insights.
Aug 31st
Data rarely gets to be the star of the visual show. It takes people who are both creative and data-savvy to conceptualize how data points can be translated into visual appeal. Today’s marketers are increasingly in-tune to both left-brain and right-brain thinking, which makes this the perfect time to consider what data you have and how you are using it.
I recently wrote a report on using Data-Driven Charts and Graphs that is filled with examples, and also contains guidance on addressing common implementation challenges. This report is my attempt to help agencies and marketers plan how data-driven graphs and charts can be employed to make their direct marketing more relevant, more engaging and ultimately more effective.
You can download the report at www.mailprint.com/charts. I’d be delighted to have your feedback. Please feel free to email me directly at rhondab(at)mailprint(dot)com.
Aug 3rd
Did you know that 25% of the people who never open your emails will be among the top 10% of your customers? – Email Experience Council
In a recent BtoB Magazine Online post Karen Bannan says, “transactional messages can help you reach out to new or current customers to help build brand awareness and even create new sales.” Her article “Tips for Transactional Email” contains a multitude of reminders of how impactful email can be for building customer relationships. It also highlights all the wonderful benefits of relevancy and timeliness when communicating with customers.
With new advances in email and printing automation technology, there are ways to make sure your transactional marketing (transpromo) stays at the top of its game by using a multi-channel approach. Here are a couple of ideas to get you thinking:
It is important to remember that the goal of the utilizing alternate channels is not just to sell more, but to get the customer to engage with the channel that’s right for them. Email Experience Council research states that 85% of the people on your email list will stop reading your emails without unsubscribing after the third message your company sends to them. How are you going to re-engage them?
Derek Harding, CEO of Innovyx, Omnicom Group’s interactive arm states, “If someone has just made a purchase, you absolutely must try and keep that dialogue going.” The way I see it, that means utilizing every channel at your disposal to serve and engage your customer.
A special thanks for Karen Bannan for her thoughtful article on transactional email. You can read it here.
May 18th
Mulling over your B2B lead generation process? Here are six "Ah-ha" moments to consider as you continue to improve your lead gen techniques.
Off. On. Off. On. If only lead generation were a faucet under my control. I am certainly seeing more need in our business and in our clients’ businesses for more leads, but only at specific times. Like most Business-to-Business (B2B) marketers today, my budget is still tight, but loosening up a bit, and I am always focused on the “Cha Ching,” or the ability of lead sources to produce profitable business.
This has made me rethink Mail Print’s lead generation process and I thought I would share my “Ah-ha” moments from the past several weeks:
Landing page forms only work if people give you real information. It’s really hard to communicate with someone named “No Name” at abc@abcdef.com. And, there’s no quicker way to turn off your sales team than to funnel them bogus leads. Make sure you have an automated or human filter in place to weed out invalid leads before they make it into your pipeline.
Lead generation tactics can become ineffective quickly. Always think in terms of what worked before, what is working now, and how many tests need to be in progress to be able to generate leads in the future.
It’s about so much more than just generating leads. Lead generation, lead scoring, lead nurturing and the all important “close” are really one big progression. One break in the process and good leads fall through the cracks and your ROMI (Return on Marketing Investment) declines.
Having the right amount of lead flow is very important to adequately utilize inside sales teams. Unfortunately the amount of leads needed is constantly changing. There must be many levers to push and pull to keep everyone productive.
Email marketing is a fantastic lead nurturing tool, but it is worthless today as a lead generation tool. Need proof? Just try to remember the last time you used your spam folder as a shopping cart.
Packages or lumpy direct mail get past the gatekeeper. Sounds expensive, right? Yes, and that’s why it works. The administrative assistant can’t throw it away, so it ends up on the boss’ desk. For example, a new “heavy” prospecting tool that we created for Mail Print has already returned $10 for every $1 invested and we’ve only sent out 10% of what we have already paid for. Cha ching!
If you would like to see a sample of our “sneak it past the gatekeeper” direct mail piece, email me at rhondab[at]mailprint[dot]com. I’d be happy to share our latest innovation in variable data printing that seems to be confusing the heck out of gatekeepers and connecting us to senior and executive level management.
B2B lead generation is a work in process, literally. Working on both the tactics and the overall process is vital to finding the Cha Ching.
Apr 8th
Searching for the right words to describe the marketing automation, management, or execution systems you're looking for? Maybe we can help.
Marketing Asset Management. Print Automation. Marketing Automation. Communications Portals. Distributed Marketing. Web-To-Print. Confused yet?
Wouldn’t it be nice if everything fit in a nice, neat package that is easy to understand and explain? In the world of marketing communications management, many people would think the above terms all mean the same thing. I actually think they don’t. I think there are so many terms because each means something a little different:
Focuses on creating an online library of digital marketing assets such as logos, templates, stock photography, videos and radio ads for use by centralized marketing staff or a network of remote users.
A term coined to define organizations that have many local markets that are marketed to differently, whether marketing strategy and execution is controlled by a central marketing department or the local stores and locations.
The ability to order printed materials through an online printing management system. Typically, this reduces a company’s inventory waste and improves the customization available on the printed pieces.
A central repository for ordering and downloading all types of marketing communications and assets, including email, logos, direct mail, radio commercials, fliers, buck slips, etc. Marketing Communications Portals are very useful for distributed marketing organizations.
Eliminates human intervention in creating printed pieces. This could be obtained via a web-to-print application or communications portal that also employs print automation, or could be a standalone system that creates printed pieces automatically based upon data streams and live data feeds.
The process of triggering marketing communications to a specific individual or audience segment without human intervention. This differs from print automation in that the automated marketing campaigns could include email, direct mail and other channels, by themselves or combined.
I’m sure there are many more terms and buzz words that I haven’t noted here. Just like any rapidly advancing technology solution, new terms are created every day. The most important thing to understand is what you really need in a solution, regardless of what it is called.
Mar 24th
Just like milk and cookies, direct mail and email are better together.
Email is, by far, the best thing to ever hit direct marketing.
One of the newest ways we are helping our clients manage their direct communications is by helping them develop automated systems to use direct mail strategically in conjunction with email campaigns. Let me share some of the innovative ways our clients are approaching the mail/email equation:
We recently developed an automated system that generates a postcard the day after a hard bounced email. This allows our client to have their customers easily update their email addresses as soon as the old email address is no longer valid. The real beauty of this is that it is fully automated. No one has to pull a list from the Email Service Provider and send it to us. It just happens.
If a long-term customer opts-out of your email communications, what does that mean?
Our client just asks by mailing a survey after someone opts-out, allowing them to address unforeseen issues and quickly win back the appropriate customers.
Several of our clients are having success by using both email and mail in conjunction with PURLs (personalized URL), as both a way to invite their audience members to visit their personalized web sites, and to follow up with respondents to thank them for visiting and drive their next action.
This may seem simple, but one of our client’s retention marketing efforts simply consists of mailing or emailing the same information, but if they have opted in to email, they get email. If they don’t have a valid email address or if they haven’t opted in to email, they get the information mailed to them. Simple, but it works.
One of our associates recently attended Marketing Sherpa’s Email Marketing Summit in Miami. Many of the attendees wondered why a company like Mail Print would attend such an event. They thought a company named “Mail Print” would perceive email as “the enemy.” Far from it. We were probably more successful at this event than the email companies… because we get it. Our clients need more than one successful marketing tactic to drive the revenue they need to propel their companies through this recession. And, oh boy, the magic we can make by strategically planning to use the right medium for our audiences.
Mail has not died. It just has a new BFF… email.