When it comes to sending out a piece of Direct Mail to elicit a favourable response, the one that carries an Offer versus the one which doesn’t – emerges the winner! Simply put, no offer means no response. A classic example of mailers containing offers are those designed by Reader’s Digest – they always pulled in the desired response.
When you have a good offer going, shout it from the rooftops; not in the by-lanes of your text. Be upfront about it… position it prominently on the front of the mailing piece to attract both attention and response!
It’s also important to know what are the most read parts of a mailer. These in order of attention-getters are:
1. The headline
2. The first 3 paragraphs
3. The crossheads or subheads
4. The P.S. at the end
It is unforgivable, if not downright criminal, how many DM writers, warming up about the product or service being offered, will bury the obvious leads down in paragraph six or seven. Text split into short, indented paragraphs highlighted with bullets, asterisks, ellipses, underlines, hand-written notes/comments in the margins, bullets – all serve as eye-catchers and keep the eyes engaged while reading the mailer.
Finally, bear in mind that the only page in the mailer that ends with a period, or a full-stop, is the last page. The last sentence on all previous pages should feature an incomplete sentence. This is what will entice the person reading the mailer to go on to the next page.
In summing up, we reiterate: The offer is all-important. If you want to dramatically increase the response to your DM letter, then dramatically improve your offer! Then watch your sales go through the roof, if not sky-high!
(From MLI, Social Marketing Division. As an integral part of our broader services, we provide clients with complete data management solutions including: Data Cleaning, Mailing Campaign Management, De-duplication and In house Database Management)
