Direct Mail Is Popular with Millennials

Direct Mail is Popular With Millennials

Direct Mail Popular With Millennials

Direct Mail is Popular With Millennials
Before we discuss the importance of direct mail and how it relates to millennials let’s cover what a millennial is first. A millennial, while there is no solid consensus established, is typically 18/22 through 34/37 years old. They are born before generation z and after baby boomers.

Confronting The Myth

"Millennials don't care about physical mail"

You may think that millennials value physical mail less than non-millennials, however, recent research conducted by Summit Research for USPS concluded that it’s just not true. They found that regardless of age, most consumers get their mail at the first opportunity and millennials are at least as engaged as non-millennials with their physical mail.

Actually, millennials do appreciate receiving direct mail!

When you look at page 12 in the statistics provided in the USPS Mail Moment report, we can see clear evidence that 86% of people actually take the time to look through the mail and 89% of those millennials picked up their mail at the first opportunity, which, indicates a high level of value.
Mail Attitudes Graph

Inundated With Technology

Millennials grew up with constant advertising attention online and most of them need a break

Mail plays an important role to the consumer, on any level, and while you may think the internet would have made things like direct mail obsolete, with its ability to reach billions of people on a daily basis, you can always depend on the tried and true method of direct mail to stick around longer and add value to any ad retargeting or email campaign.
The millennial age demographic is one that grew up with quickly evolving technologies, which, makes them more tech-savvy than other age groups in general. Growing up in a time where the world was becoming increasingly networked socially means that they, as a byproduct, are the generation that has received the most marketing attention. You would think that would mean that they would only be paying attention to email marketing, online retargeting, and social media advertisements, but, according to the USPS Mail Moment report, we can see clear evidence that direct mail might be more effective.
Young Adults

Mail Is Inherently More Exciting Than Online Ads

Due to an increase in digital advertising direct mail marketing is natively exciting because of its tangibility

This high level of importance of direct mail could stem from our general excitement about receiving physical mail. When it comes to marketing in general a tangible piece of mail is valued more than an email or retargeting banner. This is partly due to nostalgia and also partly due to the excess of information we receive digitally on a daily basis making direct mail a welcomed change of pace instead of the emails we may mindlessly delete from our inboxes.

Use The Right Channels

Just because direct mail works doesn’t mean you can’t build an even better campaign

Creating a campaign that relates to millennials revolves around a vertically integrated marketing approach that starts with a direct mail campaign, follows with an email blast, and then a set of online retargeting banners to create repetition for the user. The more they see your offer, grand opening event details, or new sale, the more likely they are to respond to your marketing efforts.
Multi Channel

Contact us today to learn about our vertically integrated marketing approach and what we can do to help maximize your ROI and drive sales to your bottom line!

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Still the One Stronger than Ever

Still The One Direct Mail better than ever

Still the one and Stronger Than Ever

Still The One Direct Mail better than ever

When you think of the future of marketing, what comes to mind?

A savvy business person knows that it is wise to diversify their marketing efforts, rather than to focus exclusively on one channel. In this day and age, it’s easy to consider more traditional methods of marketing your business to be old news, but what you might not have considered is that nearly two-thirds of people have made a purchase as a result of a direct mail piece!*

Each day, the battle to be heard and seen online becomes more competitive and more expensive. Each day, your clients are inundated with more and more junk email that they will never read, and they may never even know that they are missing out on what you have to offer! Fortunately, at Spectrum Marketing Companies we have numerous ways in which Direct Mail can be employed to lift your business above the fray so that when your piece arrives in the mail, it is only the beginning.
Direct Mail Formats

Drive Consumers to Your Website Using an Enticing Offer or Promotion

Simply asking people to go to your website is ineffective unless there is a compelling reason for doing so. Offer them a free trial or sample. Advertise a complimentary seminar. Herald a grand opening with savings coupons. There should be a clear call to action. Consider promoting a sense of urgency with a limited window of opportunity. It’s marketing 101: people respond more readily when they have a limited window to act before an opportunity will pass them by. Think of your direct mail as an appetizer, and give your clients a taste of what you can do for them!
Killer 2 Direct Mail

Add Texture

A plastic gift card is an excellent way to add curiosity-inspiring “bulk” to your mail piece. Oh, and it happens to be a phenomenal vehicle for your offer. Non-retailers, such as hospitals or educational institutions can easily replicate the effect with a magnet or other interesting feature that recipients will want to retain.

