Mail Messenger

Why you should provide CMYK files for print

2009-10-16T08:41:00.000-07:00

We’ve seen it dozens of times. Clients who supply RGB artwork often find that the color on their finished piece has shifted. The fact is that all full-color print files should be created and supplied to your printer in CMYK. There are cut-and-dry reasons for this. Lets take a minute and try to unravel why CMYK is king of print. First, lets define the key players when it comes to color:

RGB Color Space
RGB is a color space intended for the screen. Its acronym stands for Red, Green and Blue. All of the colors within the RGB color space are created by some combination of red, green and blue light. RGB is what is known as an ‘additive’ color space. When the colors are added together you get the color white. Likewise, when you remove all of the color, you create black. The RGB color space has a large range of colors that it can create—16 million to be exact. This range is known as ‘gamut.’

CMYK Color Space
Conversely, CMYK color space is intended for print. Its acronym stands for Cyan, Magenta, Yellow and Black (denoted as ‘K’ so it is not confused with blue). CMYK is often referred to as four-color-process. It is called a “subtractive” color space, because the removal of all colors results in white, where as the addition of all colors results in black. Although you can produce thousands of colors with CMYK, it has a much smaller range—or gamut—of colors than RGB does.
Now that we have called out the players, we can start to understand why RGB artwork doesn’t translate well to print:

Differences in Gamut
After studying the definitions of RGB and CMYK color spaces, the concept that RGB has a much larger gamut than CMYK is pretty evident. When an RGB file is supplied to a printer, the printer must convert the file to CMYK. There is just no other option. Because of the difference in color ranges (gamut), when the RGB file is converted, it is forced into a smaller range of colors. Through the conversion process, the software analyzes the image and reconfigures the colors into the closest CMYK equivalent. This can leave the new CMYK image looking dull in comparison to the original RGB image.

Differences in Medium
RGB is for screen. CMYK is for print. The two color spaces are created for their own specific purpose and in order to get the best results, they need to be used as they were intended. When colors get duller in RGB to CMYK conversion, its not because CMYK is a inferior color space, but that RGB simply has properties that it cannot replicate. Techno-bright colors can be achieved in RGB because the colors are created from light, whereas the paper CMYK inks are printed on cannot emit light and thus, cannot produce as bright of colors. The fact is that sometimes screen colors are just not reproducible with ink and vice-versa.
Now that you have all this RGB/CMYK knowledge, you probably want to know what to do to make sure you don’t have to deal with RGB to CMYK print conversion surprises. There are a couple tips that should make your print projects turn out as you have envisioned them:

Edit your photos in RGB, but place them in CMYK
If you have to make edits to photos used in your piece, you will want to make the major edits in their native, RGB format and then convert the final image to CMYK. The reason for starting in RGB is because the gamut is greater, you have the ability for much more precise editing. Once your edits are made, convert the file to CMYK and save a copy of the image for placement into your artwork.

Design in CMYK
Always make sure to design in CMYK. If you are working on a design element in Photoshop, make sure to be working in CMYK, or you could get an unpleasant surprise when you go to convert the file to send for printing. This also goes for files created in InDesign and Illustrator. Both of these programs give the option to work with RGB colors or in RGB mode, so make absolutely sure you are working in CMYK by making sure all swatches are created in CMYK (in InDesign) and that your Document Color Mode (in Illustrator) is set to CMYK.

When you have a solid understanding of RGB and CMYK color spaces, it makes it easy to produce the right kind of art for the right medium. Hopefully this little primer on RGB and CMYK usage will serve you well and help you avoid unexpected color conversions in the future.

Marketing in a down economy provides an opportunity to come out on top

2009-10-06T09:32:00.000-07:00

Studies show that those who advertise in a recession are more likely to increase sales in the future. In fact, marketing in a recession could be one of the best ways to grow your business long-term. When a recession hits, every business’ knee-jerk reaction is to cut their spending—and they usually hit the marketing budget first. Everyone else is doing it, you should too, right? Wrong. This is the exact reason you should advertise in a recession. There is much less advertising clutter flying around, which makes those who are advertising even more noticeable.

You see, if you advertise throughout a recession while your competitors are not, that gives you a unique opportunity to capitalize on your competitors’ err in judgement. With less advertising competition you can increase awareness of your brand, which can easily convert to market share when a consumer needs your service—whether that may be during the crunch or after it.

The secret to successful marketing is to be top-of-mind when a consumer needs a product or service. In order to be top-of-mind you must make your business known, and be visible and available when your prospect needs you most.

McGraw Hill has done several research studies on recession advertising. Some of their findings are as follows:

Sales statistics of companies that maintained or increased advertising during the 1974 recession showed a 132% growth, post-recession.
Following the recession of 1981–82, those who maintained or increased advertising spend throughout the recession achieved higher sales than their competitors in the three years following that recession.
By the end of the three years following this recession, the sales of those who had continued to maintain their advertising throughout the recession had risen over 256% higher than that of their competitors.
Another study in 2001 found that recession advertisers’ market share had grown to 2.5 times that of the non-advertisers.

That being said, can you really afford to pause your advertising?

