as opposed to commercial or business addresses? The financial condition of the Post Office has prompted the Postmaster General to ask Congress to eliminate one of the six delivery days. This would be a no-brainer in corporate America, but so far, Congress refused to comply with the request — truly a prime example of the government’s inability to run a business.

Back to the changes I mentioned at the start. They:

1) The new “Flats” Addressing Standards, which impact catalogs, magazines and newsletters larger than lettersize mail (your typical 8.5 x 11 multi-page mailers). To facilitate mail dissemination to individual letter carriers in walk route sequence, the USPS now mandates that “flats” must be intermingled with the rest of the day’s mail in what is known as “Delivery Sequence.” This means that all addressing must now be in the top half of the publication/mailer. Simply put, if you hold the piece with the closed spine to the right, the address must be within the top half. It can be printed horizontally, vertically or parallel (everything except upside down).

2) Self-mailing multi-page booklets that otherwise fall into the “lettersize” postal rates now require THREE 1 ½” non-perforated wafer seals – TWO on the leading edge and ONE on the trailing edge. This change creates one or two production scenarios: Multiple passes through tabbing and addressing equipment or the purchase of newly developed equipment designed especially to accommodate this change at the cost of thousands of dollars. And just to make the changes more onerous, they won’t permit the use of perforated tabs for easy opening. The new configuration and tabs will certainly cause the mail piece to tear… BUT the USPS will be able to run their sorting machines faster.

3) The Intelligent Mail Barcode will replace the now-familiar PostNet barcode. PostNet barcoding was implemented over 10 years ago to allow for the automation of mail sorting down to the carrier route walk sequence level. As we all know, it revolutionized the entire mailing industry. It allowed substantial postage discounting for mailers using barcodes in sorted order because it enabled the Post Office to work less and therefore save expenses. The discounts were based upon the depth of the work done by the mailer before the mail was given to the Post Office. The Intelligent Mail Barcode (IMB) goes even further. In an attempt to reduce paperwork and track productivity, the USPS has created a new technology that allows it to conduct mail sorting and delivery more electronically. The IMB will require extensive additional technology and processing by professional mailers and other postal customers to achieve any of the postage discounts.

These three changes are all geared to meeting USPS needs, but they ignore the needs of mail producers. A case can be made that the USPS is trying to mandate itself into better productivity at the cost of forcing mailers to seek other ways to communicate. In 2009, electronic communication alternatives have already substantially decreased the amount of mail that the Post Office handles. When you couple this volume decline with increased costs, the Postal Rate Commission must raise postage rates. But, each rate increase further erodes mail volume. It’s a never-ending cycle.

So…to answer my lead question: Can the USPS regulate itself into good health? The answer is a clear and resounding NO!

Is there a light at the end of the tunnel?

2009-07-29T12:46:00.000-07:00

As the summer doldrums wear on I am getting the sense of a slight rebound in direct mailing activity.

In my own shop and in conversations with contemporaries and affiliated companies the numbers are still abysmal, production is down everywhere with a capital “E”. However, the fall season is starting to take shape nicely. RFP’s are up again. Production schedules are filling in. Employees are busy producing. The question is at what level? The second question is “Will there be a profit?” Answers will only be realized after the fact of course. For now, let optimism reign.

The stock market has made back almost half of its’ precipitous decline. The mood of the consumers, thank God, is not as bleak. The government is messing with things it shouldn’t, but slowly the people are voicing their objections to some of the more objectionable intercessions. America is nothing if not resilient and forceful. Our strength of will, courage and determination is what keeps us all going in spite of exterior situations and conditions. Sometimes we appear to be fool hardy, not giving enough gravitas to those conditions and proceed anyhow. That, folks is what make this country one of risk takers who have always driven the US of A to the top of everything.

Enough philosophizing.

All my reading and research support my previous position – that direct mail is not dead.
The predicted direct mail spending declines of over 30% are more in the 10 to 15% range. Of course that is not good, but it is far from bleak especially when held up against the condition of the economy.

Multi-Channel is now the talk of marketers. The mixing of all available media in any given effort. Traditional (TV, Radio, Print, Direct Mail) and New Media (Internet , e-mail, Social Networking, Mobile Apps). The allocation of resources proportionately based upon the effort. As a driver and support mechanism direct mail still is a work horse and by consensus of the professionals I have been following one that almost cannot be eliminated. In this strategy direct mail still plays a pivotal role in many campaign successes. A place for everything and everything in its’ place.