Use Variable, Personalized Copy

This creates the feeling that your marketing efforts are pointedly focused on specific consumers. Address them by name! We can customize each piece to specifically address each customer on your mailing list, swap out fundraising donation values depending on your customer’s financial status, and even change coupon offers from one customer to the next to target each consumer.
Tan promotion - direct mail

Add Excitement

Build excitement with a match-and-win prize number or a scratch off. Adding the anticipation of unveiling additional prizes or deeper discounts for your promotion is an irresistible way to have your potential customers spend more time reviewing your offers. A match-and-win giveaway that offers an attainable prize (think $2,500 shopping spree – not a yacht), adds stopping power, elicits interest and makes the trip to your location well worth the drive. Not to mention, when someone wins, you’ll build good will, get credit for the sale of the prize, and have a story to tell that your Facebook followers will actually read. Spectrum can coordinate prize insurance for only 7% of the retail value of the prize!

Add Interest

Die cuts add originality and functionality. Clever design, unique shapes and perforations help you capture attention, stand out from your competition and increase the ease of response.
Physical advertisements, like direct mail, are proven to have more influence than other forms of advertising, cause recipients to spend more time with your message (and remember it) and elicit a stronger emotional response. Direct Mail, coupled with your other marketing efforts can create a cohesive, yet diverse array of tools to drive your business.
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In Their Own Words Kevin Chauvette

Kevin Chauevette - Testimonial

In Their Own Words: Kevin Chauvette

Kevin Chauevette - Testimonial

Mail Works

“In my opinion, there are only 2 ways to grow a business; bring in more new customers, or increase the amount spent or frequency of visit of each current customer. Spectrum has helped with both of these goals. I highly recommend giving them a try, or increasing your marketing efforts with them if you are already utilizing them.”

We Make It Easy

“My representative, Steve Rifkin, handles everything for me and has gone way beyond the expected to provide excellent service. Service like this is very rare these days!”

Try Adding Interest

“With the addition of the hard, credit card sized gift card, I find that people hang onto [my mail piece] much longer, and my success has exceeded the bar that I have set for my marketing.”

There's More For You

“Working with Spectrum has been very simple. I took a tour several months ago and it was well worth my time. I discovered that Spectrum does so much more than I ever thought, and in fact, the idea for the gift card mailer came from a tour of their facility.”
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Show Your Customers Some Love

Postcard Mailer

Show Your Customers Some Love

Postcard Mailer
Focusing on your current customers could mean a better ROI for your future marketing campaigns.

Invest in Customer Retention

This Valentine’s Day, or every day, is a good time to think of your customers and show them how much they mean to your business. Your current customers are some of your greatest assets and you can take full advantage of that by focusing on customer retention.
A benefit of focusing on your current customers is that you will spend less money on marketing to them than you will spend trying to acquire new customers. Some things you can do to help retain your current customers include:

Send Customer Appreciation Direct Mail

Sending frequent communications in the form of direct mail that shows how much you appreciate your customers. Customer appreciation direct mail, or customer retention direct mail, could take several different forms: box toppers with coupons that get included with each order, oversized direct mail pieces, like the Monster Mailer, that feature special offers and coupons or even a card mailer with special offers for your best customers.

Listen to Your Customers

Listening to your customers by setting up channels to field incoming feedback and using them to better your products and services. Your customers will tell you a lot: what they like, what they don’t like and what they’d like to see from your business. By making it easy for customers to submit feedback, you can receive and act on their feedback to help make your business-to-customer relationship better. Remember, it’s all about the customer experience – if they don’t feel satisfied with what you offer, they will go elsewhere.