Sure, everyone’s funds are tight in a recession, but for those who choose to maintain or increase their advertising throughout come out ahead post-recession. Plus, if you find your business to be slower than usual, putting some real effort into creating and implementing a well-crafted marketing plan is a valuable way to spend that time.

What is the difference in delivery times between postage rates

2009-08-18T08:22:00.000-07:00

Choosing between postage classes can be a confusing thing. Just how speedy is First Class mail in comparison to Standard Mail? Lets sort out the facts. First-Class mail is usually delivered within 1-3 days when mailed locally from the post office your mail was sent from, or 1-5 days nationally. Standard Mail (formerly known as Bulk Rate mail) costs less, but takes slightly longer to be delivered. Standard Mail usually takes 4-8 days when delivered locally from the post office your mail was sent from, or 10-14 days nationally. The benefit with First Class mail is that it has priority over Standard Mail, which means the delivery times are much more consistent. Depending on the time of year, Standard Mail can take longer than normal to deliver because the First Class mail will be delivered first. This problem may be able to be avoided if you plan your mailing ahead and mail earlier during peak seasons, such as holidays. However, if your promotion is absolutely time-sensitive First Class postage is the best way to go.

Great marketing is never done

2009-08-11T09:42:00.000-07:00

So many businesses only give their marketing serious thought when times are tough. This thinking is not sound because marketing takes time to take effect, and if you wait until you need instant results you will have waited too long. In order to grow a strong organization, you must create an ongoing marketing plan that works seamlessly. Your marketing must be a continual process.

The key to successful marketing is to craft a plan that can be implemented easily and effectively on a regular basis. A good marketing strategy will employ several types of media. So how do you know what media types are right for you? Trial and error is really the only way to know. Stay open-minded. A medium that you may think is ineffective might just work really well and vice versa.

On that same note, make sure you give each medium a fair shot. The value of a medium cannot usually be judged by a one-off attempt. Your message or approach may need tweaking or your timing may be off. Make sure you test and track each approach with a substantial trial. Some staple media are: direct mail marketing, email marketing, paid search advertising and social media (Twitter, Facebook, etc.). If there is a publication that is distributed to your target market you may wish to try placing an ad in the publication, but those results will be harder to track. Don’t forget to work cold calling or cold emailing into the plan. Literal one-to-one communication is a dying art, and you will be surprised to find the impact of real person-to-person communication can be very rewarding.

Once you have determined which medium to try, make sure you think carefully about the relevancy of each of your messages for each specific medium. You will probably find that your messaging needs to be tweaked for each media outlet (i.e. direct mail needs to be concise, persuasive and offer-driven, social media might be much more personal and casual, paid search will incorporate keywords and targeted landing pages, etc.).

When you have found a mix of media that works for you, put a plan in place to implement these strategies regularly. This plan should become part of your regular routine and shouldn’t be so cumbersome that you get bogged down by it. A smaller organization’s mix might include 3-4 marketing outlets, whereas a larger organization may include more.

The purpose of the plan is to make your marketing workload predictable, however it is important that you make sure the messaging you send out is not predictable. Branded, yes. Predictable, no. It is vital that, no matter the medium, your content remains fresh and relevant to your prospect’s self-interest. No one wants to hear time and time again about how great you are, but would probably love to hear about how you will make their life better or easier.

You may not see instant results from your marketing plan. Prospects need time to move through the sales process. Sometime they just don’t need what you are offering for months or even years. But when they do, your steady marketing should have positioned you in a prominent place in their minds. Over time, a consistent marketing plan will aid in stabilizing the flow of incoming clientele to your business.

Nonprofit Tip: The value of a single story

2009-08-04T16:01:00.000-07:00

As an organization, its easy to get carried away selling the good of an organization as a whole. However, studies show that donors have a more favorable reaction when the goals of an organization are expressed using a single story. It seems a donor can step into the shoes of one person much easier than those of a group or entity. When telling a single story, you can go into much more detail about that person—details that hang in your donors’ minds, details that enable them to relate to your mission, details that motivate them to give. The fact is that people form a connection with the story of a single person much easier than that of a collective. And this connection drastically increases their incentive to give.

Are you harvesting the power of your existing customers?

2009-07-20T08:59:00.000-07:00

As direct mail marketers, we often get so focused on obtaining new customers that we forget to nurture our existing customers. The fact is that existing customers are an incredibly profitable piece of your prospect base.

Why nurture your existing customers?
In a nutshell, the 80/20 rule should be reason enough to reconsider how you are handling your existing customers. The 80/20 rule states that 80% of your business comes from 20% of your customers. With a rule like that, you’d have to be crazy not to consider investing in your existing customers.

Not only does an existing customer cost much less than a new one—less marketing dollars, no training on your internal processes, you already understand their expectations and communication style—but a customer who purchases not only once, but twice is much more likely to keep coming back. They are also more likely to refer, and referrals give a great boost to your bottom line. Consider how many contacts each of your customers might have—25, 50, 100? Imagine how long it would take your sales force to not only locate but to make contact with that many prospects. These leads are at the tip of your customer’s finger, which means your existing customer could turn into a great tool for growing your business.