Non-Profit organizations are realizing that their knee jerk reaction of trashing their direct mail fund raising was of course not wise. They jumped to online with gusto and reaped the quick additional donations. A good thing for them. Subsequently they are also realizing that online donors will only go so far. Online donors are harder to renew, harder to enlist in the overall mission of the Not for Profit and absolutely harder to make part of the ‘family’. An important point, that senior development office fund raisers have been raising with their executive directors and boards, is that once they lose the momentum of their direct mail efforts it will be very costly to regain, if at all. They are pushing to “stay the course, keep doing what works”. Again, a real world view of the role of direct mail in a significant industry.

Commercial communicators, as in the past, have digested the annual postal increases and rule changes and come out with their revised budgets and plans. Many are redesigning a more economical delivery package to mitigate the USPS bump up in postage. Lists are being scrubbed and segmented at a much higher level then ever before. Because none of us perform in a vacuum it is always about change and the direct mail industry has always been extremely good at that. As production technologies continue to make new and interesting modalities available you can bet that direct mail efforts although less by volume will be more in terms of effectiveness. That is a good thing.

Since the turn of the year 2009 was in a ‘sky is falling’ mode and many companies were hunkering down and just trying to hold on. With fall just around the corner it seems that the clouds are just starting to break, even if it is only a little, and that of course is a great thing.

The reports of my death have been greatly exaggerated.

2009-07-01T10:58:00.000-07:00

The title paraphrases Mark Twain writing to his cousin, James Ross Clemens, and setting the record straight that he was not, in fact, dead.

Direct Mail is not dead either. Quite the opposite is true. It’s alive and well (well maybe not well, but not hospitalized).

All the buzz is about the new social media — Facebook, Twitter, Linkedin and whatever is coming online in the next five minutes. The early money is heavily betting that these will be the future of communication as the younger (20-30 something set) grows into its own. Surely some aspect of the next generation being skewed to the electronic world is true, however absolutes are dangerous.

Just as no one would say that television is dying, they also recognize that it is changing — and dramatically is some cases. With the advent of reality shows like American Idol or Big Brother or The Housewives of New Jersey, how could anyone say TV is not reinventing itself? And with the increasing popularity of cable news outlets, the broadcast networks are scrambling to hold onto what market share they still have.

So it is all about change…good and bad. Direct mail, always the mainstay of marketers and fund raisers, is also changing. The changes are political, economic and pragmatic.

With the “greening” of America, the DM industry has stood up and taken notice, and a massive effort to correct many misconceptions about the industry is underway. Mail Moves America has some wonderful talking points on its website http://www.mailmovesamerica.org/ about the importance of mail on main street, and The Printing Industry of America is actively lobbying against many of the Do Not Mail bills being promoted in various state legislatures.

Mailing industry executives are joining the fight to spread credible information that corrects much of the unchallenged positions fostered by organizations and individuals who don’t know the first thing about the relationship of mail to our forests. They claim the direct mail industry is devastating the forests, and nothing could be further from the truth. Paper companies are great stewards of forest land. In fact, some 53 million acres are maintained and perpetuated for the sole purpose of growing trees for paper products (not just paper for mail). Another popular misconception is that discarded mail is clogging our landfills. Again, not true. Waste from mail accounts for less than 2.5% of America’s dumps.

As costs continue to rise, the volume of direct mail will naturally be affected. When held up against the relative expense of certain online efforts, direct mail seems entirely too costly. The USPS is suffering from mandated federal retiree funding that is keeping them from establishing a sound business plan capable of generating a profit. This forces them to continually hike postage rates. The USPS upper management is operations oriented, so it keeps tweaking the mailing rules and populating their system with the best types of mail for their machines, not necessarily what their clients (the mailing industry) would prefer to mail. This also has an effect on volume because production becomes too costly when married to the ever-rising postage rates. So, the current postal environment is having a great impact on the direct mail industry. Quite frankly, the USPS is in a no-win spiral: Increase rates, change the rules, lose volume, increase rates again, lose more volume, etc., etc.

From the practical side, the direct mail industry has stepped up its use of very targeted, drastically improved technology. It has made “segmentation” and “personalization” the real watchwords of any marketer worth their salt. The goal has become smaller numbers out the door, greater response by percentage. The old bulldozer approach of direct mail marketing has been replaced by a sniper’s mentality. No one wants to send anything to anyone who is — or should not be — interested.

