This mail piece is from Google. It’s a windowed envelop, color logo at return address location, and mailed Standard Presort. The envelope contains a bi-fold, white stock, color one-sided, personalized form letter.
Just like their website, the piece is clean, readable, with a minimalist simplicity.
“Hello from Google,” it starts, and finished with Best Wishes. So few pieces are actually read here, but the content is required as a part of tradition. If one did read the outer form-letter wrap, they’d hear about whose viewing Google daily, and good news about their promotion season $100.00 Gift Card for ad placement.
The contents inside is a thicker card-stock tri-fold. Two-sided color. And again the minimalist feel. And finally, the back of the tri-fold includes a gum stick coupon card for $100.00 credit.
All and all, I love it. It just looks great. Very Google. Very clean and simple. Very smart.
However, the piece is dated about a week ago, addressed to a business that’s not been in business for 8 years. It was one of several brands I tested on the small business marketing. The business was called Complete Marketing Kit. Not a bad name, but, after filing, I immediately realized that marketing is never “complete”, and the service I was offering was only a guide book or check-list of items. So, they are sourcing an outdated business file and wasting money that could be easily avoided.
I doubt they had the databases sitting around for 8 years ago and just decided to use it. Google hires multiple agencies. The business database mailing list they used was one which has “mid-level” confidence on accuracy. There are many of these database floating around and often, even the smartest of businesses are found using them at one time or another.
So, what’s the ‘waste cost’ in a mid-level business file? How can we measure the cost of this portion of the marketing dollars that include businesses that have never really got off the ground, or closed their doors years ago? The SBA says that 4 out of 5 businesses go out of business within the first 2 years. So, in 8 years time, it’s fair to say that A LOT of businesses are no longer in existence. The question is, does is pay to shop for multi-business files, and mail only duplicates, or mail all the unique addresses?
The answer lies in the cost of the mail piece and the life-time value of the of business customer. With Google, their prospect list if the universe, so they must measure everything but ultimately, they are testing and measuring, testing and measuring.
Does is pay for you to invest is such a campaign strategy? The answer to that question can be answered by calling BB Direct for a no cost evaluation of your campaign strategy. Talking points will include what you’ve mailed before and the associated response rates. We want to know if improvements can be made to the audience, message, and the integration of your social, telemarketing, email, and postal mail data.
Would you like to talk with an experienced, direct marketing expert? Give us a ring at 866-501-6273. We look forward to hearing from you. www.BBDirect.com.
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