How to tap into the power of repeat customers and create referrals.
First and foremost you’ve got to get in your customer’s head. What you think they value about your product or service may not be the case. It might be your sales representative’s quirky sense of humor, rather than your low pricing that keeps them coming back. Dig around a little and try to read between the lines as to why they are loyal. Once you know why they love you, you can use that to your advantage. You can do this in several ways.

First, whatever you are doing that they love you for, keep doing it and find ways to continue improving to satisfy them even more. Never let your service slack just because you feel you already have them as a customer. Be consistent in your brand values in terms of product, service and communication. Stay in contact with them, and keep it as personal as possible. Watch out for their best interest and work to keep them impressed. After all, these people are potentially walking advertisements for your company. They are worth a few extra minutes on the phone or an extra email updating them on the status of their project or a new product they may find interesting. When applicable, feel free to acknowledge that you always appreciate their quality referrals. And if they refer, ALWAYS remember to thank them personally!

Second, consider how you can use your knowledge of their needs to produce more business from them. For example, if they consistently purchase one product or service from you, but you have a second, companion product or service that could benefit them, make sure to point this out. With today’s technology, you could even offer up this product while making a splash in their mailbox with a personalized direct mail campaign.

The moral of the story is to pony up and start treating your loyal, existing customers like they matter. After all, they potentially make up the bulk of your livelihood. If that isn’t worth a little of your time and money, I don’t know what is.

New USPS Flat Automation Changes Flat Mail Panel Requirements

2009-07-14T08:32:00.000-07:00

The USPS recently announced that it has acquired new equipment to enable the automation of flat-rate mail. As a result, the mail panel requirements for these pieces have changed. The biggest change is that the mail panel portion of your flat-rate mail must now fall in the top half of your piece. As defined by the post office, for pieces not enclosed in an envelope or polybag, the top half of the piece is either one of the shorter edges when the bound or final folded edge is vertical and on the right-hand side of the piece. The address may be parallel or perpendicular to the top edge, but never upside-down and of course the postage must also fall within this top half. As for placement of your delivery address and return address in relation to the postage, feel free to continue positioning these items as usual, with the postage to the right or upper right of your delivery address and the return address about 1 inch above and to the left of your delivery address. These changes are effective immediately.

Get creative with your mail panel in an automation-friendly way

2009-07-07T10:25:00.000-07:00

Questions about mail panels are constantly buzzing around our office. What size should the panel be? Can it have a background color or pattern? Can the indicia be inside the mail panel or should it be outside of it? Is there any way to make the mail panel interfere less with the postcard design?

Throughout our years in direct mail design and production, we’ve narrowed down a few answers to these questions that will hopefully help you in your direct mail design.

How big does the mail panel need to be?
The mail panel must be a minimum of 4” wide by 2” high, and should be anchored at the right-hand side of your piece, usually towards the bottom. This room is needed in order to inkjet on the address and barcode in a font size that is readable by USPS postal equipment. By leaving this room, you ensure that your mail piece will qualify for the lowest automation rate, which could save you a lot of money. If you fail to provide enough room, your mail piece may need to be addressed using labels, which doesn’t exactly produce the most professional look, and you may be charged extra as the piece may not be able to be automated.

Can the postage be inside this 4” x 2” mail panel?
We recommend leaving the entire 4” x 2” mail panel clear for addressing, and therefore recommend moving the postage area or indicia just above the top right corner of the mail panel.

Does my mail panel have to be shaped like a rectangle?
The mail panel does not have to be rectangular in shape, but whatever shape you choose you absolutely MUST ensure that there is 4” x 2” clear of space to add the address.

Does the mail panel have to be white in color?
The mail panel does not have to be white and can be a very light tint of a color. If you choose to tint your mail panel, it should be no more than 8% screen. If the color gets darker than 8%, there is a risk that the color will get too dark and will not contrast with the address that is inkjet on. If the address does not contrast enough, it will not be able to be read by USPS equipment.

Can I put a pattern in my mail panel?
Much like the rule about color, you can use a pattern, but it must not interfere with the address or barcode area. This means it must follow the same rule of 8% tint and it should not be high in contrast or contain vertical lines that would interfere with reading the barcode.

How can I make the mail panel less interruptive to my design?
This is a popular question, and we believe that the most discreet way of formatting a mail panel is to stretch a 2” strip across the entire bottom of the piece. This method is a little more elegant and doesn’t interrupt the flow of content as much as a 4” x 2” rectangle, however you will lose a little more page real estate.

Are you mailing to the right people?

2009-06-15T14:25:00.000-07:00

When planning a direct mail campaign, most people arduously deliberate about copy, format, design, and mail schedule. While each of these points are very important to the overall success of the mailing, the most critical aspect of the mailing—your mailing list—is often given much less attention. Many people blindly use an in-house customer list that hasn’t been examined in years or purchase a generic list without ever considering testing and evaluating its effectiveness. How profitable can your carefully crafted mail promotion be if its recipient isn’t a qualified prospect? You must carefully plan your mailing list—it is the make-or-break factor of your mailing.

In fact, in today’s penny-pinching economy, paying closer attention to your mailing list is a great way to start saving money on your mailing. Mailing to the wrong people, duplicate addresses or invalid addresses can all add up to a sizable waste of print, production and postage costs.

