When we first started the business, our focus was on providing professional data services as well as mailing services and we incorporated the company Alexander, Floyd & Associates Ltd. The Alexander was taken from Alexandra, which is Christine’s middle name and the Floyd is from my middle name, as you may have guessed.

As Alexander, Floyd & Associates did not have much of a marketing ring to it, we decided to register the trading name of Highland Marketing under Alexander, Floyd & Associates Ltd. We liked the sound of Highland Marketing and it was consistent with our roots in Fergus.

Interestingly, our certified, LCP sort software is listed on the Canada Post website under the name of Alexander, Floyd & Associates Ltd. As such, with the introduction of our new Remote LCP Sort Services, we felt it time to bring the name of Alexander, Floyd & Associates more to the forefront, especially for those that might want to confirm the certified status of our software on the Canada Post site. To this end, we have also set up a separate website for Alexander, Floyd & Associates Ltd. to feature our Remote LCP Sort Services.

So, there you have it. Alexander, Floyd & Associates Ltd. and Highland Marketing are really the same entity and we answer to either one.

Hope this helps!

News, Updates & Information

When it comes to keeping people up to date on new postal products, new direct marketing ideas and what’s happening at Highland Marketing, I think we do a pretty good job. We do our own mailings, we deploy informative e-news emails, we post enlightening articles to our blog and we share information via Twitter. And, we run frequent seminars on direct marketing. I often meet new folks at different events that comment on the quality of information that we make available. So when it comes to news, updates and direct marketing information, “we keep you posted“.

Gathering Strategic Customer Information

Good business decisions are based on good information. Our survey services are an ideal way to find out what customers think of your organization and it’s products and services. From here you can modify and/or tweak your offerings to reflect what your customers are looking for. Using state of the art survey software, “we keep you posted” by delivering the strategic information that will help you to better understand your customer needs and desires.

Delivering Your Materials Into the Right Hands

Be it Admail, Publications Mail, Lettermail, Parcels or perhaps our premium Message In A Bottle Service, we turn your direct marketing projects around quickly. Our professional staff also keeps you informed of different mailing options to help you to minimize cost as well as maximize your ROI. Of course, we have been involved with direct targeting and effective personalization for many years and our data specialists can help to put your valuable materials into the right hands. Regardless, of the type of mailing product being used, “we keep you posted“.

Keeping you posted – at all levels – that’s just the nature of our business!


It’s usually hard to pick favourites, but in 2010 three projects really stood out. Of these, one has already been written up in a marketing magazine, another will be written up in a different marketing magazine in about two weeks, and the other was a special personalized piece placed within a magazine.

I am going to share each of these projects with you, but hold back a little on the one to be featured in the upcoming magazine issue.

Die Cuts Proved That Unaddressed Admail Can Bring Outstanding Results

Investing in clients is always worthwhile. Last year we hosted a few free seminars, focusing on innovative DM techniques. One of these was attended by a couple of friends from the agency Bev Rock, Media Buyer.

If you know me, you’ll know that I squawk a lot about custom die cuts – they’re cool, they show innovation and they get attention. Bev Rock and her team picked up on this and had two fabulous dies made for Noble Insurance (with offices in Alliston, Barrie, Collingwood and Elmvale ON) – one an elegant and appealing house and the other a 50’s style automobile. Using 3 variations of these dies, they dropped Unaddressed Admail pieces at roughly one-month intervals, to the same target groups. They achieved excellent results and having repeated one variation of the same campaign already, we will be doing another one this spring. Yowsers, that’s great! This campaign is featured in an article that I wrote for the January 2011 issue of Direct Marketing News. Check out page 18. You can download it here, but please note that the entire issue is about 10 megs.

Personalized Postcards Inside Magazine Made Readers Feel Special

Both Matt and I have written extensively on the effective use of personalization and this next project went above and beyond marrying this with:

- a very cool custom die cut
- placed on top of the advertisers display ad inside a magazine
- where the die cut card matched the display ad

Wow!

Should you have missed it, I wrote a blog post on this project back in October, 2010.

