Home Features Business 10 Reasons Why Your Small Business Should Use Direct Mail Marketing

10 Reasons Why Your Small Business Should Use Direct Mail Marketing

February 3, 2022

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I think it was Mark Twain that once said “ The reports of my death have been greatly exaggerated”

And so it is when talking about Direct Mail. It’s far from dead.

I know direct mail marketing might not be the newest or coolest platform for Consumer or B2B advertising, but smart marketers realize that the most effective campaigns need to include both digital and physical mediums. Direct mail marketing, when done correctly, can do much more than just pull it’s own weight.

According to Entrepreneur.com, direct mail marketing can simply be defined as a type of marketing effort that makes use of a mail service to deliver promotional printed information to a target audience. It is a type of mail marketing system that involves sending printed information to physical mailboxes of individuals.

For a long period of time, email marketing has been the predominant form of marketing that businesses use for reaching their prospective customers. This, however, in recent times has had its own pitfalls. This includes; inability to reach and connect with the local audience, waste of resources and an inability to build trust and establish brand easily.

Statistics show that most people are less and less likely to open an email. This is as a result of the excessive emails they get in a day, spam messages they get from people and companies they are not familiar with, lack of trust, and a busy schedule. As a matter of fact, a majority of people are likely to skim through their emails, read a few, and delete the others. Worse yet, send the email directly to the spam folder and banish the sender to never appear again. This takes away your chance of making a sale or informing a prospective customer of a new development in your business. In other words, it means wasted resources, wasted efforts, and little returns.

We found a great post from the folks at Social Media Week titled “Direct Mail vs Email – Who is King”, which includes a very well done infographic (Created by Quantum Postcards) supporting our premise that Marketers should not underestimate the power of Direct Mail.

It seems that email marketing has seen it’s best days, while Direct Mail, on the other hand, proves to be much more effective. While its value has been undermined, the results gotten from using it over time by small and large businesses have been outstanding. Report shows that 80 – 90% of direct mail is opened, and the response rate to these mailings are high when compared with emails and social media. Another report by DMA (Data & Marketing Association), stated that 65% of people who received postcards as a part of direct mail marketing had made a purchase. This strikes some notes and establishes the fact that direct mailing is a good source for improving campaigns and generating leads. For a small business, the power of direct mail marketing cannot be overlooked and should be given uttermost consideration as part of a marketing strategy.

Below are ten reasons why you should use direct mail marketing for your small business

Reach your local audience: selling to your local audience is easier than selling to people far away. Your local audience may have already heard about your company, seen advertisements, or might have even walked past your company’s building. Hence, they have some level of trust in it. Direct mail marketing helps you to tailor your message to the right individuals that are liable to purchase your product. For instance, if you have a company selling skin care products in Michigan; you don’t want to send messages to people in Florida who may not purchase your product as a result of an inability to purchase it and receive it when needed. However, with Direct mail marketing, you can tailor your message to the right set of individuals in your locality.
Offers you control over the growth rate of your business: The danger involved in growing your business too quickly is almost commensurate to not growing fast enough!. When your business grows above your company’s capacity, it might become a danger to your brand, especially when you do not have the wherewithal to handle the growth capacity. However, with direct mail marketing, you can control your growth by simply controlling the number of direct mail letters or postcards you send. If your target is one new lead a month, knowing the average response rate is between 3% to 4%, you can send between 33 and 100 letters for one response.
Higher response rate: as opposed to 1% response rate from emails, 1% from social media and 0.2% from the Internet, direct mail has a higher response rate of 3.7%. This means that prospects are more likely to respond to the message you send through a direct mailing campaign, which invariably means more sales for your business.
Less competition: it is a regular occurrence that consumers get so many digital offers that they do not want. Email marketing is the most common tool that marketers use for this purpose, and because of this, there are too many promotional emails going to the mailboxes of these users which makes it even more difficult to get them to buy or even look into your offer. On the other hand, direct mail is less cluttered and saturated. This makes it possible for your offer not to get lost and hence, makes it easier to make sales. Savvy direct mail marketers make sure that their product is delivered directly to the prospects mailbox by itself and not part of a collection of “Junk Mail”.
It helps to reduce waste: Direct mail marketers have the ability to target your message to the people most likely in need of your products or services. By tailoring your message to the right individuals who need it in a particular community, you are less likely to incur any loss that comes from sending viral messages to people who might not consider your offer because they are not in line with what they are looking for. In addition, this helps you increase your ROI.
Increases brand awareness: by constantly seeing your postcards, fliers or letter with your logo and company name on it, consumers are more likely to trust you. They will see you as a reputable brand to do business with. Even if they don’t purchase a product immediately, whenever they think of buying, your company is the first that comes to mind.
Higher open rate: research shows that only 20 – 30% of emails get opened in a day. With the avalanche of email marketing campaigns done daily, the majority of emails sent are not opened. Most email recipients will either delete or move the email to the SPAM box without even looking at it. Also, most email providers have automatic filters or spam settings that move the email messages to spam automatically. This reduces the chances of your email being seen or even opened. In contrast, direct mail has a higher chance of being opened and read. Because it’s a physical letter,postcard or magazine, the recipient can easily go through it; even if they don’t read everything, they will be able to see your company’s name or logo. It’s not uncommon for someone to hang onto the offer long after it’s received, knowing that they will have use for it sometime in the future. That’s not likely the case with any promotions received through email.
It creates room for creativity and ingenuousness: unlike email marketing campaigns that are almost entirely automated, the direct mail marketing process is 90% manual. This gives room for creativity when drafting the content of the letter, designing the postcard, or magazine display ad. Thereby, allowing leaders to tap into their experience and passion for creating something remarkable. When’s the last time you saw a remarkable email?
Increase website traffic and online sales: direct mail has a significant influence on generating sales online. According to a study by USPS, more than 60% of direct mail recipients were influenced to visit a particularly promoted website. The report also specified that the greatest influence was on first-time shoppers. According to the report, direct mail recipients spent 28% more money and purchased 28% more items than individuals that were not recipients of direct mail. It also proceeded to highlight, that for websites that supported direct mail; there was an increase in revenue by 163% as opposed to websites that did not support it.
Consumers are more receptive to direct mail: 90% of the time, a recipient will likely open a direct mail piece because it looks more appealing and more personal to them. Also, direct mail require 21% less cognitive effort. This means that messages are assimilated more quickly and more effectively. This factor contributes greatly to the wide acceptance of direct mail.

Direct mail marketing is not just important for making sales alone, but is also paramount for increasing brand awareness and establishing a footprint in your local community. As a small business seeking expansion, this form of marketing should be given a high level of consideration. Even if you are already making use of an email marketing campaign, combining both of them will be very effective, and it will give you the perfect result you desire.