Engage With Your Customers

Using social media platforms to engage with your customers frequently in a positive and courteous manner. Customers will nearly always resort to social media to share a bad experience with a business. Change the norm by inviting customers to share great experiences with your business, placing an order, and interacting with staff. Engage with them to show that you’re actively involved in your social media presence.
If you don’t go out of your way to remind people that your company exists, they might buy products or services from your competitors. Coupons are a valuable tool for retaining existing customers and asking past customers to give your company another try. You can tailor your direct marketing offers to consumer behavior for the biggest impact.
Full Throttle tri fold mailer
SMC Autoservice Mailer
Killer 2 3D Mailer

Speaking of big impacts, did you know that 20% of your current customers will provide 80% of your future revenue? Things Remembered knows this and made an effort to market specifically to their current customers to increase their ROI.

In an effort to increase sales and consumer traffic at its 800 retail stores, pink-and-red postcards will be sent to consumers who bought at Things Remembered for Valentine’s Day last year.
“Things Remembered Woos Customers for Valentine’s Day” – DMN

Spectrum Marketing has the experience to help you with a custom tailored direct mail campaign with targeted email. Give us a call now to see how we can help your customer retention today!
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Monumental Sales Promotions

Monumental Sales Promotions

Monumental Sales Promotions

Monumental Sales Promotions

Focus On Your Customers. Don't Just Send Them a Half-hearted Email. They Are Worth More Than That.

According to the Gartner Group, 20% of your current customers will provide a whopping 80% of your future revenue!
So how do you get them to include you on their winter shopping expeditions? Remind them why they love doing business with you! The best way to do that is to give them an irresistible incentive to come back (offer), a specific time to visit (urgency) and use a method they are most likely to respond to (direct mail).
Direct mail is easier to read and recall. In fact, unaided brand recall with a physical advertisement is 75%, (swamping digital which has only 44%) and over 18% of people say they would respond to direct mail if they were a previous customer (over three times more likely than non-customers).
Direct mail drives traffic. Over 52% of recipients immediately scan or read retail & restaurant direct mail and respond by visiting a website or social media, going to a store location, or a combination of these methods.
The high payoff of using direct mail to reach out to your customers is well worth the cost and effort, but it shouldn’t be your only method of outreach. Combine your direct mail campaign with targeted email, retargeting and social media ads to really lift response and acquire new prospects. Make sure your location is geared to direct customers and attract prospects with appropriate signage and point-of-purchase materials.

When Are You Supposed To Do All of This?

Focus on themed promotions around major holiday weekends. Your customers are already accustomed to looking for bargains during these periods, and it’s easier to ask them to visit you when they are in this mindset rather than to change their buying behavior. There are some exceptions that can yield excellent weekend sales, anniversary sales, special clearance sales, (moving, re-opening, remodeling, etc.) and VIP customer appreciation sales to name a few.
The key is to let your customers know about the promotion in a way that can cut through the clutter:
  • Use over-sized mail pieces with high-impact design highlighting the offers
  • Combine your mail with a follow-up email reminding your customers of the promotion
  • Offer friends & family referral rewards discounts
It is no coincidence then that direct mail now holds 5.3% response rate from a house list and 2.9% response from a prospect list (up 1.6% and 1.9% respectively from 2015).
Spectrum Marketing has proven direct mail promotions for all of your upcoming events, as well as the expertise to get your message noticed and delivered to your customers on time. With the rush of winter businesses, the best time to get started is RIGHT NOW.
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Get off the Wall with Signs!

Off the Wall with Signs

Get Off The Walls With Signs

Postcard Mailer

Advertisements Are Everywhere

In this day and age, everyone is drowning in advertisements. Everywhere we look, we’re surrounded. “BUY ONE GET ONE FREE!”, “HUGE DISCOUNTS!”, “ACT NOW WHILE SUPPLIES LAST!”… it can all just blend together to the point where none of it really grabs your attention. At Spectrum Marketing, we have a solution that will literally have you standing out from your competitors.

Large Format Dimensional Signs

Dimensional signs go beyond the norm, beyond being just another advertisement and become the high-profile advertising solution you need to get your message seen.

Our large format dimensional signs provide nearly infinite possibilities for you to creatively market your business in a way that will seize the eyes of the passer-by and demand their attention. Give us a call today, and we can help get you on the path to success!

