What is Direct Mail?

Direct Mail is often colloquially called as “junk mail”. Many households receive abundant direct mails every week. Direct Mail is the term used to describe letters sent using the bulk mailer service. Bulk mail is defined as sending multiple identical mails at one time, and it usually has the least priority in sorting in a post office.

Direct mail is being used by some companies as a means of direct marketing. Other forms of direct marketing are direct sales, and telemarketing. Contrary to what others may believe, direct mail is rarely used as an advertising tool. Advertising is used to strike awareness on a product or service and to fuel demand, usually through print or mass media. Direct mail may have some advertising factor to it, but it is not produced to strike awareness for a product, rather, it is written to get something out of its intended recipient – like personal data, or donations.

Direct Mail is a popular choice for companies seeking to do a market research. they can validate responses as genuine since they have selected the respondents themselves. Some companies offer incentives for people who would respond to their surveys and research.

Direct mail is also used by some companies to mask market research with product awareness. This accomplishes two things – to gather market data, and by providing an incentive or a discount to a product, they raise product profile as well. Direct mail can be plainly used as a marketing tool to make special offers. Offers can be made to targeted individuals selected through various data collection agencies. Companies can tailor their offers based on the demographics of their prospects.

Even though Direct mail is colloquially called as junk mail, its purpose is not as “junk” as you might think. To date, studies show that people still prefer direct mail over the more convenient emails. Thanks to the vigilance over anonymity of people using email, direct mail still remains as one of the most trusted sources to get marketing information. The tangible nature of the direct mail is an important factor to its success. Even though the market is bombarded with ads from TV, print media, radio, and the internet, the direct mail remains effective because of the market’s familiarity with the use of direct mail.

Direct mail generally has a reputation of being an honest and trustworthy method of marketing because it doesn’t involve pressuring your consumer into buying. The mail delivered serves as a tangible assurance to the consumer that they are dealing with a real functioning institution, instead of companies that only exist on paper. Direct mail may be expensive, and its effectiveness still lies on the content and material delivered, but with a good product and good copywriting, the direct mail is still a great way to send your message across.