Lift Holiday Spirit and Sales with Personalized Direct Mail
ATLANTA—Nov. 27, 2012—The holidays are a time to reach out to people in a way that forms a genuine connection. Personal contact is easily the first thing to go in our modern world, where e-mails are common place and a hand addressed letter is rare treasure. But some groups and businesses are bucking this trend and making the holidays a reason to renew personal connections.
Nothing is a better example of a commitment to connecting during the holidays than the “The Big Thank You” campaign of The Bert Show in Atlanta. For the second year, the show is asking listeners, and anyone else who is interested, to write a personal letter of gratitude to the military men and women serving the United States across the world. The goal of the campaign is that all of the brave and courageous service people will have a letter of thanks in their hands this holiday season—and maybe just a glimmer of the home they are far away from this holiday season.
Last year, the drive collected nearly 400,000 letters from individuals, children, businesses and community groups. These small tokens of personal connection lifted the morale and spirits of the troops and their families, and the campaign was a huge success. The Bert Show is looking to grow and continue this success during the 2012 holiday season.
The Bert Show’s grand idea is a wonderful example of the effect a handwritten letter can have on just about anybody. Businesses can also achieve this similar sentiment through distributing personalized direct mailers to potential and current customers. Research conducted by Millward Brown, a leading research firm, revealed that people have a deeper connection to physical rather than virtual materials. The study suggests that real experiences, such as receiving a letter in the mail with their name handwritten on an envelope, will create a more memorable impact because the person is experiencing emotion elicited by the piece of mail.
Direct mail distributors can aid businesses even further by helping them target customers using certain demographic data. According to the Direct Marketing Association, targeted directed mail boasts a 4.4 percent response rate, compared to e-mail’s rate of 0.12 percent. In fact, Stuart Ogletree, a State Farm Insurance broker in metro Atlanta, estimates a five percent increase in customer response when targeting specific homeowners combined with handwritten fonts.
Also, the power of a ‘thank you’ should never be underestimated, especially in the direct mail world. AccurateLeads sends out personalized cards throughout the year to show customer appreciation. The small token of thanks shows a personal touch, again eliciting an emotional response from the recipient, and further building loyalty.
Handwritten letters are a lost art and the mailbox is getting increasingly sparse. This provides businesses an even greater opportunity to utilize direct mail products. The thrill of running to check the mailbox will not be going away anytime soon. With the holidays upon us, it is the perfect time for organizations to use direct mail to reach out to consumers and form a connection. The Big Thank You campaign provides the perfect example of how moving the gesture of personalized mail can be.
About AccurateLeads
AccurateLeads is a leading provider of direct marketing services that help businesses grow their client basis. Founded in 1984, AccurateLeads has developed a unique process that helps businesses create an individualized multichannel marketing plan to stimulate growth and out brand competition.
Source: AccurateLeads.