This was everything that a project should be with excellent data (kudos again to those maintaining it), subtle personalization (using only a greeting name and community name) and a great die cut card that got attention. One of the readers actually contacted the advertiser to let him know that it made him feel special and that’s what personalization is all about! A final note on personalization. If you use it, don’t go overboard, because that can have the opposite effect.

Message In A Bottle Campaign Yields Extraordinary ROI

You can learn a lot more about this extraordinary campaign when it is featured in a marketing magazine in about two weeks.

Until then, we can tell you that YES, these were full-size wine bottles. We did not have a report of a single broken bottle. We helped to develop a very effective four-step program to maximize results. It was very expensive, the ROI was extraordinary and we shipped a lot of bottles.

Promise to say more in a couple of weeks!

Lots of Other Great Stuff

Glad to say that there were many other exciting projects at Highland Marketing in 2010.

We can’t forget our friends at Grand River Raceway in Elora. They used a couple of our oval postcard shapes together with some great design work and a special offer that had their dining room hopping. I can attest to this, because my wife and I were there!

Pillow boxes became more popular too. We were one of the first to ship product samples in pillow boxes and we saw more new uses of pillow boxes in 2010 and helped to design a few for new projects. Apart from the graphics and copy, which must look good, we did a lot of “behind” the scenes work coming up with cool spacers to avoid crushing during shipping. After all, the physical packages must also look good when they arrive in the consumers’ hands. Oh yes, Allen our resident mathematician came up with a super program that allows us to calculate the flat width of a pillow box, given the desired popped-up height and popped-up width. Very cool!

We were also delighted with the evolution of our overall fulfillment services in 2010. And, through some analysis of Addressed Admail delivery times in late 2010, we have come up with a computer program that allows us to minimize costs, while using a combination of Addressed Admail and Lettermail to ensure that delivery times are being met. Timing for this is perfect, as we are experiencing a significant increase in our 2011 sample fulfillment projects.

Okay, time to give thanks to our clients as well as the very cool and gifted agency folks that we work with – first for putting their faith in us and secondly for listening to some of our ideas and allowing us to be more than just a mailing house.

Although young, 2011 is already rockin’ and we look forward to more innovative and exciting projects. We have also brought back our survey services and look forward to working with clients and agencies to help them find out what people really want, enabling them to fine tune their products and services and deliver the messages that people want to hear.

Before delving into this, if you might be looking to save even more money, we encourage you to read the Author’s Note at the end of this post.

Basically, with an LCP sort, computer software attempts to create bundles of mail at the following levels: DMD, DF, DCF, FCP and Residue, all of which are explained below. The lower the level, the better the price for all of the pieces in the bundle. The sort itself is based on the postal code and that it why it is important that all postal codes be as accurate as possible.

For Addressed Admail, you must have minimum of 8 pieces to make a bundle. With Publications Mail, you must have a minimum of 6 pieces to make a bundle. That is one of the reasons why a Publications Mail sort will often deliver better pricing than an Addressed Admail sort.

The different levels within the sort are as follows:

DMD    Delivery Mode Direct

This is the lowest level and pieces bundled at this level get the best pricing. DMD sorted bundles contain pieces that belong to a particular letter carrier.

DF    Delivery Facility

A Delivery Facility is a postal outlet through which mail is delivered. So, bundles created at this level contain pieces, other than DMD bundles noted above, that would be delivered by one or more letter carriers at a particular Delivery Facility.

DCF    Distribution Centre Facility

Sometimes there are not enough pieces of mail to create a bundle of mail for a given Delivery Facility. In this case, the mail for two or more stations in a region may be grouped into a DCF bundle or an FCP bundle (see below). As not all postal codes have an associated DCF sortation level, sometimes if there are not enough pieces to send directly to a Delivery Facility, the pieces may be grouped and bundled at the FCP level.

FCP    Forward Consolidation Point

Provided there are a sufficient number of pieces to create a bundle, mail that could not be bundled at a lower level will be grouped into an FCP bundle. A Forward Consolidation Point normally services a broader geographic area than a Distribution Centre Facility.

