THE DIRECT MARKETING DIVA: FAILURE-PROOF YOUR CAMPAIGN The five top blunders to avoid. A few years ago, a well-known language school ran a full-page ad in an airline magazine offering new students tuition discounts. But I doubt it received many responses to this generous offer. In a major design faux pas, the company printed the coupon on a black background with white lettering. Result: No one could fill it out. It must have been a costly mistake. And recently, a resort owner came to me to find out why his expensive direct marketing campaign wasn't working. He printed a beautiful, 26-page brochure of the hotel and its amenities and sent it to people who travel. But no one contacted the company for more information. Not a soul. What did he do wrong? Well, it turned out he didn't include an 800 number or an order form. We reprinted the brochures and included contact information and a $100 rebate if customers called within the next two months. Not surprisingly, he had great a response rate. These examples show that even an expensive and well-executed direct marketing campaigns can go awry, if you don't pay attention to the basics. Here are five common mistakes. 1. No game plan. Time and time again, I find marketers who spend hours going over the creative aspects of their campaign without giving any thought to the more practical, but less exciting matters. It makes no sense to think about what kind of photos you're going to use on your brochures, if you haven't even figured out how many customers you expect to reach and whether you can deliver your products, or services, to them. To come up with an estimate of the number of responses you're likely to receive from your promotions, look at how many you've had in the past. If this is your first campaign, expect a response rate between 0.5% and 3%. That means that if you mail 1,000 pieces and you have a 3% response rate, you can anticipate 30 orders. If you mail 100,000 pieces and anticipate a 2.5% response rate, you can expect 2,500 orders. This will give you an idea of how many people you should have on staff in your call center and how many products you should have on hand. 2. No special offers. It amazes me the number of businesses who launch direct mail or e-mail campaigns without special offers. Telling people about your company and its products isn't enough. Studies show that special offers can increase your response rate by as much as 40%. To find out what deals attract the most customers, test a few. If you send direct mail packages to 5,000 names, give half of them a "hard offer" and the others a "soft offer." A hard offer is something tangible that the customer can hold in his or her hands. An example would be an offer like this: "When you buy this cleaning product, we'll also send you a bottle of our amazing floor cleaner." A soft offer is usually a service. A mutual fund company could say, "We'd like to offer you a free evaluation to review your portfolio to be certain it will meet your future financial needs." 3. Wrong target group. Many marketers think sending brochures to a large number of people will automatically bring in new customers. But this shotgun approach doesn't make sense. You'll waste a lot of time and money if you don't focus on your target market. To successfully find people most likely to buy from you, you need to know two things: 1) Who buys from you now and what are their characteristics? 2) Where can you find people who are similar to your current customers? A good place to find comparable clients is from list brokers. They have thousands and thousands of lists. If you want to target people who'd be interested in commemorative coins, you can ask the broker for a list of people who have bought coins in the past. You don't have to pay the broker for a description of the different lists that might pertain to your business. You pay a fee when you buy the list from the list's owner. 4. Outdated information. Many marketers don't spend the time keeping their customer database up-to-date. As a result, they wind up spending money mailing material to people who have moved or closed up shop. To prevent this, send out address correction requests in regular intervals to your entire database. When you get mail that's been returned to you, spend the time updating your customer lists. Many companies don't do this, simply because it's a chore. But you'll waste a lot of money on postage and brochures if you send them to people who aren't there anymore. 5. Expensive campaigns. Marketers often get so caught up in how their material looks that they forget to determine how much it will cost. Don't bother splurging on a splashy four-color brochure that won't pay for itself in new business. Calculate how much you expect to profit from your campaign and then you can make a realistic budget. You don't have to spend a lot of money. Simple letters that focus on your customers' needs and how your company can meet them is the best-and cheapest-approach. Remember the only way to truly measure the success of your direct-marketing campaign is with more business. Derby Management 399 Boylston Street, Boston, MA 02116 Tel: 617-292-7420