Are you mailing to the best prospects for your business? If
not, you’re not using your advertising budget effectively. With a direct mail
campaign, you have the ability to mail to a list of specific and targeted,
prospects. You should take advantage of this by choosing mailing lists that
contain your best potential customers. Here are the methods I use to help my
clients get the most out of every single mailing:
Method #1: Similarity
Breeds Orders
The first method is one that you most likely have heard
about. When you are looking for a mailing list, find a list of prospects that
looks like the people who are already your best customers.
But in order to do that, you have to find out as much as you
can about who your best customers are. One way to do this is to interview or
survey your best customers. Who are they? What are their demographics? What do
they like to do? What other interests do they have? The more you know about
them, the more you’ll be able to find other prospects who are just like them.
To obtain this information you might consider offering your
customers an incentive. You might give them a discount or coupon for
responding. Or you could enter their name in a drawing for some prize. Of
course, assure them that their answers will be kept anonymous and you won’t
share the information with anyone else. And why would you want to? This is to
build YOUR business.
If you’re willing to go a step further you could use the
services of a company that will “model” your best customers. A number of big
data companies have boatloads of information on millions of people. For a fee,
you can send the names of your customers to a data compiler, and they will run
them through their database to find out everything they can about them given
all the information these companies have in their files. You’ll learn your
customers’ average age, income level, interests, etc. Share that knowledge with
your list broker, and you can be more confident that the lists you are given to
rent are closer than ever to the prospects you want to reach.
Method #2: Follow the
Response
You can generally rent two different kinds of mailing lists.
The first kind of list is a compiled list. These lists are
put together by getting information from a variety of sources. These could
include warranty cards, government records, corporate reports, telephone
directories, yellow pages, credit bureaus, surveys, and so on. If you’ve ever
filled out a card to enter a drawing for a prize, you probably had to answer a
few questions. Those cards were sold to a list maker who compiled your name
with others that had similar qualities.
While compiled lists may contain names of people with
similar interests, they are not people who are known to have responded to an
offer or purchased anything related to that interest. They have not taken any
action with regard to the interest relevant to your product or service that got
them on the list. In other words, they are not proven buyers, which makes them
weak as prospects for your offer.
The second type of list is a response list. This kind of
list contains the names of people who actually responded to a related offer,
made an inquiry about it, or made a purchase of an offer. That makes these
people much more qualified as prospects for your offer.
I’m sure you can see where I’m going with this. If at all
possible, you want to get a response-based list containing the names of people
who have responded to an offer that is similar to your own. For example, if you
are sending out an offer for a golf improvment video, then you want to mail to
prospects who have gone ahead and purchased golf clubs or other golf equipment,
apparel, and gizmos.
Method #3: Copy Your
Competition
This final method I want to highlight today is one that most
mailers miss … even though I believe it is one of the quickest and easiest ways
to identify the best mailing lists for your offer.
I’m talking about researching what your competitors are
doing to find out which ones are using direct mail. You may have to make some
effort to find them. For example, if you are a chiropractor in a small town,
there may not be any direct-mailing chiropractors in your area. In that case
you’ll have to find the most successful direct-mailing chiropractor in another
city. With your list broker’s help, try to find out which lists your
competition is using, and then get “continuation usage” information on those
mailing lists.
Continuation usage will show who is mailing the same list
over and over. If your competitor is using the list again and again, then there
is a VERY good chance that it is a good list yielding great results, and it is
one that you should be using as well. On the other hand if the continuation
usage data indicates that a number of your competitors have tried the list, and
then did not use it again, that tells you the list did not work for them, and
probably won’t work for you either.
So, find out what your competition is doing, and follow
their lead. Only use lists that are being used by your best competitors. Avoid
the lists that they are avoiding.
Use the three methods presented here to home in on your best
lists. That way you can be sure that your mailing pieces are going to the right
people.
