Great Links!

TGIF! And welcome to another edition of the Friday Blog Log. Here are some of our favorite links of the week.

Have you ever wondered what to do when your client calls you and says,"My direct mail campaign is failing miserably!" Instead of hiding under your desk, the Caslon Blog, "Worth Knowing," suggests that you dig right in and perform 3 simple steps to save the day. Here's an interesting point that we sometimes forget when we're in the middle of "life or death direct mail." It's behooves everyone to be successful -- both you and your client. This post brings up the point that it doesn't do the client any good to blame the consultant. It just makes them look like they didn't choose well. Instead, the post suggests that by being proactive, you can bring news -- good or bad-- very quickly to the client. This way you can plan together what steps to take very quickly, and how to implement a plan for immediate improvement.

There has been a lot of talk about what makes for a successful e-mail. We posted on this topic this week, as well, and discussed the importance of the from line, the subject line, and the preview pane. Dean Rieck, in his Direct Creative Blog, talks about creating compelling e-marketing campaigns from a copywriters perspective. On this post, he gives some really great advice on the copy and design elements of an e-mail message. In addition, he talks to the points of keeping the e-mail highly relevant and not too self-promotional. Make sure you don't miss this post for some excellent insight to consider for you next campaign!

We are huge fans of Becky Carroll's blog, Customers Rock! This week, she posted on how Wells Fargo has focused on wowing its customers -- then taking the next step and displaying this philosophy on the walls in the banks. Becky posts an excerpt of this philosophy from the banks website. It is really great to see a large bank take this step. This is definitely setting them apart from their competition, and I've experienced this customer focus myself when I recently switched banks and became a Wells Fargo customer. I've been very pleased with their customer service. They really consistently have gone the extra step for me. So, I know first hand that they aren't simply putting up posters. They really are practicing what they preach in the banking locations.

Finally, it looks like we may have missed out on a fun and interesting blogging event! Damn -- we hate it when that happens. There have been a plethora of posts regarding the Blogger Social '08 which was recently held in New York. I liked Servant Of Chaos, Gavin Heaton's blog post on the postmortem the best. Gavin talks about the huge sense of community that exists between bloggers -- and it's one that we experience every day. The title of the blog, "From Community to Family," sort of sums the whole thing up. Next year we're going!

Have a great weekend!

Case Study Monday: Imago Digital

Welcome to another edition of Case Study Monday. Today, we'd like to highlight a very forward-thinking direct marketing firm, Imago Digital, a division of MMI. We were lucky enough to meet these folks at a recent trade show and subsequent plant tour last week. They are a very impressive company indeed!

The reason why we really like this company is that they are extremely customer-focused. They have refined and tweaked their capabilities over time in order to help their clients continually create success through every direct marketing campaign -- and do it as business needs continually evolve.

Here is an example of some success that they were able to create for Olympic College, a two-year public college located in Bremerton, Washington.

Business Need: Olympic College needed to increase their enrollment. They knew they needed to do it via direct marketing, but they needed a vehicle that would be faster than traditional "reply" cards, and they needed to target the specific needs of their "high-tech" audience.

Strategy: Olympic brought in the experts from Imago Digital to create a direct marketing strategy that would communicate to each prospect individually through variable data direct mail. In addition, they added a personalized url (purl) as a response channel for this highly web-savvy audience.

They utilized a blueprint that included a colorful introductory postcard that was personalized on both the front and the back, and included the purl. Once the respondent went to their web page, they landed on a "VIP Welcome Page" personalized just for them. They were then able to answer a short survey regarding their educational needs, update a personal profile, and were immediately sent a thank you email for their interest. As the follow-up emails were sent out thanking the respondent, the information was also sent out to the Olympic College sales team for an immediate sales touch.

Through this process, Olympic was able to provide the most relevant information for each prospective student while at the same time building a great -- and clean -- opted in database for their direct marketing use. You really need to visit imago's website so that you can see the entire case study with the postcard and web page views. It's very well done!

