Direct Mail Vs. Email Marketing? Which Is Better For You?

When it comes to developing a marketing strategy, the bottom-line results of each approach are what matter most. Marketers agree that direct mail marketing and email marketing are not only highly effective, but also very cost-effective ways to acquire new customers, up-sell to existing customers, make new sales, and stay connected with existing clients.

When the two are used together in an integrated marketing campaign, the results are incredible. Even more importantly, any business, regardless of its size or budget, can easily implement both marketing techniques. But some businesses could benefit more from one of them than the other. So, which marketing method is better for you?

Direct mail marketing

With direct mail marketing, the business seeks mailing solutions to send mail items directly to either businesses or consumers. The advantages of this method of marketing include:

• Highly targeted – you can deliver letters, parcels, catalogues, product samples, and other items to a specific audience based on their geographical location, income bracket, age, and other factors.
• Measurable results – you can easily measure how effective your marketing campaign is based on the number of recipients who respond to your call to action. For instance, you may direct your recipients to a specific landing page on your website, give them unique coupon codes, etc.
• Entertaining and informative – since the mail item can be in any form, from a simple letter to a company brochure or catalogue to a promotional item, many recipients open and save mail items from brands they are interested in for future reference.

Email marketing

This is a fairly simple marketing technique that requires you to collect the email addresses of existing and prospective clients so you can engage with them via email. Some advantages of this method include:

• Affordable – most of the work is done online, whether it is acquiring email addresses or designing email campaigns or sending the emails. There are no costs involved besides paying your Internet provider and perhaps using an email marketing software.
• Easy to track – it is very easy to track the effect of your email campaigns on different groups so that you can adjust them for subsequent campaigns.

Verdict

Although direct mail marketing has a higher response rate compared to email marketing, the associated costs can be a big commitment for small businesses. Emails, on the other hand, tend to be easily discarded as spam without getting opened by the recipient.

It is best that you use an integrated marketing approach that incorporates both methods so you can draw the most benefits and maximize your ROI. But if you must choose one, you should consider the limits of your budget, how soon you want to roll out the campaign (it takes time to collect email addresses), how updated your mailing lists are, and how active your target audience is online.

Interested in adding direct mail marketing to your advertising mix? Please call our Toronto mailing house at 1-866-486-0423. Troi spells success, one letter at a time!