Direct Mail is a £BILLION Industry!...
Because it WORKS!

The key to successful marketing is to get close to your target customers and clients. Direct Mailing does that for you, but it needs to be managed carefully.

Here is some important advice on what to do and not do to produce good direct mail results.:-

The first key rule of marketing which definitely applies to Direct Mail is to test and measure. Only by doing this can you be sure that your campaigns are being successful and should be extended to a wider number of people.

Always start a new Direct Mail Campaign with a small number of mailings. Carefully choose the segment of the population or businesses you are targeting. The objective is to determine how successful the campaign is going to be before you roll it out to a much wider audience. That way you can decide what changes you need to make to improve performance in content, approach, or even target segmentation before you have wasted significant time and money. Work out the costs of the mailings and the profit from the resulting sales. Why spend money on anything which loses you money?


Generally it is best to start with your existing customers and clients. This is because by their nature they have already demonstrated some sympathy to your company, products and services, and are likely to be the most responsive. It is also very good practise to make sure that you maintain good relationships with these people, regularly keeping them informed about your offerings. Typically most companies do not pay enough attention to them and yet they offer the highest chance of further sales.

Always include a letter with a brochure because whilst there is an automatic reaction nowadays for people to bin an unsolicited brochure, they may pause and read the letter.

Make sure that the headline in your letter is interesting, attractive to the reader, and simply conveys your message. This is the first thing the reader will see. Make sure that the rest of the mailing focuses on the problem or issue facing the client and the benefit they will receive.

Depending on the type of business you are in, then a mailing followed up with a telephone call timed just after they receive the mail can dramatically improve success rates. This is really only a cost effective approach for high value product and services with a well qualified segment which you know is favourable. But it is worth considering.

When you get a good response from a mailing then follow that up with another mailing to the same people a few weeks later, you will probably get another good response.

We discussed measuring response rates and focusing on mailings which deliver a profit greater than your costs. Consider the bigger picture as well. There may well be test mailings which only break-even, however if these generate new clients and give you a wider client base, then assuming that some of them do repeat business then you will be better off in the long run. So it may still be beneficial to run larger mailings. Whether you do this or not is a decision you need to make based on whether there are other approaches for you which give a better return on your investment.