Results: Olympic College sent out 3,226 pieces to high school students. Out of that number:

• 90 (2.79% visit rate) students visited their personalized landing pages
• 70 (2.36% response rate) students completed the survey
• Of the 70 respondents, 34 enrolled for classes at Olympic College!

How about the ROI?

• The cost of the campaign was about $5,000
• Each student who enrolled spent $5,500 on average
• Total of $187,000 in revenues generated from this campaign
  

Wow! What a great success story. We hope you enjoy it as much as we did!

Have a great week!

What I Saw at the Direct Marketing Revolution

As readers of our blog, I know that you will love this Facebook group. It was started and is managed by our buddy, Robert Rosenthal of the Mothers of Invention fame (he also writes a great blog called Freaking Marketing). The group has recently grown to the 700 member mark -- pretty outstanding for such a young group. If you haven't yet joined the group, you may want to take a look -- I'll bet you'll love the exchange of information between direct marketers from all over the world.

I'm featuring it in today's post because of a really compelling discussion thread that's been going on for the last couple of months. Robert sent out the following idea for the consideration of all group members:

Knocking Down Organizational and Cultural Barriers

Organizational and cultural barriers are often among the biggest obstacles marketers face. Common issues include:

- Bosses who embrace command-and-control techniques
- Staffers who operate under counterproductive agendas
- Managers who act as protectors of the status quo
- Senior managers who fail to budget for innovation
- Environments that discourage bold experimentation

Yet some marketers find ways to do groundbreaking work – even in organizations not known for innovation. What techniques have you used to break through organizational and cultural barriers?

Well, did he ever evoke some great reactions on this topic!
The first replies started out by talking about the simple fact that companies need to be able to communicate better. It's true -- we've all been there. Marketing doing things in secret and hiding what they are doing from IT because their view is that IT will most assuredly stop all forward progress. Sales seeking out their own better-qualified leads as opposed to using those that Marketing supplies them -- because in their view, Marketing simply doesn't "get" who the customer is, therefore, they feed them lousy leads. Leadership cuts Marketing budgets because they view Marketing only as a cost center and refuses to take the time to review strategy with Marketing prior to cutting. In fact, I've been in environments where all three of these have occurred in the same company. What a mess!

By the way, if any of these groups sat down and actually listened to each other, perhaps there would be some forward progress, better understanding . . . all of which would all result in better decisions that would benefit the entire business.

But I digress . . back to the Direct Marketing Revolution! So, after everyone determined that communication is definitely key to barrier-busting, then there were those responses that got into the nuances of communicating effectively. One responder talked to how it is sometimes difficult to get your opinions and viewpoints listened to because there are often those opinion-leaders who almost always prevail in every meeting. Yep, been there, too!

How do you effectively get your opinion stated in a room full of opinionated and passionate people? It's tricky -- for communication, you do need an open forum, and you need to allow everyone to state their views. The trick is to manage through it effectively so that what you don't end up with is endless meetings that accomplish nothing.

As one reader said, "I have seen all types of people and many times the most eccentric, unusual and difficult people to work with are the most creative of the bunch. It takes a really solid leader to know how to get that creative energy out of some individuals and to keep office drama to a minimum."

These are just a few snippets from this topic. This is a great discussion thread -- and only one of many at What I Saw at the Direct Marketing Revolution. I encourage you to check out the group and get involved in the conversation. It's empowering to discuss issues that we face every day as business owners of wherever we work. My bet is that you'll pick up some great ideas that you can incorporate into your business from this group. In return, I'll bet that you'll contribute some excellent ideas to the group, too.

This is, simply stated, social marketing at it's finest.

Fabulous Direct Marketing Links!

Welcome to another edition of the Friday Blog Log! We've got another famous line-up of excellent blog posts for your reading pleasure.