Residue

Miscellaneous mail that has not been bundled through any of the prior levels is sorted in a precise manner and grouped into one or more Residue bundles.

As noted above, there are different pricing levels for DMD, DF, DCF and FCP and Residue, where DMD has the lowest pricing and prices increase through the higher levels. Given this type of pricing structure, mailing files with higher geographic concentrations will enjoy better pricing. For example, if a mailing consists of 5,000 pieces, all going to delivery addresses in Guelph ON, most of the bundles will be at the DMD or DF levels. However, if 5,000 pieces are to be delivered right across Canada, there would likely be very few, if any, DMD bundles, with perhaps a few DF bundles and the remaining consisting of DCF, FCP and Residue. Thus, the pricing would be higher.

Although containerization does not affect pricing, the concept of grouping bundles together into mailbags or hardsided containers is somewhat similar. For example, you may have 2 bundles to go to Fergus ON, but that may not be sufficient to create a container. Note that the building of containers is based on various criteria including number of bundles, weight and fill rates.

Well, there you have it. That is a brief overview of how an LCP sort works and what the terms DMD, DF, DCF, FCP actually represent.

I hope this helps. As always, if there are any questions, please do not hesitate to contact me.

Authors note: We have been developing our own LCP sort software, under our incorporated name of Alexander, Floyd & Associates Ltd., since 1995.

Although we do no sell our software, we do provide remote LCP sort services for clients that want to save money and rely on our expertise. After completion of the sort, we provide these clients with all of the files and paperwork that they require to assemble their mailings and induct the mailing at Canada Post themselves.

As appealing as Machineable Presort may be, before you can use it either you or your mail service provider must have presort software that has been certified by Canada Post for Machineable Presort.

Our technical team has worked diligently with Canada Post to achieve the certification milestone and it’s good knowing that all of our clients will be able to use Machineable Presort and enjoy the postage savings that it offers.

Machineable Presort offers you from 3% to 18% savings on your Addressed Admail postage and that can really add up. As we have explained in previous posts, there are specific requirements for Machineable Presort that are quite different than those for conventional presorted Addressed Admail. It’s really a matter of understanding the differences before you design your mailing piece and we would be pleased to guide you through the details.

If you would like more information on Machineable Presort please give us call. We would be delighted to help you.

Today, more than ever, blog posts and tweets are offering us all sorts of advice on effective personalization, data segmentation and cross-selling opportunities. These are great concepts and I like what I am reading. I also see different articles on data hygiene and the value of accurate data, and I like these too. However, having seen some of the finished product and listened to the heartache stemming from some third-party direct marketing (DM) programs, I wonder why I am not seeing more about the actual delivery of the message. And, “delivery” in this context is not referring to Canada Post, the USPS or Joe’s Delivery Service. It’s referring to how some things are being expressed and, not necessarily just what is being said.

Much of how things are said hinges on the vital correlation between how you choose to deliver your message and the quality of your data. Both of these elements must integrate effectively with the overall design of the DM piece.

My early training was in applications systems design and we were always taught to look at what the system was intended to deliver and work back from there. This allowed us to look at each output field and determine if it was to be derived through a process or if it was static information that we could extract from a file.

Interestingly, digital print is also a systems process. So, if we want the end result to look good, we have to design the end product much the same way, visualizing it and determining which data elements will be used and if they will come to us in a static form or be calculated dynamically. Further, sometimes not all data is readily useable and we must plan for these contingencies by having a Plan B and often even a Plan C, so that we can adjust for all eventualities.

D for Data

It goes without saying that most of our clients design DM pieces with appealing graphics and excellent copy. As many of our contacts are seasoned marketers this is their strength. Yet, when it comes to incorporating variable data, we begin to see challenges. And why not? Databases are not usually their strength and data inconsistencies and misconceptions can often be the biggest source of trouble.