In order to maximize your mailing and minimize your mail costs you are going to need to put some man-power into your list, but where do you start?

The best place to start refining your mail list is by using your existing customer database to build a “client profile” of your ideal customer. Your client profile should outline things like age, income, gender, location, profession, purchase history, etc. The more information you have about who your current clients really are, the better equipped you are to start narrowing down what kinds of people are supporters and purchasers of your product. You will be able to use the client profile to edit your house mail list and aid in selection of rented or purchased lists to supplement your house list.

When your client profile is complete, you can use the criteria to evaluate and edit your existing house mail list. Do you have prior customers who don’t fit your profile and haven’t responded to your advances in a while? Do you have prospects who refuse to convert to customers? After analyzing the list, don’t be afraid to trim the fat and clear your list of prospects who don’t show a real likelihood of purchasing your product. These contacts are simply robbing you of your postage dollars and pushing your response rates down. Its a waste of time and money marketing to people who clearly don’t fit into your client profile and show no signs of purchasing.

Ideally, you want to be mailing to people, not companies. Your mail list should contain an actual contact name, not just a company name. An actual contact name greatly improves that your mail piece will get into the right hands and be acted on. If you are unable to obtain contact names, you could address the piece to a specific position, such as ‘Supply Manager’ or ‘Household Shopper.’ Of course this is much less specific, but it should help in getting your mail piece into the hands of the right person.

Once your mail list is refined, it is important to make sure it stays in good shape. Your list will quickly begin to lose value if it is not maintained. You should have the list de-duped (checked for duplicate entries) and check for address validity often.

It is in your best interest to add to and validate the information in your database as often as possible through the use of mailed, emailed or phone surveys. Cross-reference this new database information against your mail list criteria and add or subtract from your mail list accordingly. The more information you have in your database, the better idea you have of your clients, which leads to higher-quality improvements in your mailing list.

After all this revision, your list will most likely end up shorter than it began. It is better to mail to a smaller, high-quality list than a large list full of prospects who will never purchase. If you are uncomfortable with the brevity of your list, you can always supplement your list with a rented or purchased list. Thanks to your new client profile, you will have a solid outline of criteria that can help you select a supplemental list. If you choose to purchase additional names to add to your house list, it is a great idea to test a small sampling of the list before purchasing and mailing to the entire list.

Your mail list is a constantly changing, growing, evolving thing. Its a tremendous company asset and the greatest factor in whether how mail promotion will perform. Be sure to give your list the attention it deserves—its got a big job to do.

Did you know? MERLIN means in-house verification of your mail?

2009-06-01T16:29:00.000-07:00

A component of our on-site USPS office is the MERLIN barcode verification system. “MERLIN” (Mailing Evaluation Readability Lookup Instrument) refers to the piece of equipment used by the USPS to automate the process of the physical verification of mail. It verifies the readability of barcodes and confirms that barcodes are prepared properly and that the correct postage is being used. United Printing & Mailing is one of only a few facilities in Arizona certified by the USPS for outside verification of mail using MERLIN. The USPS requests that all mailings of more than 10,000 pieces be verified using the MERLIN device. Additionally, spot-checks are performed on mailings less than 10,000 pieces. Having MERLIN on-site allows us to bypass the need for verification upon delivery to the US Post Office.

Design a smarter letter mailer

2009-05-26T08:52:00.000-07:00

Sales letters are one of the most common forms of direct mail. One might be tempted to think that the design and layout of a sales letter is a pretty cut-and-dry project. However, before you set your typestyle to 12-point Times New Roman and call it a day, consider these proven tactics to get more out of your sales letter.

Use bold, italics and underlines
Draw attention to the most important, motivating phrases of your letter using bold, italics or underlines. Be careful to use these tactics properly and sparingly. Overusing them can create a reverse effect, causing the page to look cluttered with nothing standing out.

Use indentations
Indenting paragraphs or lists of information help to create texture within your layout and set certain information off from the rest of your letter.

Use bullets to highlight lists
Breaking up your text with a bulleted list is a great way to grab your readers’ attention. Pair this technique with an indentation to draw even more attention to the list.

Include a P.S. note
Studies show that about 80% of people actually read the P.S. note first. To make the most of this behavior, its in your best interest to make sure the P.S. reads quickly and is set in an interesting and noticeable manner.

Handwritten notes
Adding a handwritten call-out or note in the margin of your letter creates an authentic, personal feel to your letter. For an added response, try using the handwritten technique on your P.S. note

Don’t forget the envelope
It’s easy to get so caught up in your letter that you forget all about the vehicle that carries it. Using a mysterious and motivating tagline is a great way to add some drama to your outer envelope. Don’t forget that a well-chosen image can sometimes increase the motivation factor of your envelope as well.

