What Are The Typical Direct Mail Response Rates?
Marketing & Sales Promotion Techniques
Trying to figure out what your direct mail response rates 20111 will be? Over the course of a marketing campaign, it becomes important to know just which parts of it are the most effective. It’s easy enough to gauge how well a radio campaign has done, and it’s usually fairly clear how well a television spot has fared. But when it comes to figuring out how well a direct mailing campaign has done, it can be dicey at best as to the exact numbers generated. However, there are some basic guidelines to at least estimate the direct mail response rates are for a given mailing and some tips on how to get better information as well.
First, on a non-targeted, blanket mailing the overall sales statistics hold true for direct mail response rates. For every thousand that get it, one will read. For every thousand that read, one will call. For every thousand that call, one will buy. The thing about that statistical universe is the fact that it holds true for virtually any untargeted marketing campaign, whether it’s TV or radio, a magazine ad or a direct mailing. But there are ways to improve those numbers.
One way is to go for a specific audience. A targeted mail campaign will generate ten times the amount of responses versus a non-targeted one in terms of direct mail response rates. A targeted group will be one that has expressed some level of interest in your product or service, either from another marketing campaign or from some other source that enables you to filter out people who aren’t interested. This could be a convention or trade show where people are going from booth to booth that they have an interest in. That enables you to get some information from them, either as a scan of their pass or a business card, so you can include them in a specific group. This means when you do a direct mailing, you’ll actually be expecting a fairly high rate of return.
Regardless of which method you’re using, one way to get a good grasp on how effective it is will be to use online resources for them to connect to. Having them go to a website or email for more information will give you some fairly accurate information as to how many people actually “bit” on your mailing.
Just remember, the quality of what you’re mailing will also affect response. You’ll get a higher response with coupons or special offers and you’ll get better hits when you give free samples away. Regardless of what you do, keep in mind that seasonal sales will also affect the direct mail response rates as well.