Our first post comes from Gordon Whyte's Blog of the Daily Challenges of the Entrepreneur. HA! And, there are many. This is an interesting read because it in, he presents an article from a leading futurist thinker, Ray Kurzweil. Kurzweil discusses the evolution on mankind from big bang to now and into the future, and how this evolution will impact the way that both entrepreneurs and big business alike manage and conduct business. The most interesting fact to us is that those who continue to be nimble and proactive will survive. Companies will have to "abandon redundant strategic planning techniques and leadership models designed for the industrial age" in order to compete in the present and future global economy.

Next, is a good post for us all to have on hand as we come up with our big ideas and want to get some press. In the DM News post, "Who You Need to Know at DM News," by author Cara Wood, Cara tells you exactly who at DM News that you need to contact to share your expertise, outstanding results, case studies, hiring needs, etc. Since DM News is read by many in our industry, this is a great resource to have on hand to get yourself published in their many publications.

While laden with lots of ads (blogging purists will most likely revolt!), this next post presents some great ideas on How to Defend your Direct Marketing Budget in these leaner economic times. Author Robert Bergquist provides some great ideas on how not to panic, how to take the right actions, looking to outside expertise for assistance in leaner organizations, and the importance of testing and tracking every campaign for success. These are all great ideas with lots of merit. And thinking about them now can pull you through for the short-term, so that you're positioned well for the long-term as our economy bounces back (it's all cyclical, remember?).

Finally, in a witty post, "Wanna Get Away Southwest," blog author and student, Zack's Business Explained in Layman's Terms Blog discusses how his CRM class pondered the recent Southwest situation where they were fined for cracks in their fuselage. This is really not good! Being an avid Southwest supporter and customer (they're just nicer than the others), I'm hoping that they get these problems fixed -- for obvious reasons, the key one being my well being. Zack provides a story board, complete with his ideas on how Southwest can effectively re-assure their customers in their take-off script.

We hope you enjoy these posts as much as we did.

Have a great weekend!

Update on European Direct Marketing

I'm always fascinated with reports on marketing in Europe. The UK, for instance, seems to be the leader in terms of business intelligence and CRM installations. Some of their large financial institutions, for example, seem much further along in realizing one-to-one marketing than similar US firms.

That's why this article from UTalkMarketing really surprised me. From the article:

"The majority of senior European marketers either do ad hoc or carried out no evaluation of their marketing campaigns, new findings from marketing software company Aprimo reveal.

Market research from the company showed 68 per cent of marketers were in the dark over the impact of their campaigns."

Wow! To me not being able to track a campaigns' success just seems like a waste of money.

The article cited a few reasons why companies weren't able to close the loop and implement sound measurement systems. They included:

1. The inability to integrate systems and processes within an organization
2. The lack of direct marketing talent (it appears that direct marketing skills are highly desired, and much in-demand in Europe.)
3. Lower than desired marketing productivity.

And, yet, the future for European direct marketers looks bright! More from the article:

"Only 6% of marketers polled believe that direct marketing is dead. Twice as many marketers gathered in the opposite corner, with 12% stating that direct marketing is now more relevant than ever.

The rest of the attendees believed there is more life in the DM industry yet, but stated that they “recognise the challenges” (48%) or “think it requires a rethink” (34%)."

So, there you have it--direct marketing is alive and kicking in Europe!

Direct Marketing and the Impact of the Economy

If you've been reading our blog for long, you know that we've written much about how this "new" economy is impacting direct marketers. Obviously, the economy effects all of business -- and in times of economic downturn, we seem to discuss it's impact much more than when things are more rosy.

Today, there is more evidence that the slowing economy has really taken a toll on us -- particularly in the area of financial services, and more specifically, mortgage and student lending. The fact that there are increasing amounts of people that are losing their homes to foreclosure due to financing with subprime mortgage lenders has become the leading story in all of our newspapers. Plus, there is now further scrutiny by our political leaders on student loan providers (for more on this, please see our post from last week).

