Database Marketing & Marketing Analytics

The #1 rule of successful marketing is tailor your offer to your audience's preferences.

Do you know your reader's gender? If so, you can write a sales letter that's two-and-a-half, to three times more effective than one aimed at both men and women.

Here are just a few simple customer details you can use to make your sales letters and offers more effective:-

• Age group
• Marital status
• Suburb
• Date of last purchase or visit

Knowing just one, or two, of the above details can give you a huge advantage over the marketer who doesn't know.

Simply put— the more you know about someone's interests, preferences and personal circumstances, the easier it is to make your words relevant and interesting to them.

You may know in advance that 60% of your list won't be interested in your offer. Why waste their time with unwanted emails, or your money on unnecessary hard mail?

On the other hand, an offer tailored exactly to the preferences of each smaller sub-group will have far greater impact.

When marketing to your database, then, it's best to break your list down into groups wherever possible. Key to this is the level of control you have over your database.

Testing the Water Before you Jump

As your list grows into the thousands, you can take the extra step of doing test-runs on small groups.

That way you can experiment with different formats and wording; you can find out what works best before sending to the main group.

Like to know more about how we can help you manage and segment your customer database into key groups of customers or leads? Contact Matt Bounds today to find out what's possible.

Many customer database systems can seem quite unfriendly. However, many have all kinds of hidden features that allow experts to set up simple, yet powerful grouping systems with software you already have, such as MS Excel, or free equivalents like Open Office Calc.

Mailouts with Personalised Letters and Postcards

Personalised colour postcards and letters with attractive graphics are no longer the exclusive territory of big companies with big mailing lists and huge budgets.

What's more, you no longer have to waste time pre-printing a template letter and over-printing the personalised parts and addresses.

Modern digital print methods allow you to create attractive personalised, double sided colour postcards in one step, print ready 'mail merges'.

Not only that, but you can create them in small runs of as little as 100 letters or postcards .

Mailouts more cost effective than internet advertising

If you've been involved in internet marketing over the last few years, you'll know how quickly advertising costs are rising. Many industry groups are now paying several dollars per click for internet advertising. Without a doubt it' is now our busiest and most competitive advertising medium.

Contrast overcrowded email boxes with today's empty 'snail mail boxes' and combined printing and mailing cost of around 1.20, even for small batches of colour postcards and you can see that physical mail offers big advantages for properly targeted marketing campaigns.

For many potential customers, letters and postcards now have an almost rare, curiosity value. These days you'll have very little competition when you contact your customers by mail.

Not only that, but if someone is even half interested in your offer, they'll keep your letter. They may even pin to a notice board or stick it to a fridge and leave it there for months as a reminder.

On the internet, once they've clicked away - you're instantly forgotten.