If you are a designer and you feel that a little Database 101 is not for you, I urge you to please read on, because what follows can help to minimize the chances of blowing your brains out over what many may consider nothing but menial tedium. It’s a dirty job, but somebody’s got to do it. If you don’t want to be the one, you can certainly pay someone to do it, but at the end of the day, if it’s not done, you could certainly end up paying for it anyhow.

I recognize that what is acceptable in format and manners has changed over the years. Virtually all business letters used to have formal greetings, such as “Dear Mr. Smith”, whereas today our business emails often start with “Hey Bill”. However, I still cringe when I receive a personalized (and I use the term loosely) letter or email that starts out as “Dear DAVE WARD”. It just looks to me like someone didn’t try or couldn’t be bothered to create a more appropriate greeting. After all there are programs that can split fields and do case conversions. And, I’m pleased to say that I don’t think that this is necessarily an age thing, as a “twenty-something” colleague that I was speaking with just last week expressed disdain for a greeting that she received structured as “Hi C. Smith”.

Sometimes people don’t understand data or fail to ask the right questions. Let me ask you this: if you were sending out a personalized DM piece would you like to use any of the following greetings?

• Dear Mr. _____
• Dear D.
• Dear DAVE
• Dear DAVE WARD
• Dear dAVE

I would hope not, and would be pleased to show you how you can avoid these challenges, eliminate “impersonal personalization”, connect effectively and keep your campaign dollars working for you, rather than spiraling down the drain.

First of all, if you are dealing with upper case data, you can have your mailing data converted to mixed case. Right off the bat, this will correct the “Dear DAVE” and “Dear dAVE”. Yes, it will also convert “Dear DAVE WARD” to “Dear Dave Ward”, but that is still less than ideal. So, what we want to do next is to parse the contact string into a first name of “Dave” and a last name of “Ward” so that our greeting simply becomes “Dear Dave”. Again, there are techniques that can be used to parse fields, albeit, in some cases some manual intervention may be required. The case conversions and field parsing should be viewed as one-time investments and you should have a way to either a) update your main system or b) have a corresponding, indexed file that your mail service provider can use to update key fields prior to mailing. These things should be discussed with your service provider at the outset, because you shouldn’t have to incur these costs every time you do a DM campaign.

Sometimes, however, we just can’t create a perfect greeting and it can become a matter of selecting the lesser of two evils. These challenges often stem from how the data fields were set up initially, as well has how the data has been gathered and entered. We have always recommended that the contact information be gathered or entered using a Title field (Mr., Ms. etc.), a First Name field and a Last Name field. This way, if the person enters a First Name of “P” and a Last Name of “Smith”, if we also have the title, we can simply use it together with the Last Name (e.g. Dear Ms. Smith).

Okay, but what can we do about “Dear Mr. ______” and “Dear D.”? Your options here would include:

• calling the contacts to update the information (not always viable)
• using a generic greeting (works better in some cases than others)
• excluding these records from the mailing

In our business, client preference always rules and we have used all of the solutions above at one time or another. For example, we had a very small handful of records where we used a generic greeting of “WHEAT PRODUCER” on the personalized baker cards that we recently tipped into a magazine on top of the advertiser display ad.

Also be cautious of rented listed lists. If you specify that all records must have first and last names, you might still receive some records where there is only a first initial rather than a complete first name. I recall a project where a client had rented a list and assured us that all of the first name fields were valid. However, as we loaded the data, we found several records that contained only a first initial. After discussing different options with the client, they elected to exclude these records rather than sending out greetings such “Dear D. Jones”.

D for Design

There are many different variations on the process of digital print and the variable substitution of data, but they all share two common elements. First, they have place markers where variable data will be inserted and second, the lengths of the fields to be inserted will vary on the finished pieces that are produced. No, it’s not rocket science, but if you don’t analyze the data first to determine your maximum field lengths, you will likely encounter premature line wrapping, which can cause:

• copy and possibly graphics to float off the page
• truncated copy within a text box

Does this really happen? Unfortunately, yes, and we have seen it on many pieces that we have received. Of course, some designs are more vulnerable to these types of challenges than others. Certainly some specialty mailers (such as die cut postcards) that are using larger fonts for greetings and other prominent text can be subject to these problems. But, at the same time, so can a personalized letter that has substitutions within a text box, so there is some degree of vulnerability at all levels. However, with a bit of effective data analysis, pieces can almost always be specifically designed to accommodate maximum lengths for all substitutions.

