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Return on Investment (ROI)
Always set reasonable expectations for your campaign and allow yourself to be pleasantly surprised if the mailing outperforms those expectations.
Let's say you send out 5,000 postcards to the addresses on the mailing list you rent. If you received just a 1% to 3% response rate (50 to 150 responses), it would be a highly successful campaign. With email, your response rate could be far lower with a 0.25% to 1% response rate indicative of a solid mailing. Fortunately, most companies find that they can achieve solid ROI even with very low response rates. Often, it is a matter of working with your broker to set expectations.
In most cases, you shouldn't expect anywhere close to a 1%-3% response rate on your first run. First-time mailers are likely to have limited results and may even initially experience a negative return on investment (ROI). Fortunately, each mailing is a great learning experience: if you have a good mailing list broker, you will be able to effectively tweak and re-target your mailing lists to improve future campaign performance.
Why are the results typically so low? It's difficult to point out an exact reason. It could simply be the wrong time of year to generate new business, your offer may seem interesting but too expensive for some businesses, or it may have been an ordinary mailing that didn't stand out from the competition. Once you conduct your initial campaign, a mailing list broker can help you adjust your approach to help develop a more productive mailing the next time around. Additionally, if you are having a hard time finding the root cause of poor performance, you may want to work with a direct mail services provider to restructure your campaign.
Here's a final tip: Since email marketing is more affordable, rent an opt-in email list and test a small campaign before investing in a larger, more expensive direct mailing. Even though your response rate could be poor, it offers an easier point of entry and you could use the experience to develop a more intensive direct mail campaign.