Measuring the effectiveness of a marketing campaign is equally as crucial as getting the campaign out in the first place. It’s crucial to have a plan in place for quantifying the value of your efforts. You don’t want your members to throw away your mailers without any interaction. You don’t want to miss an opportunity while also losing money from unsuccessful direct mail campaigns.
If your response rates are well below average for your industry, it’s time to evaluate what is and isn’t working for your direct mail items. It could be the type of mail you are sending (postcard, brochure, envelope) or the message within your mailer. You need to send offers and discounts based on the targeted audience you decided to pinpoint.
Stress Testing
Consult your previous data before starting a new marketing campaign. You always want to improve response rates. The best way to improve response rates is to continue finetuning your direct mail outreach. You can learn from previous data and build new projects that will produce better responses.
Stress testing is a great way to determine if a project will succeed before committing to a project long term. If a stress test reveals a project will not be successful, you will save time and money and can continue building a better project before sending out mailers.
How to Measure Responses
Here are three ways to measure the success of your direct mail project.
Include a custom, trackable URL
You can include unique URL’s into your mailers that link your members to a landing page built specifically for your direct mail campaign. You can take this step a little further by including a personalized URL (pURL) — for example, “yourwebsite.com/their-name”.
A URL provides excellent insight into the effectiveness of your direct mail marketing because it’s easily trackable. You can use the same analytics tools to measure other elements of your website. You can discover how many people are seeking further information from your mailer by visiting the URL.
If people aren’t using your URL, it’s time to brainstorm what to change that will encourage participation from your recipients. Keep your direct mail simple and straightforward while including a URL that will provide the member will more detail.
Include a trackable phone number
Not everyone likes to go online to find out more information. Some people prefer calling a number to get more details. You can include trackable phone numbers in place of or in addition to URLs. You can measure responses based on the calls to the toll-free number. You should be transparent with members in stating what they can expect by calling a number. Make offers and discounts enticing so that people will call the number right away.
If people are not calling your trackable numbers often, it’s time to evaluate why. You can determine if your offer wasn’t clear enough or if it wasn’t worth exploring more in the eyes of your members.
Include a QR code
QR codes are barcodes that can be scanned using a smartphone’s camera. After scanning the barcode, the recipient goes to the targeted landing page. QR codes are another great way to encourage member’s to pursue additional information while sharing an offer. Make it clear that the purpose of the code is for the member to scan it with their phone.
Also, make sure the landing page is mobile-friendly. Otherwise, someone may quickly close the page if it’s challenging to navigate on their phone.
If people are not scanning QR codes, think about why. Is that offer best presented as a QR code? Maybe another technique like URL’s or toll-free numbers would be more effective.
Make Your Direct Mail Work Through Valtim
Valtim has an abundance of products and services to help your organization’s direct mail projects thrive. We can assist with stress testing projects before you commit to a project. We can also show you how to analyze previous direct mail data to ensure future projects continue to improve. In addition to stress testing, we can help you add URL’s/pURL’s, create and monitor toll-free numbers, and add QR codes to your mailers. If your response rates are not what you desire, we can continue working with you. Together, we will build the best strategy to encourage your members to accept offers from your organization.
