Savvy marketers always want to maximize their return on investment (ROI) by getting the biggest bang for their marketing buck, but which approach is more effective – mass marketing or direct marketing? Mass marketing communicates to the widest possible group of people, hoping to catch the attention of consumers who want to buy something at just the right time. Direct marketing sends targeted messages directly to individuals who are most likely to need what you are offering.
Using internet marketing, increasingly fragmented audiences, and more sophisticated targeting software, the scales are tipping in favor of direct marketing. With new ways to integrate messaging with mail, email and digital activity, the Direct Marketing Association predicts direct mail spending will be $47 billion this year. One way to increase the ROI of direct campaigns is to use PURLs, or Personalized URLs, which direct recipients to a unique online destination. Here are seven reasons why direct marketing can be effective in driving up your marketing ROI:
- It’s cost effective: ROI can be increased by keeping costs low while increasing campaign effectiveness. Because of its imprecise nature, mass media advertising campaigns can become very costly as they try to search out the most likely buyers of a product or service. Direct marketing focuses on a specific, targeted group of the population and works hard to connect with them. Tools such as PURLs can be used to motivate recipients to become engaged by directing them to an interactive, customized landing page.
- It’s controllable: While mass media does offer large audiences, not all of them are potential buyers. Direct marketing can also reach large audiences, but they can be highly targeted based on your unique demographic specifications.
- It’s fast: With mass media, you often release a marketing campaign and wait while you hope the results come in. Direct marketing has a very fast response time because it is usually driven by offers that have an expiration date. This creates a sense of urgency for customers and prospects to take action, and the addition of a PURL moves them along to the next step.
- It’s easy to implement: Mass media campaigns often take a lot of time to plan, meet with media representatives and implement. Direct marketing can be executed very quickly by accessing information in your database, creating a special offer, and using the Easypurl dashboard to quickly broadcast personalized emails, and link recipients to highly personalized landing pages.
- It’s more personal: With mass media, you don’t know who is receiving your message, so it can’t be personalized. With direct marketing, you know exactly who is receiving your message and can personalize the experience using custom PURLs and dynamic landing pages.
- It’s flexible: You can increase the effectiveness of your direct marketing efforts by utilizing multiple channels such as email, direct mail, Web, SMS, call tracking and QR codes through one platform such as Easypurl.
- It’s easy: It is difficult to track results with mass media. The Easypurl platform has a robust tracking and analytics feature that allows you to track your campaigns and evaluate what is working and what is not.
PURLs in direct mail and email marketing really make a difference. Easypurl is a complete online solutions provider for Personalized URLs, landing pages, email marketing and postal mail tracking with intelligent mail barcodes (IMB). Visit our Easypurl website to learn more about direct marketing and how to get to help drive up your marketing ROI.