In today's DM News, author Eleanor Trickett reports that now "the Federal Trade Commission and a couple of Attorneys General have pointed the finger at fraudulent mortgage marketers." And further, due to this, "there’s no question that market forces have caused many direct marketers and their agency and supplier partners to reconsider how they are marketing products in such a volatile environment."

We all know of stories where people bought homes that they could not afford due to the creative financing that was available to them -- and as we watched the run-up on housing prices, we all knew from history that there would be an eventual . . . and certain . . . pullback.

At any rate, due to this focus on the mortgage industry, direct marketers have had to come up with new ways to more effectively serve the market today in order to help their companies sell more loans. As Trickett reports, "Many financial services marketers have told me that they have significantly retooled their mortgage marketing programs, from straightforward acquisition tactics to a strategy based more on education and informed decisions. What effect this will end up having on conversion rates has yet to be seen, but it will be interesting to learn how mortgage marketers are trying to maintain ROI for their DM efforts."

From our perspective, this is just another example of how we have to be continually prepared to rise to the challenges that the economy brings us. As direct marketers, we have to come up with better and more effective ways to increase response and conversion rates -- and positively impact ROI . . . even when the economy is not being particularly helpful.

We've all heard the saying "Hindsight is 20/20." We can all think of the conversations that we were having one and two years ago predicting this eventual outcome in the mortgage market. The problem was that we were all in the midst of riding the highs of that market, and striving to take advantage of those profitable times. Well, in hindsight, we did all see the downturn coming. As we continue to see the impact of the economy on mortgage lenders, we'll bet that those companies who planned for the downturn and began to plan their strategy accordingly are most likely the companies that will continue to prevail in this new economy. As we continue to track this, those companies will reveal themselves and establish (or maintain) their leadership position in the mortgage industry. We predict that the lessons learned from this difficult time will be the subject of business school case studies for years to come.

Yikes! Is it Monday or what? Have a good week! : )

Even Prince Does Direct Marketing

This is something I never thought I would be lucky enough to write about--Prince and Direct Marketing! Oh Joy--my mundane marketing world is getting exciting!

Found an interesting article today, Prince Does Direct Marketing with Latest Album. The article discusses how Prince used fundamental DM principles to market himself. His decision (which apparently is not making all music people happy) was to give away copies of his latest album away to promote the album and his shows.

From the article: "Prince's latest album entitled Planet Earth was recently released in the UK in three million copies of The Mail newspaper...Record shops in the UK were angered with the promotion, saying that the move devalues the music itself and that it should be sold, while some UK bloggers who uploaded the album for free after receiving their free copy in The Mail said Prince makes the majority of his money with ticket sales and tour merchandise and saw it as a way to get the word out rather than devaluing the music."

Here's my take on this--if it makes Prince fans happy (and how can FREE ever make them unhappy), then it's a great thing. I'm sure that this move has built loyalty among his key fanbase. The promotion has made headlines (heck, even me, a marketing blogger, is talking about it), thus boosting awareness of the new album. Sampling, or giving away free product, is certainly not a new marketing tactic, and I think it was used correctly in this instance.

I take my hat off to Prince. Not only a brilliant musician and one of the most creative people in our time, but he's also a savvy marketer. I guess I'm not surprised in the least :)

Becoming the Master of Your Customer Data

In a recent article from Business Intelligence Network, Richard Skriletz discusses the importance of "Mastering Master Data -- How to Succeed with Master Data." Skriletz talks about how really understanding and integrating your customer data is key to building more profitable customer relationships -- and how solving this business problem with help your business reap huge rewards from a profitability perspective.

It goes without saying that in order to effectively compete in todays competitive marketplace, you must truly understand your customer relationships. Skriletz (and many others) have referred to this piece of mastering your data as being customer centric. It is important to understand the transactions that your customers perform with you, however, it is even more important to understand the customer relationship as a whole. Skriletz states it well: "This is the first challenge to becoming customer-centric: recognizing that a series of fragmented customer interactions delivered by separate customer service, account, product or billing business units does not ensure customer satisfaction. Businesses where customers churn are beginning to tackle this challenge in order to keep their high-value customers."

