Direct Mail as a Data-Driven Performance Channel

Proving Direct Mail’s ROI With Precision

With today’s latest innovations, direct mail marketing can be tracked just as rigorously as digital efforts, allowing return on investment (ROI) to be measured with precision. By incorporating digital enhancements into mailpieces, brands can make it quick for customers to respond while gleaning real-time data on their interactions.

Including a smartphone-scannable QR Code^®[2] on mailers, for example, creates a seamless path from the mailpiece to complementary digital content. This can help with a range of different goals, whether it’s increasing sales online, growing social followers or engagement or generating new newsletter sign-ups. Near field communication (NFC)arrow_right_alt works in a similar way. With the inclusion of wireless NFC tags, brands can provide customers with an instant connection to digital content. Simply by placing their smart devices on or near the mailer, recipients can gain access to a wide range of content, including landing pages, product demos, videos, coupons, event tickets, payment options and more.

Personalized URLs (PURLs) also offer a simple way to lead customers to digital content. These URLs are customized to each individual, often with the customer’s first name, and can lead directly to personalized landing pages. These landing pages may offer tailored product recommendations based on prior purchases, exclusive discounts based on loyalty status and other content specifically geared to individual consumers. Innovations such as these have helped direct mail achieve a strong average ROI—56% for house lists and 67% for prospect lists.^[3]

Including a QR Code or PURL in mailers also makes it easy to track engagement, including who scanned the mailers, where mailers were scanned, which operating systems were used and what users did (e.g., which products were most explored or purchased, which content was most popular and how long customers stayed on a web page).

With near real-time insights, marketers can time the release of complementary digital ads to the same customers, helping to keep the message top of mind, providing an easy way for them to respond and allowing for unambiguous attribution.

Using Direct Mail as a Catalyst in Omnichannel Campaigns

Direct mail plays well with other channels, enhancing and amplifying digital strategies. With the seamless coordination of digital and physical marketing, brands can create higher-impact, actionable campaigns with better attribution, reinforced customer touchpoints and more effective digital efforts. In fact, 35% of marketers rate the ability to integrate with digital channels as one of the top three advantages of direct mail.^[4]

In addition to QR Codes, NFC and PURLs, tools like the United States Postal Service Informed Delivery^® feature can also integrate physical and digital channels, giving enrolled customers a digital preview of their incoming mail. Along with the preview, brands are able to include “ride‑along content” that complements the mailpiece. As an example, if a postcard is promoting an upcoming seasonal sale, the ride-along content may lead directly to the online shop.

Incorporating these kinds of technology into direct mail campaigns—and tying them into large omnichannel efforts—can be a major differentiator in capturing customers’ attention and keeping them interested. In fact, research by Jonathan Zhang, Ph.D., shows that physical materials such as direct mail require 21% less cognitive effort to process than digital media while generating stronger emotional responses and higher memory retention.^[5]

More advanced innovations, like augmented reality (AR)arrow_right_alt , can take campaigns a step further, offering immersive, interactive experiences with ample opportunities for data collection. With an AR-enabled mailpiece, recipients can use a smartphone to be transported to a 3D experience via the mailer.

By linking physical engagement to digital actions, marketers can achieve accurate attribution while reinforcing their message across multiple channels. Nine out of 10 marketers agree that an integrated strategy has a positive effect on campaign performance.^[6]

Quantifying Impact With Advanced Measurement Techniques

With marketers carefully assessing every digital impression, action and conversion, campaigns that incorporate direct mail may seem like an unknown. But with the right measurement techniques in place, brands can quantify the incremental value of direct mail in omnichannel efforts.

For example, setting up holdout groups (or control panels) can help marketers get a clear picture of the impact of direct mail. By creating a holdout group comprised of customers who will be excluded from receiving mailings and a treatment panel, comprised of customers who will receive the mailing, companies can accurately measure success. By comparing the response rates and conversions of the holdout group to the treatment panel, marketers can clearly gauge the mail campaign.

More incremental testing can also allow for a holistic analysis of the role direct mail plays within broader marketing spend. This enables marketers to analyze large sets of data to identify patterns, with both internal and external “dependent” variables considered, such as seasonality, pricing strategies, budget allocation and economic conditions. By evaluating the effect of these variables on an isolated “independent” variable, such as conversions, marketers can establish relationships between each of the dependent variables and the independent variable.

Just as it’s important to understand how mail affects key variables, such as sales and engagement, it’s also crucial to see how mail interacts with other touchpoints along the customer journey. In contrast to single‑touch attribution, in which marketers credit single touchpoints (typically the first or last) for a sale or conversion, multitouch attribution involves assigning credit to each touchpoint that contributes to the sale. This provides a more complete view of how different marketing channels work together.