Nonprofit Tip: Don't toot your own horn

2009-05-18T09:40:00.000-07:00

After reading that headline, you may be asking yourself what we are talking about? How else will anyone understand the great things your organization is accomplishing if you don’t tell them? Before you take these thoughts much further, let us point out that we do believe that you need to explain to your donor base how their support is impacting your organization, but what would happen if this explaination didn’t come from you? Third-party opinions tend to carry much more weight than your own. This is exactly why you go to a friend when you need a recommendation on which roofer or handyman to hire. You don’t trust what the roofer or handyman has to say nearly as much as your unbiased, trusted friend who has personal experience with them. What if you appealed to your donors using someone else’s words? Next time you have an appeal letter or email to write, consider telling the story through a volunteer, or interview someone who was changed or affected by your organization—use a true proponent’s voice to appeal to your audience.

Why your customers want you to use direct mail

2009-05-11T16:07:00.000-07:00

Making the sale, writing the press release, arriving on time for your two o’clock client meeting, getting your invoicing done or making just one more call before quitting time—these are the things that make up our day. Then, just as we’ve been able to leave the office, we are greeted with a whole new set of tasks: carting the kids to soccer, piano or martial arts class, getting dinner on the table, walking the dog and straightening the house. Our lives are constantly buzzing.

In our current age of hyper-active scheduling, there seems to be little chance for an advertising message to have enough time to sink in. Think again. Strangely enough, the time-tested method of direct mail seems to be appealing to readers more than ever. Here’s why direct mail works for today’s audience:

Direct mail is less-interruptive than other mediums
With many advertising mediums, you get bombarded with messages in such a way that they are tough to avoid. TV ads interrupt your favorite show every 10 minutes, radio ads are played every 2 or 3 songs and internet ads pop up or flash incessantly at the side of the web page you are viewing. This is not the case with direct mail. It gets delivered to your mailbox and from there, you choose when you want to read it.

Direct mail gives the reader control
USPS research studies show that most people do enjoy flipping through their mail. As mentioned in the previous point, the great thing about direct mail is that you get to choose when to peruse your mail. You don’t have to look at the mail right as you get home, although it is there for you if you would like to. Feel free to make—and eat—dinner and even do the dishes before taking any time to look through the mail. Whether you wait until later in the day or even later in the week to read your mail—it will be there when you are ready. You, the reader, are in control.

Direct mail can be held onto for the future
Although direct mail is usually created to be urgent and time-sensitive, a reader can choose to prolong the message and hold onto mail that they may have a future interest in. Case in point: how many times have you held onto a catalog only to place an order from it a few months down the line? Your prospects do this all the time. The key to advertising is to be present when your prospect needs your product or service. With direct mail your message can reach a little further, as your recipient can save the mail piece for later, or even pass it on to a friend. Try doing that with a radio ad.

The fact is direct mail is easily accepted by most prospects, which gives you the window to make your best pitch for your product or service. Although direct mail may be a more traditional form of advertising, it still holds an important place in the mind of the consumer.

USPS postage rates are set to increase in May

2009-03-30T10:47:00.000-07:00

Its official, the USPS just announced a rate change on postage that becomes effective on May 11, 2009. The biggest change is that the price of a 1-ounce, First-Class stamp will increase from 42¢ to 44¢, and other USPS mailing service prices will increase as well. So what does this mean to the direct mailer? You can now expect to mail standard rate letter-compatible pieces weighing up to 3.3oz between the rates of 19–21.9¢ each, if mailed within your SCF or BMC. In addition to the rate for standard mail, periodicals and package service rates will also be changing. The USPS has also announced that they will continue to adjust their pricing annually in May.

For more information, see the USPS website at www.usps.com/prices/pricechanges.htm

Should you add brochures to your direct mail mix?

2009-03-30T10:29:00.000-07:00

Your organization probably has some sort of brochure or collateral that you distribute to prospects who request it. The great thing about a corporate brochure is that it can perform many functions throughout your marketing. If it is designed in a mail-friendly manner, one might even consider using it as part of your direct mail efforts. However, is it a good idea to use a brochure as part of your direct mail campaign?

If your direct mail campaign has the right goal in mind, your brochure can be a great element to add to your direct mail campaign. Here are a few ways they work best:

Use your brochure as part of an awareness campaign
Your company brochure most likely depicts a general overview of your company, and its service or product offering. If you are looking to distribute a mail campaign to generate awareness alone, your brochure could be a great, readily available way to do just that. The only thing you would need to be sure about is that the brochure has a mail panel built into it to be mailed as a self-mailer or that it can be housed in an envelope to be transported through the mail. In the future, you may want to design your corporate brochures with this possibility in mind, and make sure to include a mail panel area.

Include your brochure with a letter mailing
Another way to integrate your brochure into your direct mail mix is to include it with your letter mailings as extra information about your company. As we discussed last month, letter mailers are great for building credibility, and inserting a brochure can help supplement the information provided in your letter mailer and help build that credibility.

Follow-up to information request
Finally, your company brochure can be used as part of a follow-up campaign to prospects requesting information. Most organizations receive dozens of leads per day, and implementing a follow-up campaign to touch base with those leads who fail to make a purchase can convert to more sales in the future. Following up with your prospects through the use of a direct mail piece, such as a brochure, is a great way to maintain contact with your prospects for a greater duration of time and strengthen their bond with your organization.

Why high-resolution images are important

2009-03-30T10:14:00.000-07:00

Have you ever asked your designer to pull a logo or image from your or one of your affiliates’ websites, only to receive a blank stare? This is because your designer understands that the use of web images is not a good practice, and it will very well degrade the overall professionalism of your mail piece design.

