FAQ

Address zones must be at least 6.35cm (height) x 8.89cm (length). Standard Canada Post indicia must be at least 19mm tall, to a maximum height of 35mm.

Troi Mailing Services has 25 years of direct mail experience. As an accredited Canada Post Smartmail Marketing Expert Partner, we know the postal system comprehensively. Here are some ways you can reduce postage costs on your direct mail campaign:

1. Cleaning Up Your Duplicate Address Records:
   Troi Mailing Services’ dedicated data team will eliminate any duplicate or invalid addresses from your direct mailing list, so you can optimize your postage funds.
2. Direct Mail Weight and Size:
   Direct mail comes in a variety of sizes, shapes, and forms. Weight and size are the primary drivers for postage costs. For example, if you normally mail out a full-size catalogue to your customers, consider sending a smaller digest-size catalogue with links to your full online catalogue. While weight is an important factor, dimensions are critical too. Minimize costs by keeping your mailing within the window for Standard “Personalized Mail” (formerly known as Addressed Admail).
3. Review Your Postage Options:
   There could be other postage categories to best suit your direct mail pieces. You may be using one option, when another, less expensive option would also be appropriate for your business. These postal category options can include Personalized Mail (formerly known as Addressed Admail), Publications Mail (Pubmail), Machineable Lettermail, Incentive Lettermail, Postal Code Targeting (PCT), Small Packet (USA and International), and USPS Marketing Mail. Each category has different requirements, delivery times, and benefits. Please contact your Troi Mailing Services representative at 1-866-486-0423 when trying to determine which postage option will work best for your direct mail campaign.
4. Convert To A Neighbourhood Mail Campaign:
   Neighbourhood Mail (formerly known as Unaddressed Admail) has the lowest postage rate and can provide you with a successful direct mail campaign. Neighbourhood Mail (formerly known as Unaddressed Admail) works well as a prospecting, acquisition or branding tool. This type of mailing can target apartments/condos, houses, farms and businesses. Canada Post‘s Precision Targeter program will provide you with a broad range of criteria to choose from, and targets specific letter carrier walks that will match closely to your intended audience profile. Neighbourhood Mail (formerly known as Unaddressed Admail) is often used to make the first connection to your targeted audience, and provides you with an opportunity to establish new relationships.

Quality assurance is an important element of database management. Troi Mailing provides two data services to our Clients to reassure you that your mailing list is up to date.

1. Troi Mailing Services uses Canada Post address validation software to identify and remove duplicate and invalid addresses within your address files. Troi will provide a duplicate address file and invalid address file that you can use to clean up your database.
2. National Change of Address (NCOA) processing will help identify clients that have moved or passed away in the last five years. This will help you to ensure that your Personalized Mail gets to the right person at the right address before it enters the mail stream. National Change of Address (NCOA) processing should be done periodically to keep your client address records current and accurate.

Direct mail success can be measured and analyzed more precisely than other media. Troi Mailing Services staff will be pleased to outline common industry practices that you can incorporate within your campaign to help measure its success.

For an acquisition mailing (designed to acquire new business), a response rate of 1% – 2% is considered successful. For more targeted personalized mailings, every industry has distinct expectations. For example, not-for-profit renewal mailings (designed to obtain gifts from existing donors) should work toward a successful response rate of 8% to 10% by industry standards. Direct mail response rates are dependent on many factors, but the three most important factors are Target Audience, Creative and Offer.

Direct mail response rates are dependent on many factors, but the three most important factors are Target Audience, Creative and Offer.

Other factors that affect response rates:

• Type of program – i.e. acquisitions or renewal initiatives
• Ease of response or redemption of offer
• Relevance of product to recipient
• Competitive activity
• Seasonality

The more personalized you make your direct mail campaign, the greater chance you will incite the recipient to take action.

A civic number is the street number within an address record. For example, the civic number for Troi Mailing Services in Toronto is ‘445’. The full address is:

Troi Mailing Services

16-445 Midwest Road

Toronto ON M1P 4Y9

Mailing list pricing is dependent on multiple factors such as:

1. Size of the list (number of records)
2. Complexity of the demographics selected
3. Source of the address records

Lists can be purchased or rented, potentially starting as low as 7 cents per record. Minimum fees are often charged on mailing list orders that are below a certain number of records.

Lists can be purchased or rented from different sources that include Canada Post’s data solutions team and other list brokers. It is important to ensure that the organization engaged to procure a list is reputable and has a privacy policy in place to ensure the data is secured and kept as current as possible.

Canada Post sometimes offers postage discounts for Commercial Accounts, based on annual volume commitments. Please contact the Troi Mailing Services team for more information at 1-866-486-9350.