Direct Mail will change. What will not change is its role of supporting marketing efforts, including those of all the other media — radio, television, print and, yes, even online.

The world is never “either-or”. Reality is always somewhere in the middle. There will always be those who still want to go to their mailbox everyday with anticipation of what it might hold for them. Direct Mail is not dead, it is just morphing into its next persona.

Economic Importance of Advertising Mail

2009-05-26T05:12:00.000-07:00

Since the economy has taken a nose dive, I have been distracted by the necessary adjustments that had to be made around here to keep the company moving forward. Now that those are in place — for better or worse — I’m once again thinking that the following facts cannot be overstated.

The direct mail and printing industries are such huge segments of the marketplace that further erosion will be detrimental to the good of the country as a whole. The following is from Mail Moves America Organization website.

Advertising mail is critical for small businesses. More than 300,000 American small businesses rely on advertising mail to reach consumers in their neighborhood. These are your local mom and pop shops, your neighborhood florist, and the small coffee shop on the corner.

Advertising mail is the most affordable, effective advertising tool for these small businesses.

Advertising mail spurs economic growth. Last year, advertising mail
contributed more than $702 billion in increased sales to the U.S. economy.

Advertising mail creates jobs. More than 3.5 million Americans have jobs that directly or indirectly depend on advertising mail.

Advertising mail is effective. More than 8 out of 10 households read or scan the advertising mail they receive.

Advertising mail is convenient. Individuals can look through their advertising mail at their leisure.

Advertising mail is environmentally responsible. Nearly all paper used for advertising mail is generated from sustainably managed forests where trees are planted, harvested and then re-planted. In fact, the forestry industry plants more than 1.7 million new trees each day – that’s 620 million trees every year.

Advertising mail is recyclable. According to the EPA, annual recycling rates for advertising mail have increased seven-fold since 1990, and those rates continue to climb.

Advertising mail makes it easier for consumers to shop from home, which means fewer traffic jams, headaches, wild goose chases and wasted time and gas. Here’s a way to cut our carbon footprint – if we all replaced just two trips to the mall each year by shopping with a catalog or direct mail, we would:
--Cut traffic and car time by 3.3 billion miles.
--Cut automobile pollution and carbon dioxide emission by more than 3 billion pounds.
--Save more than $325 million on gasoline alone.

The Printing Industries Alliance has taken a leadership role in telling the truth about the potential impact if the “Do Not Mail” drive actually gets traction in the state and federal bodies considering it. Make no mistake, the result of any “Do Not Mail” legislation will be disastrous to the U.S. economy. Visit their website, educate yourself and then become the loyal opposition.

Survey Results - Should USPS eliminate one delivery day?

2009-03-31T05:02:00.000-07:00

On March 25, 2009 the US Postmaster General John E. Potter, went before Congress to outline the dire fiscal condition of the US Postal Service. He indicated that the situation was so dramatic that the USPS would run out of money in the foreseeable future. In his address he proposed that Congress allow the elimination of one mail delivery day. Currently mandated to deliver six days a week the Postmaster asked that mail only be delivered on five days.

We thought the topic so important that we surveyed the 4,065 subscribers to our MAILWAYS newsletter. Our recent e-blast survey was opened by 599 recipients, with 122 clicking through. Of those, 81 completed the survey.

They were asked if they had any knowledge of the USPS requesting the elimination of one delivery day because of its current dire financial condition. Subsequently, they were asked to identify the typical size and focus of their mailing campaigns. Respondents were a mix of companies and organizations that indicated they used the mail to reach their audience, with the largest group reporting that they sold or marketed through the mail.

Overall, respondents’ average mailings were in the 2,500 to 5,000 range, with 25% indicating they mailed over 5,000 pieces in their direct mail efforts.

By a large margin (about 85%), they said Saturday delivery should be eliminated in an effort to help the USPS financial crisis; 15% said that some other weekday should be eliminated, and about half of those had no preference.

Of the respondents who indicated that they thought the elimination of one delivery day was the most effective way for the USPS to cut costs, over 54% were companies that used the mail as Sales/Marketing tools.