We shouldn’t expect most designers to perform this type of analysis on their own. After all, it’s not necessarily their strength. However, it is something that they must take into account, and requests can be made for third party vendors to provide a detailed analysis. With this critical information in hand, designers can then select the appropriate fonts and font sizes and allocate sufficient space within the design to accommodate all substitutions.

Before departing this subject I want to make one final observation on how the use of upper case can dramatically affect how much space you may require. Please have a look at the following l’s and L’s:

• 40 l’s: llllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllll
• 40 L’s: LLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLL

The foregoing shows the same font at the same font size, but just look at the difference in length when using upper case!

Of course, the other aspect of design is producing something that has appeal, gets read and generates responses. While experienced marketers will already understand these concepts, there may be others out there that can use a couple of tips. If those folks can simply remember “AIDA” when designing their marketing materials, they will be on their way to creating solid marketing pieces. “AIDA” is an acronym that stands for Attention, Interest, Desire and Action and you can read more about it at ChangingMinds.org.

D for Delivery of Your Message

Thus far, we have looked at how you can combat the effects of weak data on your campaigns, how field lengths must be taken into account at the design stage and we’ve touched on the important elements of Attention, Interest, Desire and Action. The last item that we want to examine is how some very successful marketers use data to deliver seamless, “touchy-feely” messages that make the reader feel right at home.

If you want to engage your reader this way, first you must be careful not to turn them off with a lot of servile flattery by using their name in every paragraph. Again, looking at the baker card campaign that I mentioned above, the card only uses two pieces of variable information. The contact name is used in the greeting and the community name is used, but once, to mention that the seeds being promoted might be perfect for the recipient’s own area. There is no fawning, just a plain, insightful message that worked.

Depending on the richness of the data that you are using, you can also engage your readers at a personal level without even using their names. Your present data may not be as extensive as what I will discuss here, but this type of data is available and, although it can be pricey, it can also be an excellent resource for building your overall client base.

Let’s assume for a moment that we have purchased a list of consumers that suffer from back pain, headache or both. We might also know what their favourite pain remedies are and whether these consumers are brand loyal or using competitors’ brands. This type of data is powerful medicine when used in the hands of a skilled marketer.

Although I’m sure that most people would not structure a letter this way, let’s look at what we would not want to say to someone suffering from back ache that is currently using a competitor’s brand of acetaminophen:

Dear Dave,

I know that you suffer from back pain and that you are currently using Pain-Whackers acetaminophen for your pain relief.

Dave, we want you to try our. . . .

If you are Dave, are you buying this? Chances are that your reaction would be something along the lines of thinking “Who are these people and where did they get all of this information about me?” as you scrunch up the letter prior to tossing in into “File 13” (the garbage).

Let’s contrast this to the following:

Dear Dave,

We all know that when back pain and headaches strike, it’s great to have fast-acting relief that we can count on.

The dependability of our advanced ibuprofen is unparalleled when it to comes to delivering. . .

Notice that this letter references both back pain and headaches, leading with the more appropriate (in this case, back pain). By mentioning both ailments in this order, it minimizes the likelihood of raising the suspicious question of, “How’d they know I suffer from back pain?”, as might be the case if only the one ailment were mentioned. Of course, if Dave happened to be a headache sufferer, these would be reversed, as follows:

We all know that when headaches and back pain strike, it’s great to have fast-acting relief that we can count on.

This letter also subtly extols the virtues and an alternate analgesic without mentioning the fact that we know that acetaminophen is currently the pain remedy of choice.

These types of letters can be structured in many different ways and I am sure that you can identify opportunities that you could use in your own industry. However, keeping it subtle and engaging the reader in an insightful way are key.

