CATEGORIES
5 Tips To Ensure Your Envelope Gets Opened
One of the biggest challenges in direct mail marketing is getting people to actually read what you have sent. All those weeks or months of effort getting the right content and design together would go to waste if your material doesn’t get read, and the first step to that is making sure your envelope gets opened.
Check out these 5 tips to make envelopes too irresistible to pass up:
- ADD SOME COLOR.
Instead of the traditional pristine white envelopes typically used for business correspondence, make your envelopes more interesting by using color. Imagine a huge pile of mail and you catch a glimpse of red or yellow. Anyone’s attention would be automatically drawn to what stands out, and this is the first step to get your mailer to the “read” pile. Changing the color of your envelopes from time to time can also help keep them fresh and interesting even if you’ve sent correspondence to the same recipient multiple times.
Using colored envelopes would cost a bit more than the regular white ones, but it’ll be well worth the extra dollars if it means your envelope gets opened instead of being tossed to the junk mail pile.
- MAKE IT LUMPY.
This is another surefire way to get people excited about your mailer. If it’s not flat like the rest of the envelopes, there must be something inside! Lumpy envelopes build a sense of excitement and automatically give your mailer that added value. Why not include a product sample, or maybe a small promotional giveaway? Not only does the envelope get opened, but your potential customers are more likely to read and respond to your mailer when they get a little something extra.
- CHANGE THE SIZE.
Similar to the impact of using colored envelopes, you can use an envelope that is anything but the standard #10 size. Go smaller with greeting card-sized envelopes, or go bigger to get to command immediate attention and stand out from that stack of mail.
- USE HANDWRITING.
A handwritten name and address on the envelope makes it look personal, which increases the likelihood of it being opened. Now, this would be okay if you were just sending a dozen or so mailers, but with direct mail where you could be sending hundreds or thousands, it would just be plain ridiculous. Good thing that there are websites where you can convert your handwriting into a font like myscriptfont.com or fontifier.com. Using handwriting or equivalent would be a matter of discretion though, as some businesses would prefer to keep the overall look formal.
- USE TEASER COPY.
Why not give your recipient a hint of what’s inside? Use a provocative statement. Rouse curiosity with a question or catchy headline that promises answers/details inside. Take teaser copy a step further with messages targeted at specific audiences by using phrases that speak about to your customers’ identity or interests. For instance, “Free gift for golfers!” or “Exclusive offer for Moms!”
Envelopes can do more than just keep your marketing material intact until it reaches your desired recipient. Follow these tips and help your envelope do its most important job: to get opened!