Smaller mailers saw little or no impact on the use of mail as an effective tool to reach their audience (67.5% to 30%). Larger mailers, however, had the opposite point of view, stating by 62% to 33% that the mail would lose at least some of its impact as a communication tool if a delivery day was eliminated.

The companies mailing over 10,000 pieces per effort were equally divided regarding losing one delivery day being the most effective cost savings effort the USPS could take at this time.

A final question asked to gauge the overall impact such a change would have on the postal service. Ranging from Very Significant to No Impact at All, the responses were exactly Neutral in their opinion with 41.8 %, Very Significant or Significant (36.4%) Not Significant or No Impact At All. Average weighted opinion of the respondents was well within Neutral range.

The responses led us to believe that losing one delivery day would not be traumatic to the business community and that Saturday delivery was overwhelmingly deemed the prime candidate to be cut. Although there are those who are more cautious and believe that other avenues may produce more fruit in helping the Postal Service reorder their financial house without such a huge cut in service. However, even these would appear to still believe that mail is, and will continue to be, a powerful tool in their efforts to reach specific audiences. It did not appear that any one segment of those surveyed would be ready to abandon their use of the mail.

Do Not Mail Legislation - How Bad is it?

2009-03-10T09:22:00.000-07:00

How bad is the DO NOT MAIL movement?

If the troubled economy is not bad enough the individual state governments are collectively determined to make it worse. Once again this year several state legislatures have proposed DO NOT MAIL legislation aimed at curtailing advertising mail to individuals.

Allow me to debunk at least some of the claims presented as the rationale for these potentially disastrous new laws.

First, the “Save Our Forests” claim that direct mail results in the devastation of America’s precious timberlands. In fact there is 12 million more acres of forestland today then 20 years ago, but don’t take my word for it, this comes from the U.S. Forest Service. The Society of American Foresters reports that the annual net growth of U.S. forests is 36 % higher than the annual volume of trees removed. To supplement the abundance of timber available for paper production the level of recycle activity has also increased to a point where 53.4% of paper products ARE recycled, that is not my number but the U.S Environmental Protection Agency (EPA). So those postcards, self mailers, catalogs and letters are doing nothing to damage the forests or the environment. By the way, as far as the landfills are concerned the EPA says that direct mail accounts for a mere 2.4% in weight of the total municipal solid waste generated annually.

The “annoyance” dodge. Of course the claim here is that direct mail is intrusive. Personally I say get a life, but professionally I understand the folly of my opinion. Thankfully, the mailing industry identified years ago that it did not want to be identified with or suffer the same fate as the now mostly defunct telephone marketers. A self initiated and self financed registry of folks that wanted to limit their exposure to unsolicited direct mail was created. Administered by the Direct Marketing Association (DMA) the registry is made available to member data and list managers who are required to remove those people from their mailing lists. So with one action, registering your wish to be removed from such lists, individuals can significantly reduce the amount of unsolicited mail they receive.

And what about the “privacy” issue. Do people wish to remain anonymous? Surely it sounds that way. Once again, my personal opinion is at odds with my profession. If you don’t want anyone to know anything about you then always pay in cash, never answer a survey question, never register for anything, never use your correct address, or name for that matter and the world will pass you by. We live in an information age and as such data has become a valuable commodity. Think about it, direct mail is no longer about casting a broad net and seeing what you can catch in terms of sales and purchases. Rather, it is all about refining the data, knowing various criteria about individuals that allow in narrowing of the approach in terms of numbers and the increasing of the relevancy of the offers and approaches that are made. Here you should read, better data means less mail. Better data means more effectiveness from less pieces.

So what is the ‘bad’ side of the Do Not Mail legistation. “A Do Not Mail registry would attempt to solve a problem that does not exist and would have devastating consequences for every home, community, business that relies upon our Postal Service” said United States Senator Susan Collins. Why, especially in today’s fiscal climate, would our elected representatives want to seriously impact the 3.5 million Americans who have jobs directly or indirectly supported by advertising mail. The direct mail advertising industry generates $686 billion in sales, 300,000 businesses use direct mail to reach potential customers. A Do Not Mail registry would cost the US Postal Service between $4 and $10 billion annually. This lost revenue would have to be made up by seriously increased postage rates and service cutbacks that would affect each and every American.

Like so much that happens in our hallowed halls of government the Do Not Mail registry is ill conceived, unnecessary and potentially harmful to a broader segment of the population than it would ever shield from a piece of mail. Contact your representatives and tell them to vote against any Do Not Mail legislation.