So why exactly are web images such a no-no?

To start with, you need to understand what makes up a digital photo. All digital photographic images (including website images) are created of hundreds of pixels. These pixels are incredibly small and should be completely invisible to the naked eye when you are viewing an image at full size. If you were to zoom in very closely on a digital image you could see each pixel and how each one’s color slowly shifts to provide optical illusions of smooth color transitions that make up your photo.

Web images are saved at 72 or 96dpi (dots—or pixels—per inch) because web browsers view at this resolution, and print images are saved at 300dpi. When a print designer is asked to take an image from a website, it must be scaled up from 72dpi to 300dpi, which essentially means each pixel will be enlarged to three times its original size. This creates a “pixelization” effect. Pixelation appears because the pixels that make up the image have been enlarged so much that you are now actually starting to see each one individually and the smooth optical illusion breaks down. The information in the image has essentially been stretched to such a degree that there are now gaps in the display of the pixel information, and no amount of “photoshopping” can supplement this lost information. Because the pixels are now over-sized, pixelated images will appear blurry in print, which does very little to enforce the professionalism of your organization.

To avoid this problem, all individuals who are involved in coordination of print design should make sure you always keep a copy of the native, high resolution image files on your hard drive or on a back-up disc. This way, when your you or your designer needs high-resolution images, you will be able to access them quickly and easily.

Nonprofit Tip: Ask while you can

2009-03-30T09:56:00.000-07:00

In our current economic state, most non-profits are facing the daily challenge of staying financially afloat. Many are wondering what they can do to keep their donors dedicated to their cause in order to keep donations coming in. The reality is that the economy could still get worse and non-profits need to make the most of every opportunity to motivate current and potential donors. At every touch point with potential donors, your mission, and how it effects your donors, needs to remain at the surface. Don’t be afraid to ask for support. Be it in your corporate communications or in everyday conversation, now more than ever it is important to drive home your goals and clearly request donor support—and every contact counts.

How does direct mail stack up to email marketing?

2009-03-30T09:43:00.000-07:00

With technology improving daily, there is an ever-growing buzz about how direct mail and email marketing compare. The fact is that it is hard to be exact with which medium is better—it greatly depends on the nature of your message, your audience and your relationship to your recipients. We’ve outlined a few items below for you to consider.

Although email marketing can be cheap, the long-term standing of it is questionable due to spamming and the possibility of future regulations imposed by the government on email marketing tactics. Emails tend to be easily ignored and people often find them irritating—they are simply one more uninvited interruption in their overly busy day. It is this fact, paired with trying to wrestle your message through spam and junk mail filters, that makes the environment in which email marketing messages are received not very positive. Since most people don’t wish to receive unsolicited emails and it becomes all-too-easy for them to quickly press “delete” and your message is gone forever. Overall, email marketing doesn’t seem to be taken as seriously as direct mail because it has become so commonplace. Well, developed, reliable email lists can be tough to come by and, although open rates can be high, “opened” email is all-too-often given surprisingly little attention.

On the other hand, direct mail response rates generally fall between 1 and 3%, with those rates rising up to 5% and higher when a campaign is being resent to a previous recipient. Overall, direct mail list sources are much more developed and reliable, due to the fact that direct mail has been effectively used for so long. Although direct mail is also unsolicited, it is much less interruptive and people don’t seem to mind it. It has become widely accepted, which lends to its effectiveness. In fact, many people claim to enjoy receiving their mail and look forward to perusing it. This may be because postal mail is much more personal in nature. With direct mail, you can create a tangible connection with your brand, using formatting and paper choices that is just not possible with email. Direct mail is much harder to ignore, and much easier to hold onto for later—how often have you filed a catalog away to make a purchase later? The environment for direct mail is also much more positive than email, as people often make a specific time each day just for opening and reviewing their mail.

With email marketing, a more accepted practice is to use it to encourage current clientele to make a repeat or additional purchase. Additionally, if you can entice them to request to receive your emails voluntarily, much of the negativity can be removed from the medium.

However, with minimal struggle, direct mail marketing holds strong. There are very few drawbacks to a good direct mail campaign. With the ever-increasing amount of advertising messages that are pressed upon us everyday, direct mail seems to be more welcomed than ever, as the control is awarded to the prospect to choose how and when to accept and focus on the message being delivered.

Use letter mailers to instill trust in your offer

2009-03-17T14:58:00.000-07:00

Instilling trust in your sales pitch is key to a successful direct mail campaign. But how can you create your campaign to enable this trust from your customer? A sales letter mailer is a great way to start. Letter mailers are one of the most time-tested, tried-and-true direct mail marketing formats available to you.

So why exactly are letter mailers such a great, trust-instilling medium? For starters, letter mailers feel more personal. They also allow for higher quality communication to your prospect and offer the ability to build credibility. Lets examine those qualities a bit more:

Letter mailers feel personal
The letter medium began as a personal form of correspondence and the format still triggers a reaction that just feels more personal. In comparison with other direct mail formats, it seems we are hard-wired to view a letter as a more legitimate form of mail. There is something about opening an envelope that is more private, and therefore personal. Additionally, letter mailers often use live stamps as opposed to an impersonal indicia, signatures and post-script notes to help project a more personal look.

