10 Steps to High Response Direct Mail Creative

Chris Christiansen, a copywriter and art director friend of mine found in the Seattle area, shared a one-page list with me entitled “Eleven-Point Checklist for Direct Mail Success.” So, I started with and used his list for this article because they align themselves to my own experiences as a direct marketer. All comments surrounding the questions is my work. Please take issue with me rather than him if certain statements conflict with your own experience.

1. Is the mailing appropriately priced and within budget?

When a copywriter makes this his first point, it speaks volumes about the direct marketing creative professional’s level of ability. He recognizes that his job is not only to create attractive work that brands a product, but he must sell the client’s products or services at an acceptable Cost Per Sale.

He knows that he must work within the framework of how much he can afford to spend to make the sale. This means knowing what direct mail formats cost, and how to engineer them for the latest printing technology for lower costs. This also means being aware of postal rates, postal regulations and paper stocks that fit within the postal weight limitations.

The DM creative team’s knowledge expands beyond production costs and postal requirements. The skilled direct mail copywriter understands the lettershop process and uses the information available on the database to personalize the message for each recipient. He then fits production budget to the selling situation.

The direct marketing creative team knows that the mailing must work within what they can spend to make the sale. This means knowing what direct mail formats cost and how to engineer them for the available printing technology.

The required direct marketing creative team must:

• Know that selling IS job #1

• Understand how to control the direct mail production budget

• Use the database information to improve the selling power of a direct mail package

2. Is there a sense of unity to all components?

This explains why the industry calls a direct mail piece a “package.” A package positions a mailing piece as a cohesive whole regardless of how many elements it holds. Each element supports the other. This also shows why professionals do not take an existing brochure and try to incorporate it into a direct mail package where it doesn’t fit.

All elements match the production process. The pieces fit together at the lettershop level so each inserted element in the package allows proper clearance for machine insertion into the outer envelope. Depending upon the chosen format, the personalized letter or response form that drives the package shows through the window on the outer envelope for delivery to the recipient’s address.

Each element, except for the outer envelope and Business Reply Envelope, stands alone to reinforce the offer, The key product benefits and the call to action with web site address, telephone number and company mailing address are added to each element. That’s because the respondent often discards certain elements of the package later returning to the saved piece. The respondent must know how to respond and is reminded why she/he saved the piece in the first place.

3. Does the reader know exactly what’s expected of him/her?

This seems almost trivial. But clients often get too close to their promotions to realize that their language, deep knowledge of the product and other assumptions are so far removed from their customer’s experience.

Don’t assume anything about what your customer knows or understands about your product.

Make a clear Call To Action by including a time-sensitive offer both with words and graphics. Include a coupon response form even though you expect 90% of your responses to come by phone. An order form says, “I want you to respond to me.”

In fact, the call to action belongs in your brochure and your letter as well. Everything leads to asking for some type of response from the recipient. I am amazed by the packages I get that have a single piece enclosed in the envelope. It contains feature copy that lacks a strong review of the benefits. Some mailers have no call to action whatsoever. Always tell the prospect what you want him/her to do.

4. Have you touched on all the prospect's objections and converted your features into benefits?

The copy answers ALL the customer’s objections. Talk about lost opportunities if the reader does not respond now.

Select the main selling proposition and focus on that theme throughout the package. All product benefits are repeated in each package element including the response device, the letter, and the flyer. Skilled writers emphasize the main or unique selling proposition to compel immediate response.

Remain personal and real in the whole package. The first line of the letter, the PS and sometimes even on the outer envelope are all built to get the desired response behavior.

5. Is your Call To Action clear and your offer easy to understand?

This is not the time to try and sell everything you have by offering too many options. The KISS principle proves true. Asking the recipient to make a decision from a long list of options delays decision. And a delayed decision is the death knell to your response rates. Make the decision clear with one or two options at most.

6. Is the letter personal — from one human to another?

Don’t sell organizational goals or what you are trying to do from your perspective. Sell your proposition as if you were writing a personal note to your mother, brother or friend one person at a time. Talk about the benefits the respondent will enjoy by responding at once to your offer. Focus on what’s in it for the customer and not the company.

What is your customer profile? Don’t deal only with the demographics, but also understand the psychographics.

Are you dealing with young women between the ages of 20 to 35? Do they own their homes, or are they renters? But more importantly, are they working outside the home? Are they pressured by household responsibilities combined with job pressures? Do they have children? If so, how many? How will your product help them with these day-to-day problems?