So, by embracing the philosophy of “less is more”, using specific personal information sparingly, and then tailoring your message to connect with your reader without being obvious, you can certainly deliver your message in a powerful way.

Sir Francis Bacon said “Knowledge is Power” and how you use the knowledge that you have at your disposal can certainly affect the power of you message.

As I said at the outset, I like many of the articles that I am reading and agree whole-heartedly with their objectives. But, I have also heard of some avoidable challenges that have arisen on some third-party projects. I would like to be able to tell you that we win every project that our many friends and associates are involved with, but that would not be true. If we did, I truly believe that we could circumvent these types of problems. However, we have helped to orchestrate quite a few successes in these areas and I hope that readers of this post will be able to use some or all of the ideas presented to drive successful personalized DM projects, minimizing or eliminating the various challenges that we have discussed.

Image credit: Kriss Szkurlatowski (modified)

In late May we announced the introduction of Canada Post’s new Smart Data Cleaner services and wrote blog posts titled Say Good-Bye to Inaccurate Data and Weak Data Can Kill Good Creative.

Having observed a modest uptake on the new data cleansing services, now that summer is over and we are “back to work”, I believe that this bears mentioning again.

However, before continuing, we must also remember that sometimes it may well be the address rather than the consumer that is being targeted. For example, if I sell septic system supplies or services, I probably would not want to target a customer who has moved to the city and is now on city sewage services. If someone moves, you may no longer have the correct contact name, but you may still have an appropriate address to target. There are different options one might consider here that can be discussed based on the circumstances.

Continuing on then, it is a given that most organizations are faced with budget challenges and, more and more, the onus is on us to do more with less. Of course, this includes producing a healthy ROI on our marketing campaigns.

Given a need and desire to show the best possible returns, would anyone knowingly mail to outdated addresses? We would think not, but in reality, this happens all the time!

As we noted in our prior post, 20% of Canadian households move every year. When we looked at the math, we showed just how quickly a database can become outdated. Using conservative estimates, we demonstrated how on a file of 50,000 records, 20,000 of these could have outdated addresses within three years! Granted, Canadians can complete a change of address form when they move, however, mail is forwarded for only six or twelve months (optional) and unless you get an updated address, your mail will not be reaching the correct person after that point.

It is also startling to realize that, independent of whether the consumer or business name is correct, on average only 56% of “uncleansed” addresses are accurate. Accurate in this case meaning that the address, postal code and community are correctly matched.

I would like to look at the math in this post in a slightly different way. Let’s assume that we get a 5% response rate on our file of 50,000 records that we mentioned above. That is 2,500 responses. But, when we consider that 20,000 of these records are outdated, we actually got 2,500 responses resulting from 30,000 good records. That comes out to an 8.3% response rate and, had we mailed to 50,000 current and accurate addresses, we would likely have received around 4,150 responses. That is a huge difference and would increase our actual response rate by 66% (i.e. from 5% to 8.3%).

Also, if we assume that it cost us $2.00 to print and mail each item, we would have spent $100,000 for the 50,000 items, rather than spending only $60,000 to print and mail to the 30,000 good addresses. This would increase the printing and mailing costs by an astounding 66.7% (.667 X $60,000 = $40,020). Ouch! Or, looking at it another way, we could reduce our print and mailing costs by 40% ($100,000 – $60,000) if we only mail to the 30,000 good records.

So, if we are looking at maximizing our direct marketing ROI, data cleansing is a good place to start. Based on the examples used in this post, we were able to reduce costs by 40% and increase our response rate by about 66%, simply by ensuring that we were mailing to a current and accurate mailing list. That is a very good ROI.

But wait! Even if you do use an outside service to clean your data, it is only clean on the files at the service provider’s end. The same errors and inaccuracies still exist on the host system (s) that the data was extracted from. So, how are you going to update your main systems, or are you? If you do not your data would have to be updated and cleansed every time you mail and that is both costly and cumbersome. In another post we will look at how we have handled these types of projects in the past, and how we can help clients to ensure that all updates and corrections are applied to their host systems. This offers you the best of both worlds!