Letters allow for increased communication
The written structure of letter-writing intrinsically lends itself to creating a dialog with your prospect, and it leads your reader through your message more naturally than other forms of direct mail. And since the entire process is more natural, odds are your prospect will absorb more of your message. Plus, the physical format of a letter offers more room for your message than many other direct mail mediums.

Letters help build credibility
Since letter mailers offer the ability to present a great deal of information about your product, service or organization, they also give you more chances to build the credibility of your organization and its offerings. A letter gives you room to provide in-depth information about your product and organization and offer up the statistics, testimonials and facts necessary to walk your prospect through more of the sales process and build their confidence.

Whether you are new to direct mail or a veteran of the medium, a well-written sales letter can prove to be a great option for presenting information in a personal and credible manner.

It doesn't matter if you like your mail piece

2009-03-17T14:47:00.000-07:00

When setting up your mail campaign, many things are taken into account: mail list, mail piece format, mail date and most importantly, target audience. Direct mail is all about response. And response is all about your target audience. Many campaign managers get hung up on their opinions toward their mail piece however, for the sake of these goals, it really doesn’t matter if you like your own mail piece. So how exactly do you set your opinions aside and create a mail piece that matters to your customer?

Determine a target profile
To build the most effective mailing, it pays to take the time to determine precisely who you are marketing to, what you want to motivate them to do and how you plan to motivate them. Use any data available to you to establish criteria for details like gender, age group, income group, demographic location, occupation, spending habits or any other discerning qualities that might be important in relation to your prospect and your product or service.

Think like your customer
Once you determine your target profile, you can put yourself in that customer’s shoes and start to think like your customer. Consider the criteria outlined in your target profile and write, design and plan accordingly. A mail campaigned for a woman will probably be completely different than one designed for a man. Different features will matter to different income groups or demographics. Based on spending habits, you could draw conclusions on whether your target group would be expecting a high-end piece or something more standard. Use the criteria outlined in your target profile to jump-start your creative thinking and draw natural conclusions about your prospect and fashion your campaign accordingly.

Don’t be swayed by personal preferences
All-to-often campaign managers let their personal preferences become deciding factors. Since establishing your target profile and thinking like your customer should be the core drivers of your campaign, your personal preferences should not play a part in the creation of the campaign. Just because you don’t like the color pink doesn’t mean it isn’t the right choice to draw in your target audience.

Always remember that direct mail is a statistic-driven medium. Keeping your preferences at the sideline and customer-centric criteria in mind when planning your next campaign can help provide a firm structure to base your mail campaign upon.

Putting the puzzle together

2009-02-27T13:53:00.001-08:00

Believe it or not, direct mail design is much less about creativity and much more about the architecture of information. For this reason, we compare it to putting together a puzzle. Whether you design your mail piece yourself, or contract it out to a third-party designer, it is in your best interest to make sure you have all of the pieces of the puzzle before you start setting up your mailer.

When designing a mail piece, the goal is to get your information across to your prospect in a clear and convincing manner within an extremely short amount of time. In order to do this well, the mail piece needs to be planned out and well-organized to highlight the right things and pull the reader’s eye through the piece. A seasoned direct mail designer can work with you to identify the most important elements of your message and set up your mail piece to highlight those items and arrange secondary information so it can be read easily.

Failing to assemble all of the pieces of the puzzle before beginning the design can end up being detrimental to the overall flow of the piece. For instance, if your designer is given a 5-word headline to begin with, but at the last minute that headline is changed to a 10-word headline, the layout will obviously not work in the same manner. The layout will get squished, emphasis will get lost and the entire piece may lose impact. Its like completing a puzzle only to be asked to insert additional pieces. The result would be far from appealing and make little sense.

How can you avoid this problem and produce a winning direct mail piece? As the old adage goes, an ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure, and pre-planning all of the elements of your mail piece is the key.

Nonprofit Tip: Spin a sweet tale for your prospects

2009-02-16T10:31:00.001-08:00

As outlined in our headline article, emotions are the primary driver for action. As non-profit marketers, using this to your advantage is key. You can accomplish this through storytelling. Not only is storytelling entertaining and easy to read, but it hits right to the heart of the matter. When you tell your prospective donors about the impact of your organization and the lives you are affecting, you give them a memory to associate with your cause. Storytelling makes your impact and issues relatable to the ordinary person. When you tell your readers the story of “Susan, the single mother of four” who your soup kitchen fed until she could get back on her feet, rather than “thousands of homeless” your readers begin to form a picture of your impact and a emotional relationship with your organization. Be descriptive with your prospects and give them a vision of the tangibility of your organization through the art of telling a story. Spin a heart-opening tale and watch as purse-strings loosen.

Emotions act first

2009-02-09T10:29:00.000-08:00

Everyone knows the central goal of all advertising efforts is to persuade the prospect to act on your appeal to them and buy into your product, service or cause. Persuasion seems as if it should be simple, right? Simply explain the benefits of your product and your prospect should want to purchase. If only it were this simple. Research shows our brains don’t take decision-making quite so lightly—they make decisions in a much more complex manner.