In our work with the telecommunications industry, we've experienced this first-hand. In the late '90s and early '00s, many of the large telecommunications firms were losing as many customers as they brought on to their network. It's really quite astounding to think about this. Those firms that embraced the concept of mastering their customer data and effectively looking at the entire customer relationship, were able to stem the tide of churners and create more loyal -- and long-term customers. Those who didn't -- well, let's just say there are fewer telecom companies out there today, and this is a contributing reason for their ultimate demise.

We've written a white paper (titled Data Management Solutions) on effective customer data integration techniques. We are passionate about this topic because we've seen our customers benefit greatly from utilizing this tool to make their direct and database marketing efforts more successful than ever. Let's all become masters of our customer data environments! We promise it'll make you a hero!

As in Life, Timing is Everything

DM News just published a Direct Marketing Association (DMA) study: Timing key for consumers not buying via DM

Essentially, the DMA surveyed a panel of consumers and asked them why they did NOT respond to a direct marketing offer. The primary reason was that it wasn't the right time to make that particular purchase.

From the article: "According to the DMA’s “DM Consumer Response Study,” a national survey of multichannel direct marketing sent to 1,000 U.S. consumers that was conducted between October 2006 and January 2007, 24.4 percent of respondents cited “not the right time” as the main reason for not buying during the two-day diary period of the study."

Now, if we direct marketers only had that crystal ball, we'd know EXACTLY when to present an offer. Response rates would go through the roof. Our customers and prospects would be so pleased that we were serving them so well. We'd save money on not marketing to people not in the market. Life would be good.

Sadly, it's not that easy. However, with a clever look at available data, there are some cases when you can hit that need head-on; when you can anticipate exactly when your prospect will be needing your product and hit them with an offer right at that moment. Here are some real-life examples of times when our clients have gotten it right. Needless to say, results from these "just-in-time" campaigns were spectacular.

Example 1: Use credit data to trigger shoppers. For a mortgage client, we used a credit bureau to monitor their prospect universe of homeowners. Anytime one of those prospects applied for a mortgage loan through one of their competitors, our client would send them a compelling offer, via first class mail. Since the mortgage process can be lengthy, in many instances, our client was able to take the sale away from its competitor. This marketing program served the consumer as well; they now had a few competitive loan offers to review.

Example 2: Watch for life events that cause big changes. The classic example is targeting new home-buyers. The concept of marketing to new homeowners is certainly not new. But, as a new homeowner myself, I can attest to the effectiveness, IF you are presenting the right offer. Personally, I took my 20% coupon from Linen and Things and went to town! I bought new towels (had to match the new bathroom), rugs, window treatments, even a gazebo for the backyard! The 20% discount (on top of an annual sale) made me pleased. And, Linen and Things' investment in a postcard mailing to me, a new homeowner in their area, paid off in spades.

Example 3: Watch for usage patterns or how your customers are transacting with you. Credit Card marketers are pretty good at this (although they don't always take advantage of their findings). They'll look for rapid increases in card usage usually on the look-out for fraud/stolen card. We always urge them to go the next step and, if the increased utilization is NOT fraud, try to figure out what is causing the change. Are these business purchases, that haven't been made in the past? Perhaps the customer is starting a new business. What a great opportunity for a financial institution for small business services. Do the purchases appear to be related to home remodeling? If so, there's yet another set of opportunities (REFI, anyone?).

So, in a nutshell, while we Direct Marketers don't always have that crystal ball to understand exactly when our prospects and customers need to buy from us, we do have lots of data and tools at our disposal to implement what RRW terms "Just-In-Time Marketing." We've written a white paper with more ideas and tactics to make this happen. We'd be happy to share.