How Do I Get Started

First, we will discuss with you what you hope to achieve with your new dimensional signs. Perhaps you have a new product that deserves the royal treatment to kick it off, or you have a limited time offer for which you need to create awareness. Whatever your needs, we can fulfill them.
After helping you conceptualize your idea, the project will move along to our graphics department where we can create anything you want, much faster than you would have ever thought possible! Our talented creative team has years of experience creating stunning dimensional signs that are certain to achieve the RESULTS you’re looking for.

After approval of final artwork, your sign will be produced and can be installed by one of our 3M Certified installers in 5 to 10 business days. From call to concept to on the wall. It’s that simple! Call us today and STAND OUT FROM THE CROWD!”

Pizza 911 Flat Dimensional looking signage
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In Their Own Words

Klem's Success Story and Testimonial

In Their Own Words

Klem's Success Story and Testimonial
As a smaller company, it is important for us to make certain our advertising is effective, and Spectrum Marketing Companies’ exceptional work has had a tremendous impact on our sales! Klem’s would not be where it is today if not for our dependable and professional partnership with them. Spectrum is the backbone of our advertising strategy and has consistently produced excellent, effective results. They clearly have the experience and skill to make a business successful, and our work with them has been both positive and productive.
Since advertising with their direct mail campaigns, which included several response coupons, we have seen a huge increase in traffic to our store, which translates into more leads. The response we got from our spring targeted piece was astonishing – we received back over 800 coupons! In addition, we mail quarterly, personalized Rewards certificates to our loyalty customers. We provide the mailing list, and they do the rest. It’s that easy! It was a great added bonus to offer to the consumer. As we explore different advertising methods, we look forward to continuing the use of these inserts to grow our current customer base.
We advertise in other media and design magazines, but our customers mention Spectrum far more than any other source. We plan to continue making Spectrum a part of all our ongoing marketing efforts because we’re confident it works! For anyone looking for high integrity, and professionally minded advertising, Spectrum Marketing is the company of choice.

– Jess and Mike Klem

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Direct Mail Outperforms All Digital Channels

Direct Mail Holiday Response Out Performs

Direct Mail Outperforms All Marketing Media

Direct Mail Holiday Response Out Performs

Direct Mail Response Rates

Outperforms all digital channels

One critical distinction direct mail continues to hold is its ability to generate a large volume of response in a localized market. While close in cost-per-acquisition to social and other digital channels, direct mail maintains the ability to cost-effectively generate a higher volume of response in a defined geography which is a critical distinction for local marketers.

For example, a local fitness center may be able to generate 50 new members through a PPC or social media campaign but needs to drive 350 new members each month to meet their operating objectives. This is where direct mail shines! The 50 members generated through various digital channels are often the low hanging fruit that has already entered the market on their own and finds the business through their own proactive efforts.

Direct mail takes a more intrusive approach by presenting offers to consumers that would not otherwise have been planning on making a buying decision and pulling them into the market to take advantage of a strong offer.

With so much attention being placed on emerging technologies and digital media trends, direct mail often gets overshadowed. However, successful marketers are driven by results and ROI which direct mail continues to deliver.
The 2017 Direct Marketing Association response rate report published the following key facts regarding direct mail relative to digital channels.

Direct Mail

Direct mail achieves a 5.1% response rate with a house list and a 2.9% response rate with a prospect list.

All Digital Channels Combined

Combined response rate of only 2%

(Email 0.2% for a Prospect list and 0.6% for House/Total list; Social Media 0.4%; Paid Search 0.6%; Display Advertising 0.2%)

Industry Facts

35% of respondents expect to increase the amount of direct mail in the coming year. 46% expect to use the same amount.

