SELF-MAILERS AND REPLY CARDS Think of your self-mailer as a large sheet of paper on which you print and then cut out an envelope, a letter, a brochure, and a coupon or reply form. But instead of cutting them apart, you fold the sheet in such a way that, when unfolded, they present your message in a logical fashion.

NOTES ON THE DIRECT MAIL

CREATIVE

CHECKLIST These notes are a supplement to the material presented in this article. They are not a selfcontained substitute for that material.

1.Purpose. What the mailing is to achieve. This can include immediate sales, finding long-term customers, building a base on which to sell through personal, telephone, or additional mail follow-up, information gathering, and so on. If more than a single purpose is selected, pick one as key. Where else in life would you devote exactly the same effort to every objective?

2.Budget. The budget for direct mail creative stops with design (#10) plus internal and outside charges for #11 to #14. How the total project is budgeted and what must be approved before creative design may begin are decided here. Note that #15 and #16 are for approvals only.

3.Test(s). What, if anything, is to be tested. Schedule not only the time allocated for the tests themselves but also for analyzing and following up on them. #4 must have this information to build a workable time line.

4.Time line. The specific time line for the creative process and how it relates to testing, plus the time required to satisfy all the other checklists noted at the bottom of this checklist.

5.Supervision. Supervision for the creative processes, if such supervision is different from the overall supervision. If several supervisors are involved, decide who may and who may not override whom. Only one person can be in charge.

6.Audience. All we can learn about our obvious target audience(s) and, possibly, new prospects we had not realized were there. (In regard to the latter, the evil of “B.O.” (body odor), was invented by an agency to find a need for a strong-smelling soap practically no one had known they wanted.)

7.Focus. The specific focus (approach) of each test in attempting to achieve the purpose in #1. Most often, this is done by giving the copywriters and designers broad guidelines on which to use their personal creativity.

8.Research. If research is wanted or needed, what will it cost? How long will it take? Who will do it? Who must approve? Most important, what actions will you take on the basis of the research results? Start with the last point first. If the answer is “none,” go directly from #7 to #9.

9.Writer. If you are the writer and are new to writing, do just one approach from beginning to end before going on to the next. Then base the second approach on the first, the third on the second, and so on. Now go back and redo the first—and probably the others, too. You’ll be astonished by how much you’ve learned and how fast you’ve learned it. This article gives you a step-by-step approach. Use it every time.

10.Designer. Direct mail design is a specialized art, so find and use a specialist, especially if you are a beginner.

11.Typesetter. For simpler projects, try desktop publishing—but only if your in-house setting meets professional standards. Professional quality typesetting, generally provided by the designer, tends to be the least expensive of outside costs.

12–13.Photo/Art. Not just a nice illustration, but a picture that does something—that moves the viewer to share your objective. Would the Sistine Chapel be nearly as much of an attraction if the finger of God were closed into His fist? Generally, use art for emotion and photography for fact. If in doubt, test . . . and always be ready to be pleasantly surprised.

14.New art. Who prepares it? Who approves it? Who reviews it with the filmmaker? Who, if anyone, may change it, based on the film-maker’s suggestions?

15.Film proofs OK. If the designers (#10) are not the only approval required, the designers should at least be consulted . . . and listened to. They’ll be the only ones to catch the “obvious” design mistakes no one else sees.

16.On-press OK. This is often a time-consuming process, but it is absolutely essential. If possible, send two persons: a print production expert who knows how—and when—to give on-press approval and one to learn how to do it. There’s much more to this part of the job than meets the untrained eye. (See Article 6 for my near disastrous introduction to the approval process.)

17.Test analysis. “Back-end” testing and analysis affect everything the creative people will do if they are given the opportunity to learn about it. Accordingly, share the results, no matter what they are. Be specific: It’s hard to do better next time if all they are told is, “It failed.” It’s even hard to do as well if all they know is, “It’s great!”

18.Editorial OK. This is the final authority on the mechanics of language, the house style, and the technical accuracy of the text, including stock numbers and prices. The editorial person or department sees and has final approval of the final manuscript and checks the final type against it, whenever that is ready. Make no changes in either one without editorial approval. Remember, there can be only one final version!

19.Legal OK. Direct mail and other direct response advertising are regulated by federal, state, and even local laws. (Sales tax collection is just one of the legal issues.) Make yourself knowledgeable, and if in-house legal expertise is not available, use your direct marketing association to lead you to where it is.

20.Postal OK. Your post office approved your design in writing, including any message you plan to put on the outside of your package. Right?

21.Lettershop OK. Your mailing service saw dummy samples of your package, told you they could do it, and quoted a price in writing. And the mailing package hasn’t changed without their knowing it.

22.Logo. Someone has actually looked at and checked every logo, every address, and every contact number on the mailings. And so have you.