Lastly, as we mentioned in our prior post, if you are unsure as to the current state of your data, we are offering a free, no risk assessment for Canadian mailing data files. Please feel free to contact us to take advantage of this offer.

That being said, however, we recently made an interesting adjustment to our own website, which could be of great interest to anyone interested in the broader scope of direct marketing. In this article, we would like to share what we did, and consider how similar techniques could be used to support your marketing efforts.

On the home page of our site, we have a “slideshow” window, through which we rotate a series of slides in order to promote different services or parts of the website. Until very recently, these slides were entirely static. That is to say that they were simple, unchanging images that were simply fetched from the server.

One of these slides was specifically designed to promote this very blog. However, through some thinking and discussion, we determined that it would be extremely cool if we could somehow have the title of the most recent blog entry appear on that slide. As the primary designer and developer of the site, it fell to me to determine if there might actually be a way of doing this.

It turns out there was, and so we implemented the functionality. If you’re interested in seeing it in action, just hop on over to our home page. If you’re really interested and would like to know how I did it, I’ve written about the process in another article.

As interesting as this is, though, the point of this article is not just to demonstrate something that we did, but to point to it as an example of a potentially powerful marketing technique to use on your websites. By its very nature, dynamic content can include a very wide range of different values, derived from a number of sources. Depending on the nature of your website, and the extent of your data, there can be a variety of different ways that you could potentially use the concept of dynamic content to beef up your online marketing efforts.

One such method that we at Highland Marketing get really excited about is the powerful fusion of direct mail and the web, through concepts such as a web driver card.

Consider that any addressed direct mail campaign is fundamentally driven by data. Even if you only have basic name and address information, this can be a powerful tool for generating dynamic, personalized content, both in mailer itself and on the web!

Have you ever been to a website where the URL (web address) looks something like this?

http://www.yoursite.com/dmpromo.php?id=1357863

Notice the question mark? Everything after that is what we web geeks like to call the query string. It’s a method of passing unique information directly to a page, and once we have that information, we can do all sorts of cool and interesting things with it.

For example, in the URL above, the data we pass to the page is an ID number. If we have a database of individuals available online, we could very simply use the number to retrieve an entire array of information about a particular customer, including name and address data. Then we could use the individual’s name to tastefully personalize a landing page.

We could also use cookies to save this information for further retrieval as the user navigates deeper into the site, or comes back later. Oh, and before anyone gets all nervous, cookies are not a bad thing and cannot install viruses on your machine or the machines of your clients. They are simply a way for websites to store user-specific information on your computer, for subsequent retrieval at a later date. Check out this article for more information.

Anyhow, by passing user information to cookies, we could add further personalized messages as the user continues to navigate through the site. We could also fetch address data to auto complete relevant forms, such as those on the  contact page, or the checkout of an eCommerce store.

Of course, if your customer database contains more than just simple name and address data, you can take this dynamic content concept even further! Suppose that you had a slider window like ours one the front page of your site and customer purchase history on your database. You could then use the customer ID in the query string to retrieve that purchase history and then select display slides that are most relevant to the buying patterns of that particular customer!

This could take multiple forms too. It could be just a matter of presenting different products that your data suggests a user might be interested in. Alternatively, you could also present the same product in different ways. A business man and a high school student might both be interested in the same laptop computer, but their reasoning is likely to be completely different. If you can distinguish between them, then you can use dynamic content to help make your advertisements appeal specifically to this reasoning!

Loyal readers will note that we’ve discussed these types of possibilities before in an article titled “Personalization and Direct Targeting”. The particular scope of that post had to do mostly with direct mail, but by building a connection between mail and a website, these same concepts could easily be ported the the digital world, to help further marketing efforts and drive sales.

Whether online or in the mail, effective marketing is all about getting the right message to the right people at the right time! If we can do anything to help you with this key marketing function, please do not hesitate to contact us.

In this article, I would like to return to that subject and consider the very important relationship that exists between copy and design (or layout, if you prefer), which must be carefully considered whenever you’re doing a project involving variable print. That relationship revolves around line length.