Let's Up the Ante---- AGAIN

2009-02-18T08:43:00.000-08:00

Here we go again. The annual request for an increase in US postage has gone to the Postal Rate Commission. The most significant increase, as always, is in the price of a First Class stamp, which this time is slated to rise 3.7% to 44 cents.

I understand that expenses increase in every business, and adjustments must be made to keep the business healthy, BUT the USPS has its head in the sand and will never survive until it changes its business model.

The Postmaster General went before Congress recently to bemoan the fact that America is mailing less. DUH!! Over the past 15 years, many alternatives to mailings have been created to improve communications and direct marketing, and everyday more and more interesting, fun and easy means of conducting business are becoming available to anyone with a computer or cell phone. Also contributing to the drop in mail volume is what seems to be the USPS’s perpetual need to raise rates and implement rule changes that make commercial mail more difficult and expensive to produce. DUH, again.

The current debacle is not entirely the fault of the Postmaster General. It is more the fault of government. In fact, a few years ago, the USPS was forced to take on several billion dollars worth of retiree payments and told to make up for the cost by raising rates. If the USPS had not been forced to assume responsibility for these retiree payments, the postal service would be in much better shape today.

I’m in favor of people (and organizations) paying their own bills, but this situation is over the top. When we are talking about spending a very questionable $789 billion in the hope of rescuing our economy, does it really matter that the USPS has to have a 3.7% rate increase. Apparently, the Postmaster General was not connected enough to get a few billion for his operation.

More Rule Changes - PHEW

2009-01-10T03:48:00.000-08:00

I have just scheduled the e-blast of our January 2009 MailWays newsletter, and, already, I have a new development to tell you about.

The US Postal Service is creating controversy in the mailing industry about those little round tabs that hold self-mailers closed.

For years, the USPS has wanted to change the rules governing the preparation of self-mailer mailings. They have allegedly tested different configurations of tabs placed on mail pieces in order to minimize the jamming of their sorting equipment. The bad news is that complying with these new rules will have a serious impact on cost and the time it takes to produce such mailings. The good news — if there is any — is that the entire matter has been published in the Federal Register and is opened to comments from all concerned parties.

The roar is building. Mailing professionals have produced white papers, posted their objections on blogs, submitted comments to the USPS and generally tried to dissuade them from implementing the rule change.

I will keep you posted. If you would like to read the proposed changes, go to the Federal Register , otherwise check back here. As soon as I hear something new, so will you.

So Far So Good

2008-12-08T14:14:00.000-08:00

With the Economic sunami full and scary affect it's a wonder that the entire population has not lost it's collective mind.

Not only have we all been on an emotional roller coaster, but the rhetoric is deafening.

Although economic ups and downs are part of a capitalist society the current situation seems to be new ground. Let's hope that calmer heads, both inside and outside the government prevail, that the ship rights itself in short order and things return to some semblance of normal.

In the meantime, the volume of direct mail seems to me holding for our clients. Those who use the mail to reach their audience are staying the course. Being a little more careful, of course, but still doing what they know works. The fundraisers are sticking to their guns by using time honored methods in the mail, supplementing with "e" fund raising. Our advertisers are making sure their lists are clean and targeted. They are examining their offers to make sure they are sharp and exciting. And our membership organizations continue to send important information to their groups.

Only a little more time will tell how long the status quo will continue. The reports from our clients, although spoken with less than gusto, is that they are going to stick to basics and in their world direct mail works.

So Far So Good

Merry Christmas, Happy Holidays and a blessed New Year to all.

Welcome

2008-10-22T05:18:00.000-07:00

Welcome to our new directmaildoneright.blog. I hope to be able to provide interesting and informative direct mail articles and content relating to the use of direct mail in today's economy.

If you have any questions or comments I would be glad to have your posts. If you are out there on the web and find information that would be interesting to our visitors I would be glad to have your postings.

For over twenty years I have been in the direct mail and lettershop industry. I have seen the good, the bad and the ugly of direct mail and have amassed a considerable amount of information that I would like to pass on to our visitors.

Be patient, I am new at this blogging thing, but I'll catch up as fast as I can so directmaildoneright.blogspot becomes a credible, interesting and informative stop in your busy day. If you need information right away visit our website at www.americanmail.com

Thanks for visiting, have a great day and God Bless you and yours.