When Responsiva Data Services started trading in 2003, the initial route to market was through regular postal mailing activity. 500 letters would be sent out each week, typically generating four to five genuine enquiries per mailing. At that time it was a well-documented statistic that around 1% response rate was the norm.
Over the course of the last ten years I have yet to hear any variance on that statistic, in so much that marketeers will still say a one per cent response rate is standard. But times have changed since 2003; there has ben a huge rise in internet and social media advertising and brand awareness. Pay-per-click services surged massively, the demand for email addresses has soured and even telephone marketing increased; despite the introduction of the Corporate Telephone Preference Service in 2003, which now hosts about 20% of all companies. Perhaps the biggest hit on direct mail (postal mailings) is that the price of a stamp has gone up hugely. Why pay so much postage when (if you have the email address) you can market your company "for free", or at least for a tiny fraction of the postal mailing cost?
The truth is that cold email marketing is not such a great return on investment. The good "cold" emails cost money to maintain, there is a high churn and the response rates are usually disappointingly low.
Whereas postal mailing still yield a typical 1% enquiry rate. For some time now, Responsiva has targeted 5,000 new business prospects every two to three months via direct mail. Although the business data (i.e., the targets) comes at cost to us, the print, pack, post and envelopes don't. The reason for mailings of 5,000 a time is because the Royal Mail has not penalised the commercial user of the postal service; Mailsort discount is available, rendering the cost of each letter just 32 pence. And that includes all printing, packing, C5 window envelopes and the postage. In other words, the cost per enquiry (with responders at one per hundred) is around £32.
By contrast this favours well against most other forms of marketing. Even the search engine advertising has proven more costly than this over recent years, whereas a telemarketer (who charges say £250 per day) would need to develop seven or eight warm leads each day to match this. And my estimate for email marketing is that the data alone costs between five and ten times this amount to yield a similar volume of positive responses.
So it remains a fact that postal mailings do still work. And they work well. Perhaps not if you only plan to despatch a few hundred letters, as the postal discounts don't apply to this volume. But upwards of 4,000 letters and the costs plummet.
If you would like to learn more about marketing your business through direct mail, and sourcing a well qualified prospect data list, please get in touch. With many years of experience in the business data industry, Responsiva will ensure your prospect list is well targeted, fairly priced and probably the strongest any UK list broker can provide. Contact us at www.Responsiva.biz, info@responsiva.biz or Freephone 0800 118 5000.
Over the course of the last ten years I have yet to hear any variance on that statistic, in so much that marketeers will still say a one per cent response rate is standard. But times have changed since 2003; there has ben a huge rise in internet and social media advertising and brand awareness. Pay-per-click services surged massively, the demand for email addresses has soured and even telephone marketing increased; despite the introduction of the Corporate Telephone Preference Service in 2003, which now hosts about 20% of all companies. Perhaps the biggest hit on direct mail (postal mailings) is that the price of a stamp has gone up hugely. Why pay so much postage when (if you have the email address) you can market your company "for free", or at least for a tiny fraction of the postal mailing cost?
The truth is that cold email marketing is not such a great return on investment. The good "cold" emails cost money to maintain, there is a high churn and the response rates are usually disappointingly low.
Whereas postal mailing still yield a typical 1% enquiry rate. For some time now, Responsiva has targeted 5,000 new business prospects every two to three months via direct mail. Although the business data (i.e., the targets) comes at cost to us, the print, pack, post and envelopes don't. The reason for mailings of 5,000 a time is because the Royal Mail has not penalised the commercial user of the postal service; Mailsort discount is available, rendering the cost of each letter just 32 pence. And that includes all printing, packing, C5 window envelopes and the postage. In other words, the cost per enquiry (with responders at one per hundred) is around £32.
By contrast this favours well against most other forms of marketing. Even the search engine advertising has proven more costly than this over recent years, whereas a telemarketer (who charges say £250 per day) would need to develop seven or eight warm leads each day to match this. And my estimate for email marketing is that the data alone costs between five and ten times this amount to yield a similar volume of positive responses.
So it remains a fact that postal mailings do still work. And they work well. Perhaps not if you only plan to despatch a few hundred letters, as the postal discounts don't apply to this volume. But upwards of 4,000 letters and the costs plummet.
If you would like to learn more about marketing your business through direct mail, and sourcing a well qualified prospect data list, please get in touch. With many years of experience in the business data industry, Responsiva will ensure your prospect list is well targeted, fairly priced and probably the strongest any UK list broker can provide. Contact us at www.Responsiva.biz, info@responsiva.biz or Freephone 0800 118 5000.
