Direct Mailing & Newsletter Tips

What is direct mailing? For many, it’s the junk mail that fills their mailbox. Postcards, letters, and brochures for products or services they don’t need…or don’t believe they need. Cost for direct mailing can be very, very low with dismal or wildly successful results. Follow these tips to make sure your DM campaign is the latter.

Target Audience

Don’t start designing your direct mailers or newsletters until you fully understand who your target audience is. This should have been done when you created a business plan, but it may have changed since you first created the plan. Is your target market women or men? Are they parents, grandparents, or childless couples? How old are they? Are they looking for higher quality or lower price? Are they married or single? Are they students or career professionals? What do they enjoy doing? What motivates them?

Rather than throwing out a huge net to the entire population who might buy your product or service, figure out what group or groups of people are most likely to buy it and send your mailer or newsletter only to that group. While grandparents may buy diapers for their grandchildren when they visit, direct mailing and newsletters advertising them should be directed to parents. Keep your net of potential customers tight.

Start Writing

The headline of your direct mailing headline should be short, sweet, and to the point. Above all, though, it needs to be catchy. Go through your own junk mail, which is probably filled with direct mailers, and set aside the ones you are actually interested in reading. What is it about the headlines that intrigue you?

Which newsletters do you read? Why? Make a list of the interesting features of newsletters and mailers you have read and even look forward to receiving. Try to include as many of these as possible in your own direct mailer or newsletter.

Price should be a side note when designing and creating direct mailers and newsletters. While your pitch might include a great price, customers won’t care how cheap they can get your widget if they don’t first believe they need it. Convince them of the need then offer them a great price.

Directives

Once your direct mailer or newsletter recipient has read through your mailing, he or she should have clear, simple instructions on what to do next. Should they call you? Make sure your phone number is correct and very readable. Should they visit your hometown store or website? The address should be written clearly. If you aren’t open 24/7, as a website is, you should list your hours as well.

Your direct mailers should call your customers to action. Tell them why they should act now rather than waiting. Do you have a special deal for a limited time? Do your customers need to purchase your service before the seasons change?

Newsletter Specifics

Use graphics to make your newsletter pop. From special text fonts to make quotes stand out to charts that visually demonstrate the need for a product or service, using graphics not only breaks up a newsletter it also provides eye candy for the reader to remember.

Choose one or two colors rather than full color to save on cost. You can use one color with different tints to present a variety without costing more for another color. Light blue can be made by tinting 100% blue, for example. If you can only afford black and white, remember to incorporate gray and consider shadow-effects for headlines to add dimension.

Direct Mailer Specifics

When designing your direct mailer, consider a postcard. It’s less expensive than a letter to print and send and can include catchy colors and phrases.

Don’t get creative with placement of your address or the recipient’s address. These need to be plain text (Arial, Tahoma or Courier work best) and should be large enough to read without being cramped. Avoid designing a piece with a box for the recipient address to fit in – some addresses will contain super long names and won’t fit easily in a 2 x 3 inch box.

If your mailer is a piece of paper that is sealed or stapled rather than in an envelope, you need to understand the added cost of using seals. These can cost $.02 for each seal used on each piece. 10,000 mailers with 2 seals a piece will end up costing an additional $400.