MAIL ORDER, DIRECT MARKETING,

AND DATABASE DIRECT MARKETING Database marketing is based on two criteria: (1) the existence, availability, and use of pertinent information on which you can base your marketing decisions and (2) the modification of that marketing effort as new data become available. Database direct marketing involves exactly the same things. Its only difference is in the way it sells—directly rather than through others. For example, a mailing that urges you to buy by mail and makes it practical to do so is a basic part of mail-order direct marketing. Exactly the same mailing that urges you to make the purchase in a retail outlet is mail advertising. Quite a bit more than nomenclature is involved in this difference. Marketing concerns itself with “the four p’s,”—product, price, place (distribution), and promotion, explained in more detail starting on page 112. In direct response, what we normally think of as promotion is actually sales—our advertisement and method of selling are one and the same. Promotion, therefore, is best budgeted and utilized for research to find better ways to make sales work. The distinction is arbitrary, but of value in (1) selling the absolute need for advertising to management and (2) keeping the research budget from skewing ultimate sales costs.

Establishing Your Database Imagine that you are a sales representative with 25 key accounts. In your customer database, or old-fashioned notearticle, you keep the names of your clients with, as far as you can learn, their business reasons for dealing with you—price, delivery, quality, and so on—as well as such things as their birthdays and favorite places to eat. You’ll note others on the staff who are important to the purchasing decision, and you’ll note the “politics” involved in the decision. You’ll try to discover the key competitors’ approach to luring your business away and how you might react to it. This database is for clients or customers. You have an analogous file for prospects. Both of these information-laden resources are your database. The database is invaluable, but only as long as you continually both update your information and act on it. Now, expand this example to thousands or millions of names. The process still holds. But now your data are on a computer, and a whole new set of considerations is required:

• Which department “owns” the computer: Accounting? Order processing? Estimating? Direct marketing? What is the pecking order? Most systems generate data through order entry. Access to that information and to computer time for its analysis is critical to databased marketing.

• What can the computer do? That is, what is its capacity for receiving, analyzing, and acting on each piece of information? If your sales efforts involve 1,000 different items, how much time and capacity are involved if you want access to everyone who ordered any single item? Any one of 100 different categories? Twenty-five categories? Can the computer do the same for prices? Frequency of orders? Any combination of these? Can it add, remove, and correct data quickly and easily? Can it protect data? What are its limitations, and how does it fit into today’s state of the art? Note that your computer is not involved with lists you purchase for mailing but only with supplying in-house lists and handling responses. Purchased lists go directly to a mailing service.

•A Note on Style: Go back and reread the preceding two paragraphs—not for content but for style. Note the many short sentences and sentence fragments. See how question marks emphasize the need for answers and action. Mentally remove those question marks, and substitute commas. You’ll have an instant demonstration of the need to keep it simple.

What You Really Have to Know Determine what you must know, store, and be able to manipulate by computer to improve sales. What would you do with different kinds of information if you had it? Differentiate between “nice to know” and “vital for improved performance.” Your computer will, if instructed, endlessly store expensively gathered information you thought you wanted but didn’t know what to do with once it arrived. Before you ask for it . . . 1. Determine what will be done with any information once you have it. 2. Be open to and welcome unasked-for information, unwelcome information, and inconclusive information. They can be as important to your marketing as actual sales. Believe the numbers . . . but in addition to getting just the facts, consider whether it makes any difference to also know “why.”

Database Direct Marketing and the Four P’s

1. About the Product (or Service)

• Research for customer needs before anything is produced.5 Research further when you get conflicting answers. (Yes, we want the lowest price. No, we don’t have time for comparison shopping.)

• Research for satisfaction after the product or service has been delivered. (Is it what you expected? Are you satisfied? How might it be better?)

• Modify the product or service based on what you learn, providing it is practical, cost effective, and in your long-term interest to do so. And remember . . .

• Your concern as a marketer is not with profit but with customer satisfaction. 2. About Price

• Database analysis lets you produce a “best” price before more than your test is put into print, on the air, on the Internet, or is used in telemarketing.

• You determine that price based on your audience’s criteria. It is the audience that makes the buy/no buy decisions. 3. About Place (Distribution) Determine how the order will be solicited, how it will be received, and how it will be filled.

• Will you use only mail? Newspaper or magazine print advertising? Radio and TV? The Internet? Telemarketing? Package inserts? Out-ofhome? Sampling? Or some combination of these?

• Will orders be received by mail only? By phone (including a toll-free number)? By fax (including a toll-free number)? By computer? Or by some combination of these?

• Will everything be shipped from a single location or from regional centers? Which will be faster? Which will produce lower shipping costs?

• How will you control drop shipments sent directly from manufacturers or wholesalers rather than by you?

• Should you do direct response only? Establish your own retail outlets? Sell through others? Use your promotions to help you answer these questions! 4. About Promotion

• Test your product, price, and sales approaches as requested by those in charge of each. Note that this testing is not limited to mail but may— and often does—include telemarketing, focus groups, and other types of research.

• Assist the people in charge of the product, price, and sales in evaluating test results.

• Apply specified results in test promotions to validate research.

• Test direct mail or other direct response media continually, from minor revisions to totally new online approaches.

• Believe the numbers.