The human brain is comprised of two main decision-processing stations. The first station is referred to by researchers as the “First Brain” or what is commonly knows as our Limbic System. The Limbic System is the root of our primary emotions, such as survival instincts, desires and self-protection. This system is the first stop on the road to decision-making.

The second station in our brain is referred to as the “New Brain” or the Cerebrum and Cerebral Cortex. The Cerebral Cortex is responsible for organizing, retaining, communicating, learning and creating. In short, this is the root of our logic. This system is the second stop in our decision-making process.

As a message travels through the brain, it is stopped at the emotional First Brain before it is allowed to proceed through to the logical New Brain. Many advertisers make the mistake of thinking that a logical presentation of information will sell their product, however this brain model refutes this thinking. In order for your message to be processed logically, it must first be processed emotionally. Credibility is the secret to getting through the gate-keeping, emotional First Brain.

Credibility basically translates to trust, and transparency and like-ability are two key factors in building trust. If your brand and promotion are transparent and honest in nature and presented in a like-able manner, they are likely to be allowed through to the logical brain. Less like-able brands and shady promotion tactics will always be questioned at the gate-keeping First Brain station, and will require more information before these messages are allowed to proceed.

Over all, this research shows that we base our initial response to messaging on our emotional reactions, and support these reactions with logical information evaluated by our logical minds. When creating your next mail campaign, be sure to keep this in mind. Create your promotions to be honest, transparent and like-able, and you will be able to connect with and persuade your audience much easier.

This post is based on information presented in the book, Design for Response: Creative Direct Marketing that Works, by Leslie H. Sherr and David J. Katz.

Streamline your statement mailings

2009-01-26T09:08:00.000-08:00

Is your utility company trying to cut costs for the coming year? If so, are you still trying to manage your statement mailings in-house? Although manufacturing your statements in-house may seem like a money-saving procedure, many organizations, like utilities, who use monthly statements are finding that keeping up with emerging USPS technologies and requirements is getting to be more and more costly.

If you are feeling overwhelmed with keeping up with the ever-changing USPS regulations, it may be time to consider outsourcing your statement mailings. Here are a few things to consider:

Cost and ability to keep up with changing standards
Direct mail is in a state of constant change. In order to keep receiving the best postage rate for your statements, you need to keep up with specific USPS standards. Should you miss a step, you could end up costing yourself a significant sum of money. Working with a professional mailing company means that you are hiring a source who must keep up-to-date with all changes made by the USPS—their business relies on it.

Cost of your statement processing personnel
Even if you are managing to keep up with the ever-changing USPS standards and equipment, is it taking your personnel too long to process your statements? If you were to hire a professional mailing company, they should be able to process a 10,000-piece, single-sheet statement mailing in about 3 hours. Given the increased speed of processing, hiring a professional printing and mailing company may prove to be a more affordable option than funding the salaries of individuals who process your statements.

Cost of miseducation and errors
Do your mailings often end up in a rush to get out, due to the complexity of the task? Do mistakes result? Do your personnel find themselves repeating tasks due to miseducation or changing standards. How much could it be costing you not only in postage and supply costs, but in wasted salaries when an error is made or tasks are needlessly repeated? When you choose to outsource your statement mailings, you are hiring a company who has statement mailing down to a streamlined science, which means your mailings get out on-time and on-budget.

Think like your customer

2009-01-20T15:00:00.000-08:00

Have you ever received a mail piece that just seemed to make no sense to you? Did the piece advertise odd features of a product, or was it hard to read? You can learn a lesson from these mailers and when its your turn to create your mail piece, make sure to create it from your customer’s point of view.

But how exactly do you think like your customer?

First off, realize what’s important to you, might not be important to your customer. As you are conceptualizing your piece, try to think about the features of your product, service or event that stand out to you as a user. Depending on your subject, these may be quite different than what stands out to you as an observer within your organization. For example, you may be tempted to use technical verbiage that is meaningful within your organization, but is not easily understandable to your end user. It may be in your best interested to explain the technical verbiage to the prospect, or choose simpler verbiage when applicable.

Second, narrow your focus for quicker communication. Often, direct mailers make the mistake of trying to fit too much information within a small space. Too much information leads to clutter. In today’s over-messaged marketplace, simple stands out. Direct mail offers are processed quickly by your readers, and in order to make an impact within the short amount of time your readers give each mail piece, you must be concise and targeted in your concept. Give the reader only as much information as they need to take your desired action—call your office, log on to your website or stop by your facility, etc. There’s a good chance that you will still need to offer your prospect more information once they contact you but remember, the goal of direct mail is to acquire qualified, interested leads that you can convert into sales once the prospect contacts you.

Finally, give your prospects a good reason to call. The most important part of your direct mail promotion is the offer, and you’d better make it compelling enough to get a response. Remember the old adage, you’ve gotta give something to get something. A temporary discount, and added bonus or even a valuable packet of information can be great offers. All-too-often mailers make the mistake of simply offering their information up to prospects with “nothing in it” for the prospect. In today’s self-centric society, the offer, or customer benefit, is what gets your prospects to call.