7. Do you have a clear image of who you are writing to?

Once you understand the recipient's stress and greatest fears, then you are ready to write about how your product can help her. Talk with her about how your product can help relieve some of her stress and help her get closer to her dream. Speak not only to the need, but the fever beneath the need.

Personal, benefit-filled letter copy is what increases direct mail response. Visualize your audience as an individual you know who fits your audience profile and write to that one person. You cannot believe how many letters I have written to my deceased grandmother selling her on what I knew she would have wanted if she were still alive.

Use testimonials from happy customers as a powerful tool to support your claims. Use evidence, customer research or any form of external evidence that support your product benefits.

8. Do they have the same clear image of your company or of the person writing the letter?

The communication goes two ways. What can you assume the recipient knows about the one who signs the letter or the company that is writing to them? Is there already knowledge of what you offer, or even better, have you found an emotional bridge between the customer and the company?

That is why the sender of a letter — or an email — is an important part of the marketer’s arsenal. For example, do not send a lead generation letter from the sales manager who might come across as selling to fill his quota. Instead, send it from the product head or inventor of the product. His passion for the product sounds more believable.

9. Are you “honest” with your audience and does your presentation reflect that characteristic?

Yes, I know. It is hard to believe that honesty is still the best policy. But genuineness in this advertising-drowned society seems to work as it always has.

That is why real customers rather than the copywriters write the best testimonials. Believable testimonials talk about the good and do not shy away from areas that could be better.

I am not suggesting that the sales piece should feature a list of true confessions, but. But powerful messages have an element of honesty. The customer is not stupid, and the message conveys your respect for all your customers. The customer knows that you are not perfect. Your company provides money back guarantees and satisfaction guarantees. You supply customer service people who have published phone numbers and email addresses.

One of the most powerful tools selling tools available to high quality companies today is the open forum on their web sites. Customers and prospects will find out what kinds of complaints or issues buyers are experiencing with the company. They will search the forum within minutes before responding to your mailing

Research shows that 60% of direct mail respondents check out the company's web site before responding. Some will search 3rd party forums.

Readers see how the company deals with customer problems. There is nowhere to hide. Prospects are smart enough to see if the company is making a real effort to resolve problems.

Customers want companies who want to help them and not just make money.

10. Do you lead with your strongest sales argument? Does the copy “flow”?

Your product or service offers many benefits, but which one should be your main or unique selling proposition?

If you had 3-5 seconds to get your prospect’s attention, what would that be? In today’s overcrowded communications environment, that’s all the time you have to gain interest. This is true for whether the message is on a web site, a print advertisement, a broadcast advertisement, an email or a direct mail package.

This key benefit is both unique to your offering and important to the prospect. But unique selling propositions today are rarer than four leaf clovers. So, the best you can expect is a winning, main selling proposition.

I never will forget what one primary research project revealed about the power of the main selling proposition.

This research was sent to Chief Marketing Officers and sponsored by a direct marketing agency I ran several years ago. We sponsored a broad-based survey to find our main selling proposition for our direct marketing creative services.

In the survey, these Chief Marketing Officers told us what they were looking for in a direct marketing resource. And our client history proved that we were able to deliver on them. But which one capability or client benefit should we feature to engage our prospects when speaking to them about all the things we offered? Here is the list of what we discovered our client's were looking for in a direct marketing agency.

-Ability to beat controls

-Cost efficient media plans

-Multichannel capabilities

-Knowledge of their customer

-Knowledge of their industry

-Strategic planning capabilities

-Knowledge of the branding discipline

These were important to the hundreds of CMO’s who took part in the research. But which main selling proposition should we use when communicating with these CMO prospects?

Our research group created a perceptual map of the findings. It showed that if we pursuaded our audience of one of these benefits, then we had them hooked.

The perceptual map found that the main selling proposition was our ability to understand the prospect’s customer.

So, our future communications focused on our knowledge of customer buying behavior.

We emphasized the fact that we were experts on our client’s customers. We reinforced this main selling proposition with customer testimonials. Our sales went through the roof once we knew what our prospects most wanted to know about us. We found a way to lead with this point in all our self-promotion messages.

Focusing on this main selling proposition creates flow for the balance of the copy. It emphasizes your strongest selling point and generates qualified prospects.

The conclusion— Direct mail is personal.

The guiding principle throughout these "10 Steps to High Response Direct Mail Creative" revolves around the idea that direct marketing is one-to-one selling.

Bear in mind that the recommendations in this article reflect hundreds of direct mail tests and millions of responses. So, these standards are not compiled from what respondents say, but rather by what they have do.