Stick With What Works

Marketers continue to embrace multichannel marketing, with 52% of the respondents using three or more channels for their marketing efforts. In these instances, the most popular channels tend to be direct mail, email and social media.
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Make Direct Mail Greener

making it all greener

Ways that you can join Spectrum in becoming more environmentally friendly

making it all greener

How you can make direct mail greener

  • Use finished product sizes that maximize sheet or web-roll yield and reduce the amount of trimmed paper waste. We’ll make recommendations for you!
  • Remember: simply because a piece was designed a certain way does not mean that it has been formatted in the best possible size.
  • Choose to avoid the application of varnish or aqueous coatings. This reduces excessive chemical finishing and consumption.
  • Reduce paper thickness! Consider changing the basis weight (e.g. 80# to 70#). Fewer fibers are needed per sheet of paper, saving resources.
  • Paper Brightness Use paper bright enough for, but not exceeding, the design needs. Increasing brightness may require more bleach and other chemicals in the pulping process.
  • Select paper stocks that are post consumer content recycled. Many paper selections are available and consider avoiding papers that are heavily finished with extra gloss or additional coatings from the mill. Consider avoiding papers that are heavily finished with extra gloss or additional coatings from the mill.
  • Eliminate over matter. Know the quantity or pieces that you will need for your project before you place an order. Don’t guess, plan ahead!
  • Spectrum uses inks that contain vegetable-based products and is friendly to the environment.
  • Be diligent and clean your database mailing lists. Start by purging incomplete, outdated, and duplicate records. Consider “house holding” and eliminating records outside your geographical reach. Always verify and update your list against a certified address correction and national change of address registry software. We can do this for you!
eco friendly recycling leaf

Spectrum is committed to reducing waste and potential adverse environmental impact associated with glossy and post-print coatings.

Join Spectrum in recycling paper and metal products!

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6 Reasons Why Your Direct Marketing Should Include Coupons

6 reasons why you should include coupons on your direct mail

6 reasons your direct marketing should include coupons

auto service direct marketing

Including coupons in your marketing helps create loyal customers

The right direct marketing strategy will help you build loyal relationships with customers and make it more likely people will turn to your business when they need a product or service you sell. These days, many shoppers are tightening their belts and trying to do more with less money, making coupons and direct marketing a winning combination.

Not convinced? Here are just six of the reasons you can’t afford to leave coupons out of your direct mail campaigns.

1. Customer Tracking

Sending coupons to customers creates extra opportunities for tracking their behavior. If you send two or three different offers, you will be able to see which offer generates the greatest return on your investment. Including unique tracking codes in each mailing makes it easy to collect data without asking customers to fill out surveys.

2. Targeted Campaigns

Using coupons makes it easy to target your campaigns to specific groups of customers. Want to promote a baby product to new mothers? Design a coupon with pastel colors and pictures of items associated with child care – rattlers, pacifiers, or baby bottles, for example. Selling professional services? Capture interest by designing a coupon with your target audience in mind. Someone in need of a bookkeeper would probably respond better to a conservative design than one with a lot of different colors and font styles.

3. Increased Loyalty

Repeated contact with customers – if they have given you permission to contact them – helps build loyalty. Use your direct marketing coupon campaign to reward people for their past purchases, share birthday wishes with your most valuable customers, or offer special perks to a segment of your list.

4. Customer Retention

If you don’t go out of your way to remind people that your company exists, they might buy products or services from your competitors. Coupons are a valuable tool for retaining existing customers and asking past customers to give your company another try. Tailor your direct marketing offers to consumer behavior for the biggest impact.

5. Brand Reinforcement

Do you know any advertising jingles by heart, even if you haven’t heard them in years? It’s hard to forget those catchy commercials for Meow Mix and Kit Kat bars. Mailing coupons is much more affordable than producing and airing a jingle. You want customers to be able to quickly identify your brand every time you send a mailing.

Reinforce your brand by using these design elements consistently in your direct marketing:

  • Slogans/taglines
  • Logos and pictures
  • Background and text colors
  • Text styles

6. Higher ROI

Because mailing coupons is so affordable, it typically has a higher return on investment. Target your customers carefully to increase their chances of redeeming your offer, or else your mailing will not be a success. Many business owners believe they will lose money by mailing coupons, but there are many good reasons to incorporate coupons into your direct marketing strategy. If you target your offers correctly, you will give customers a reason to visit your store and remain loyal to your brand.

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