Direct marketing/mail

Luckily, you are just seconds away from some very smart brand marketing solutions. Click here!

Key points

In the European Union, it is now illegal to send unsolicited e-mails if there is no prior business relationship

There is also a whole industry of companies who will now blacklist you if they think that you are producing unsolicited e-mails (spam).

Having said that, unsolicited e-mail (spam) now accounts for 60% of all e-mail traffic.

In more detail.........

Recent European Union law has now made unsolicited e-mail outside a pre-existing business context illegal. Offenders can be fined significant amounts if, of course, they can be found.

In order to comply with the law, you should always ask people whether they wish to receive information from you by e-mail, and you should avoid using "recommend a friend" functions, if the e-mail will be originated by you.

Unsolicited telesales calls are also illegal in some countries.

Nonethless, direct marketing/mail is also becoming such a popular medium that, in the U.S., households can receive 20-30, or more, catalogs alone per month. In business, a similar number of direct mailshots could easily be received by one individual during the course of a week. Therefore, most of it is either filed without being read in detail, or thrown away.

So, is it worth it if you are going to be ignored by most customers, & alienate much of the rest? Apparently. Buying relationships at a distance are growing, whether via catalogs, the Internet, or telesales. The simple rule of direct marketing/mail is to knock at the door politely & wait to be invited in. Don't put your foot in the door or, worse, attempt to kick it down. People don't like that sort of behaviour.

The other rule is to remember that you are delivering an on-going brand experience, not just making a sale:

• your materials must "live" the brand
• your people must "be" the brand when they are contacted or when they contact the customer (accents/attitude/expressions/humor)
• your logistics must match & exceed expectations, & you must keep customers informed at critical moments in the process (be willing to phone back)
• if anything should go wrong, put it right immediately without quibbling & make amends with the customer
• a relationship at a distance is not as strong or resilient as a close personal one, so look for occasional opportunities to meet the customer in person
• thank the customer for "visiting your shop", whether they buy or not
• treat valuable customers as valuable customers; minimise activities with customers who are not in your focus customer segments - you will waste your resources & build confusion into the brand

Measurement

Direct marketing/mail campaigns are usually rigorously monitored in terms of the customer response:

• asking for more information
• ordering a trial
• buying the product/service

Sophisticated statistical or neural network techniques are used to predict likely customer response to a mailing piece, based on past behavior or customer profile. An accurate prediction of response will significantly reduce the cost of a campaign, or significantly increase its effect in the market place, but this will depend on the richness of the customer profiling data from which the prediction can be drawn.

Luckily, you are just seconds away from some very smart brand marketing solutions. Click here!

For further information, please contact enquiries@mudvalley.co.uk

© 2004, Mud Valley ™ brand marketing community.

Related answers