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Marketing Quick Tips
Email Vs. Direct Mail
E-MAIL PROS:
PRO: E-mail is fast. In two ways. First, your development time is minimal. As soon as you want to test an idea, you can write a compelling e-mail, and hit the send button. Second, your prospects get your e-mail instantly so responses can come in within minutes. Speed, from start to finish.
PRO: E-mail is a great testing medium. And you can get virtually instant answers to marketing questions. Is an offer going to be a winner? Send a group of prospects an e-mail and you'll have an answer. Want to know which headline is going to pull more?
Do some e-mail testing and you'll quickly have an answer.
PRO: Downloadable marketing pieces are instantly available. For example, if you're offering a report filled with valuable information, prospects can click through to your landing page, fill out a short form, and download your report in under two minutes. The fact that they don't have to wait long to get their free report boosts response rates.
E-MAIL CONS:
CON: Thanks to spam, sorting through e-mail messages can be a real drag. Which means your prospects are looking for anything familiar or important and deleting everything else.
CON: E-mails limit creativity. An all-text e-mail is obviously visually quite boring. Even using HTML, with some color and photography, the look is either limited or can be blocked from view by email filters. Bottom-line: with e-mail, your graphic designer is fighting with one hand tied behind the back.
CON: Great e-mail lists are hard to find. Unless you've built up a healthy, double opt-in database of emails it can be difficult to truly benefit from email marketing. Sure, you can use a partner's or group's list by having them send emails on your behalf, but it can become tedious to go thru this every time you want to send out a campaign or test different marketing ideas.
DIRECT MAIL PROS:
PRO: Its something your prospects can tangibly touch. Sure, it's called "junk mail.", and yes, people short their mail over the garbage can. But when prospects
sort through their postal mail, you're able to interrupt and engage them in a way a single email subject line never will.
PRO: Direct mail gives you space to tell the whole story. Your only limitation is the space requirements you chose yourself. If you want to send a single postcard - you can. If you want to send a 5 page letter with and enclosed audio CD - you can do that too.
PRO: You can include and/or use as many different pieces as you want. From a colorful flyer, to a glowing testimonial sheet, to objective product or service reviews and comparisons, to whatever. Anything you need to convenience prospects to buy from you - you can put together and send.
DIRECT MAIL CONS:
CON: Direct mail can be expensive. Postage and printing can cost a lot of money, and then there's the list rental and mail-house costs to consider. Not to mention creative development. Bottom-line: the front end costs are definitely higher than email. But when done right - direct mail can be very profitable.
AND THE WINNER IS:
It's a tie! Yes, both e-mail AND direct mail should be included in your marketing mix. The advantages of both mediums far outweigh their individual disadvantages. The key here is to test. Do your prospects prefer that you communicate with them via email or direct mail or both? If one medium is favored over the other, that doesn't automatically mean you should stop using the less favored one. Sometimes it's the combination of a one-two punch from both mediums that leads prospects to finally choose to do business with you.
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