Is Direct Mail Bouncing Back?

As one of our offerings at BMC, the revelation that direct mail appears to be making a comeback despite us living in a highly digitised world was a pleasant surprise. The news comes from the BDaily website and praises the evolution of personalised digital print technology for helping to push forward the prevalence of direct mail in the 21st Century.

It seems that such personalisation is leading to customers opting for ‘ink over pixels’, the article claims, choosing to open physical post over digital mail. This is because consumers see direct mail as more authoritative than email, the Royal Mail’s MarketReach report states; along with this a poll of 9,000 individuals for CMS Ltd also found that 83% of people find direct mail easier to absorb than email.

However, this isn’t to say that email and other digital campaigns should be abandoned – it was discovered that the most effective campaigns use direct mail to grab the consumer’s attention, before using digital campaigns (such as email correspondence) to lead them onto the next stage.

It is this combination that provides the most successful results, it seems, as consumers were found to be more likely to go online after receiving a piece of direct mail. This is because an email by itself is considered too informal and 70% of respondents of the Royal Mail report said they received too many. In fact, 51% of respondents delete an email within two seconds, but 69% said they always open a piece of direct mail from a company or brand regarding a product, service or promotion.

Tony Kemp, who runs Hello Market, said: “Emails can easily be lost or junked; by using hard copy as well, businesses can speak to their customers in a way which makes sure their message gets across.”

Do you think a combination of direct mail and online strategies will work for your business? Will you be researching personalised direct mail services in a bid to increase consumer engagement?