Why You Should Embrace Direct Mail

The way we communicate and receive information has changed dramatically in the last century. Email now serves as a primary communication method for our work and personal lives, as well as a medium for learning about brands and purchasing products online.

Print media can serve as a key component of a campaign, or provide a supplemental channel that offers a more tangible experience. And this opens an opportunity for direct mail printers to step in and provide significant value for their customers with personalized direct mail.

The direct mail industry does face some challenges these days, however — including paper shortages, labor shortages, and rising postage costs. While Congress is working to stabilize and improve the USPS, direct mail printers are looking for ways to meet demand and deliver the quality customers expect without increasing costs. If printers can find ways to address these challenges there is a big opportunity for growth in this space.

According to MAGNA & Matterkind, at the end of 2020, direct mail was a $16 billion market. Innovations in printing technology and marketing tools are making it more effective. Businesses can now send personalized direct mail to customers they are already engaging with online, and in many cases, these direct mail touches can cut through the noise more effectively than digital marketing alone.

The report also found interest in direct mail is high: People spent an average of eight minutes opening and reading mail each day in 2020 (up two minutes from 2019), and 60% of millennials said mail is more important to them now than it was three years ago. This growing interest in mail gives brands the chance to capture attention with targeted messaging in a medium consumers pay attention to.

Companies are using direct mail to supplement email communication, drive traffic to digital campaigns using QR codes or custom URLs, promote online offers, and more. These touch points can be woven into a larger campaign, so they fit well with the timing of email, ads, and other digital tactics.

The latest digital inkjet printing technologies are helping PSPs take on direct mail print jobs of all sizes, so more companies can make this medium part of their campaigns. And these technologies are part of a large digital printing market expected to grow to $225 billion by 2029, according to Dr. Paul Ewing and Dr. Sean Smyth in “The Future of Digital Print: Long-Term Strategic Forecasts to 2029.”

More than 625 billion pages have been printed on an HP PageWide (Booth C4256) web press to date. HP continues to partner with PSPs to deliver technology, ensure simple and dependable press operation, and impress customers with offset-class print quality on a versatile digital inkjet web press.

Direct mail printers can help deliver these experiences with digital inkjet technology. HP’s fleet of graphic solutions are unrivaled across the industry, and enable print houses to create the custom, memorable direct mail their customers need. With digital inkjet printing, you can help direct mail live up to its potential, allow your customers to reach their audiences, and deliver a high return on investment.