List Tips

We Bet You Didn’t Know That…

Tips for Your Direct Mail Campaign

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Knowing the basics before diving head first into deep water can keep you and your organization from drowning into a sea of the unknown. As far as sending out direct mail to aid in your marketing campaign is concerned, a little bit of basic knowledge can prove to bring in major results. At Rescigno’s Marketing Connections, we suggest the following guidelines when putting together a successful direct mail campaign.

 

*Decide on your Message.

First and foremost, coming up with a focused purpose and clear message you are interested in sending is crucial. If you don’t know what your intention is neither will your recipients.

 

* Compile the Right List.

It is essential to the success rate of your campaign to have the right mailing list go out to a targeted group of individuals who would best meet the needs of your current goals. Our professionals at Rescigno’s work hand in hand with your organization to efficiently compile a list of the most efficient recipients for your direct mail campaign.

 

*Visuals are Tasteful & Attractive.

Figuring out the right layout and design of your direct mail piece is imperative to the success of your campaign. Attracting others attention by having an appealing visual will keep their interest to read on. By having unique ideas and personalization placement with the use of VDP you are guaranteed continual success.

 

 

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Which Is More Expensive?

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If you spend, say, $15,000 on a direct mail appeal, but you gain $60,000 in revenue, would you say it was worth it?
Conversely, if you spend $5,000 over the course of a full year on email, but gain no new leads or the campaign merely pays for itself…which really is more expensive?

Direct mail never was more alive than it is now. Why? Because we counsel our clients to target their lists and suggest they don’t mail to lapsed customers/donors after 3-5 years of inactivity. Every once in a while they may get something, but again not expensive pieces designed to go to loyal supporters/customers.

Does targeting mean cutting names? Yes, it does. Mailing less but mailing smarter and in a more strategic way; it’s just one of the ways RMC adds value to its clients’ marketing campaigns.

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How to Store Information

How you store your name information depends a lot on the type of mailings you do.  However, you should always try to make your database the most versatile it can be.

Therefore, we recommend storing your contact names as separate fields

  • Prefix
  • First
  • Middle
  • Last
  • Suffix
  • Nickname or Salutation

Storing the separate fields will give you flexibility if you want to send personalized letters using a “Dear Firstname” down the line (please Contact Us for more information on personalization).

Storing the data in separate fields will also allow you to send mailings to just the family. For example – if you have newsletters going to all the alumni from a school, but only want to send 1 per household.  If you have the last name field separated out, you can then address the mailing “Dear Lastname Family” instead of addressing to just one person and having the rest of the people feel like they did not receive a mailing.

In addition – we recommend entering your data in mixed case (John not JOHN) as it will be easier to convert to personalized letters if the information is already in the proper case.  (Rescigno’s can fix your information if it was entered in all upper or all lower case and you would like to personalize your letters.)

Please note that NCOA is being used to comply with the new Move Update Requirements mandated by the post office. The NCOA service requires a separate first and last name field which is another reason to separate your data.

Additional Information to Track

In addition to storing the name and address information, it may be helpful for your organization to store the following information about your constituents:

  • Year of Graduation (for educational institutions)
  • Gift Giving History
  • Employer (some have matching gift opportunities)
  • Children
  • Spouse
  • Education

This type of information is most helpful for organizations that rely on appeals to support their institution’s budget.  While you do not want your database to become cumbersome, additional pieces of information will allow you to customize your appeals to a greater detail to attract donations.

What to do with Bad Addresses and Deceased Constituents:

We recommend keeping all constituents in your database, even if you do not have a good current address for them.  You can do this by creating a field in your database and setting it to “Bad Address” or “Deceased” for those that should not be included in your mailings.

The reason we recommend keeping the constituents in your list is because there are services you can use that will research a person based on their last known address.  If you delete the person completely, you will have no way of tracking them down.  Additionally, if they decide to contact you down the line, you will still have their giving history and all the other information you had collected about them.

For the deceased constituents, there are some institutions that contact the family members to see about setting up a trust or for memorials and you will want to keep a list of all deceased constituents for this purpose.

If you want to make sure your list is completely up to date – please contact us.

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