We'd love to hear of more examples of when you got the timing down and hit your customer or prospect at the exact right time, when YOUR crystal ball was working for you :)

Using Profitability Models with Data Mining For Direct Marketing Success

As direct marketers, we are constantly searching for better ways to reach our customers and cause a positive reaction (i.e., get them to buy some of our products or services). Recently, CIO Insight published an article that talks about utilizing profitability models in conjunction with data mining to create more profitable customer relationships (our mantra).

The authors state, "We can use these models to come up with very accurate forecasts about how long this customer will stay with us or how many purchases they'll make over the next year. So, use the basic probability model to capture the basic behavior and then bring in data mining to understand why groups of customers with different behavioral tendencies are different from each other." It's a perfect marriage of two scientific marketing tools that when joined together can really boost the success of our direct marketing efforts. It makes our hearts sing to be able to more effectively dig out those profitable customers! More importantly, this gives us the ability to enhance the customer experience by knowing how to treat our valuable customers.

In addition, using profitability modeling with data mining helps us to profile new customers and understand the likely actions of current ones. It simply makes sense to utilize these techniques together. If you're interested in this topic, make sure you read this article -- it's excellent! Also, we have written a Customer Profitability Case Study that you may enjoy.

Beyond CRM -- Customer Experience Management

Continuing on our theme from yesterday's blog posting of acquiring -- and keeping -- customers, author Bill Porter of Porter Research has written an interesting article on CEM -- Customer Experience Management. According to Porter, "Customer Experience Management is a multi-dimensional phenomenon including both process and product and differs greatly from earlier simplistic movements like customer delight or the magic three questions to ask customers today. On the process side CEM seeks to measure customer expectations all the way from early customer encounters in the buying process – customer identification and customer acquisition - through support help requests and additional purchases of products and services throughout the customer life cycle (or the customer retention phase). On the product side, key factors like partnership and transparency matter a lot while customers traverse the phases above with a supplier or vendor."

As direct marketers, CEM is key to effectively planning campaigns -- whether they are fueling your acquisition or retention efforts. In fact, we would argue that the three key phases of CEM -- as outlined by Porter-- act as a strategic roadmap for your marketing plan. Paying close attention to your customer segments as they move through these phases will allow you to increase the success rate of each direct marketing campaign, and assist you in reaching your profitability goals.

TGIF!

Direct and Brand Marketers: No Longer Enemies

Recent Direct Marketing Association (DMA) research indicates that direct marketing is becoming increasingly important to brand-building. "DM News" published this article: Lines between DM and brand marketing blurring: DMA.

From the article: "Direct marketing’s scalability, measurability and undeniable ROI has moved it to the forefront of all marketing, including branding,” Eugenia Steingold, senior research manager at the DMA and author of the report, said in a statement."

Well, of course! Isn't it much easier for a CEO or CFO to allocate marketing funds to programs that are measurable? Again, it's easier to justify programs that you can quantify with real numbers that prove the marketing investment paid off--either in new customers acquired, new sales made, or new relationships forged.

More from the article: “The findings of our latest report show that direct marketing tactics designed to increase consumer awareness and action are ubiquitous — from URLs on all marketing materials to 800 numbers, to calls-to-action in TV, radio and print ads — and across every other type of marketing media”

It's so gratifying--I remember years ago when I had to fight to get an 800 number included in a print ad. The creative types at the "general" ad agency simply didn't want to ruin the integrity of their art-work. Ha--it's nice to be proven RIGHT.

In all seriousness, this integration of brand and direct marketing just makes sense.
"The report examines how direct marketing and brand building are being integrated in today’s multichannel environment to increase response rates, sales, profitability, and brand awareness."

And, just how big of an impact does DM have on marketing, overall? "Respondents report 64 percent of their marketing dollars are allocated to DM and 36 percent go to mass marketing. Nearly 70 percent of brand marketers rate personalization as having a positive or strong positive effect on brand, and 64 percent rate targeting as having a positive or strong positive effect."

Bottom-line: Direct Marketing and all the tools associated with DM is the backbone of today's marketing world.