Telemarketing Lead Generation Blog

How Telemarketing Can Maximize ROI from Dimensional Direct Mail

Posted on Jul 20, 2010 by Sharon Dahlhaus, Account Executive

Even though email, online, and social media marketing have come to the forefront over the past several years, most companies still utilize direct mail as a part of their marketing strategy. In a recent study by Direct Marketing Association, over $175 billion was spent globally in 2009 on B2B and B2C direct mail marketing efforts. While direct mail has been a proven medium over the years, it is important to remember that results are always tied back to ROI, especially in the B2B world. Similar to an email getting caught up in a spam filter, sending direct mailers that never reach the prospect (no matter how impressive the creative) is a waste of marketing dollars. To combat this, our clients have found combining specialized telemarketing with eye-catching creative is a recipe for success. Here are several strategies that can be utilized to not only increase the number of direct mail pieces that reach your prospects, but also help deliver strong conversion rates and ROI:

1. Take a Dimensional Approach – The toughest challenge with direct mail campaigns is reaching the prospect with your message. Reaching C-level executives is particularly difficult because their mail is heavily screened. So unless your direct mail letter or postcard stands out from the rest, it most likely won’t reach the desk of your potential client. That’s why dimensional mail is one of the most effective ways to reach prospects. It gets attention because it doesn’t look like everything else that the prospect is receiving that day.
2. Pre-Qualify Your List with Discovery Telemarketing – Dimensional mail campaigns are not inexpensive to produce, thus it’s critical that investment is not wasted on names that are out-of-date and addresses that are incorrect or incomplete. Even accounts that are handpicked by Sales rarely have all contact data complete and up-to-date. Once a list is identified, a first step should be to perform telemarketing to insure the data is 100% accurate before mailing.
3. Follow-up with Post-Mail Drop Lead Generation Telemarketing – Once the dimensional mailers are dropped, it is important to launch a series of well-timed follow-up calls, strategic voice mails and follow-up emails (to mirror the messaging in the mailer). Even though the dimensional mail pieces will most likely include a link to a vanity webpage and an 800 number for the prospect to call if interested, on average between 60-80% of a campaign’s leads/appointments are secured via this type of proactive follow-up.

The proof of our approach is in the results. Here are some stats we’ve seen:

• Regular Flat Mail = 0.5% conversion
• Dimensional Mail = 1.33% conversion
• Dimensional Mail with Telemarketing = 2.9% to 6.3% conversion

Conversion rate is defined by number of leads/appointments divided by the total number of contacts who were sent direct mail.

Tagged: telemarketing lead generation, targeted telemarketing, telemarketing and direct mail, sales lead telemarketing, sales leads, telemarketing appointment setting

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