GUEST AUTHOR –DIRECT MAIL
The emotional response
Let’s be honest, direct mail isn’t people’s emotional response. No safely discard. The mind is
just a challenging advertising response, no consideration. prone to classifying stimuli, to
Readers are
medium in which to execute The combination of eye save us time and effort.
intuitively
successfully; it’s more like tracking and facial coding is a Just the right degree of
climbing Mount Everest without one-two punch, look and feel, heightened tonality, with good
adept at
a rope. awareness and consideration. enough production values to
avoiding
Direct mail can and does And here’s a few lessons from support being worthwhile is
work, but there are companies using that combination. important.
advertising
all around you falling off the Now let’s look at the visual
messages.
mountain all the time. Key factor aspect, whether on a self-mailer
Rather than listen to their For starters, split-second timing or on the envelope or inside the
screams, however, let’s is the key factor. You probably envelope. People will have their
concentrate on what it takes to sense that reality. But maybe initial emotional response – if
get to the top by generating the you don’t know that the average any – to a stimulus within three
kind of response rate and sales consumer viewing a print ad in a seconds or less, typically.
you long for. journal will take about 1.6 In other words, the joke that
A bold opening to create a seconds to look it over and has to be explained to you is
shocking effect? That could be a move on. With direct mail, the never as funny as the joke
fair assessment, but it’s not and window of opportunity may be you just get. Ensure that
here’s why. I’ve read about the even less. the visual is meaningful
low response rates, sometimes My motto is . . . ‘He who not a gimmick, conveying
directly from prospects –like the hesitates is bait’. the essence of one of
guy who admitted they had once You want your piece to stay t
sent out a mailing that in the hand, not the trash can. a71
w

o things:
The key emotional
approached a million pieces only And to achieve that goal, you benefit of the key
to get a single, that’s a single, have to take some chances. rational benefit of
lone response. After some amount of direct
In contrast, I once was asked mail testing – including having a71
your offer.
A turning point in
by a major insurance company accurately predicted for one the implied story that
to come up with a creative brief, financial services company how your direct mail piece is
hire an advertising agency, and 25 of the 27 pieces we tested telling, whether that
see what would happen. What would perform in-market based turning point be the
happened was the most on the realised response rate, I initial hook (problem
successful direct mail campaign have to tell you that I’m not
in the company’s history. fond of the odds of winning with
In writing the brief and a letter in an envelope. It takes
working with the agency, I drew too long to get to the story.
on my now decade-long The exception: unless you’re
experience using a pair of willing to take a chance on the
research tools that have taught outside of the envelope. What
me – and now, in a minute, you kind of chance? The creation of
– a lot about what works and gripping fear that makes them
doesn’t – and why. grip the direct mail piece a little
One tool is eye tracking, the longer, or an arresting visual.
split-second recording of where Sounds easy, right?
people look. Without attention, Try to use shock and
no awareness. awe. But a big splash of
The other tool is facial shocking novelty won’t
coding, originated by Charles work if it means people can
Darwin as the single best means easily classify the mailing
of non-invasively gauging as ‘junk mail’ they can
30 January/February 2009 www.dmi-news.com
Page 1  |  Page 2  |  Page 3  |  Page 4  |  Page 5  |  Page 6  |  Page 7  |  Page 8  |  Page 9  |  Page 10  |  Page 11  |  Page 12  |  Page 13  |  Page 14  |  Page 15  |  Page 16  |  Page 17  |  Page 18  |  Page 19  |  Page 20  |  Page 21  |  Page 22  |  Page 23  |  Page 24  |  Page 25  |  Page 26  |  Page 27  |  Page 28  |  Page 29  |  Page 30  |  Page 31  |  Page 32  |  Page 33  |  Page 34  |  Page 35  |  Page 36  |  Page 37  |  Page 38  |  Page 39  |  Page 40  |  Page 41  |  Page 42  |  Page 43  |  Page 44  |  Page 45  |  Page 46  |  Page 47  |  Page 48  |  Page 49  |  Page 50  |  Page 51  |  Page 52