Inkjet Summit 2017: Some Direct Mail Insights You Need to Know

The more personalized your direct mail message is, the more compelling it becomes to the receiver, says Marco Boer, VP, I.T. Strategies.

How do your customers — marketers — view print? How are they using print as part of their overall marketing mix? Does print still fit as a piece of a relevant marketing message?

During the 2017 Inkjet Summit, Nathan Safran, director of research for NAPCO Media, and Marco Boer, VP of I.T. Strategies, provided insight into the minds of marketers and how they view direct mail — and print — as part of the overall marketing mix.

According to a report by NAPCO Research and Target Marketing (a sister publication to Printing Impressions), a quarter of marketers are planning to use print — whether it’s direct mail, magazines, catalogs, or newspapers — as part of their marketing mix in 2017. This represents the second largest “bucket” behind online marketing to create customer engagement.

Additionally, direct mail was the second most used method for customer acquisition and retention. Why? Simply put: because it works. According to the research, direct mail provides the second highest ROI behind email marketing. And when those direct mail campaigns provide a personalized or customized message, the response rates increase dramatically.

So why not focus just on email and online marketing if it gets the best returns? Why go through the time and expense of creating and delivering direct mail pieces? Because there are some substantial drawbacks when it comes to email and online marketing. While it may be easy to create an html email and send it with the click of a mouse, Boer was quick to point out that click fraud is becoming a tremendous problem for marketers. According to a report by the Association of National Advertisers (ANA), advertisers are expected to lose an estimated $7.2 billion globally in 2016 as a result of fraudulent impressions or bots. In February, a Texas jury ordered TriMax Media, a digital advertising agency specializing in search engine marketing, to pay one of its competitors $2.3 million for what jurors agreed was an elaborate click-fraud scam. (Read more about it on Ad Age.)

Direct mail — and print — don’t have to deal with this problem.

So what industries are looking to increase their direct mail spending in 2017? According to Safran, the top seven industries are real estate (50% increase over 2016), healthcare (42% increase over 2016), creative services and agencies (41% increase over 2016), financial services (40% increase over 2016), telecommunications (38% increase over 2016), manufacturers (37% increase over 2016), and publishing (36% increase over 2016).

These increases will translate into increased pages in print. According to Boer, the direct mail segment of the market will see 15% CAGR through 2021 just in inkjet pages alone.

If you are interested in attending the 2018 Inkjet Summit, please complete this interest form.