As we have mentioned previously, part of the power of using variable copy involves being able to include targeted marketing information directly within the copy of a piece. For example, we might have some copy like this (wrapped in a simple design that I whipped up really quickly):

Notice that both the individual’s name and company name are included within the body of the copy itself, making use of the whole concept of personalization. This works well enough as a mockup, but in real world situations, things could potentially get a little dicey.

Why? Because not everyone’s name is Jon. Nor does everyone work for the fictitious SomeTech. Names vary (thus the term “variable”). Even more importantly, the relative length of names also varies. So, while the surname Jon works quite well here, what would happen if the piece were addressed to a Christopher or Alexander, or someone with an even longer name?

Assuming that the variable print technology that your printer will be using can accommodate for paragraph wraps, here’s one example of what can happen:

Doesn’t look so great does it? The longer first name changes the way that the paragraph wraps, forcing the company name down onto another line, and totally messing up the balance and spacing of the design!

If your printer’s technology doesn’t accommodate paragraph wraps, other strange things can also start to happen. Take this one for example:

Instead of wrapping when the name becomes too large for the space provided, the size of the type is reduced in order to be able to actually fit all of the text. Again, this is not something that you really want to see on your finished piece! Undoubtedly, there are probably some other issues that could crop up too.

Of course, it gets even worse if there is a long first name and a longer company name:

In this instance, the design is totally messed up, and the prospect or customer who receives the piece probably won’t be all that impressed with the sender.

So what can you do to circumvent these line length problems? Here are some simple steps you can take:

Talk to Your Printer

The very first step that you need to take is to initiate a discussion with your printer. Talk to them about their software and learn about how it accommodates for longer or shorter strings in variable text. This information is absolutely critical, because it can actually have a direct impact on how you choose to design a piece.

For example, if the printer’s software does have the ability to force wraps within a block of text, then you can just build substitutions into your paragraphs, and know that all the wraps will happen exactly as you plan them (the key word there being plan).

On the other hand, if your printer’s software doesn’t accommodate for proper wrapping, that’s something that you are definitely going to have to take into account in your design, making appropriate choices to help prevent things from going very wrong.

Analyze Your Data

Because variable print is driven almost entirely by your data, your customer or address file can actually provide you with some really important information that can help you with the overall design process. We’ve already seen how the length of certain fields can have a negative impact on the appearance of a poorly designed variable piece, so that’s a good place to start.

Run some tests to determine the longest value for every field that you will be using for substitution purposes. Armed with this information, you can actually carefully structure your design in order to ensure that there is adequate room for the longest values that need to be printed.

Don’t just look for the longest data, though. You should also look for missing data. Though it may not be quite as impactful in terms of pushing content outside of the margins and boundaries of a design (as seen above), it’s still an important exercise. Not only will missing data have a profoundly negative impact on your copy, it can also leave gaping holes in the overall design of the piece.

Always try to be aware of your data and build your designs accordingly.

Test, Test, Test

When working with variable print, it’s also always important to test your work. Even if you’ve talked to your printer and analyzed your data, you’re really just asking for trouble if you don’t take the time to actually run some tests and make sure everything works out properly.

In my experience, there are two main forms of testing that I do.

First, there is manual testing. When I’m doing this kind of testing I basically just insert a number of different variables into the design by hand, just to see how everything comes out. Obviously, it’s a labour intensive process, and I’m somewhat limited in how much testing I can actually do. That being said, however, it’s still an effective form of initial testing that I think is essential to any variable print project.

Also, this kind of testing is even more effective if you’ve taken the time to analyze your data, since you can actually take the longest strings in your database and specifically test those.

The other form of testing comes directly from the printer. Every single time we do a variable print job, one of our stipulations is to receive and review a PDF containing several records (usually at least 100). This allows us to go through the pieces and check them against the data file, to make sure that all the substitutions are working correctly. It also gives us the opportunity to check and make sure all the wrapping and placement is working as expected.

On simple jobs, we usually find that the first 100 records provides a reasonable sampling. However, on more complex jobs, or jobs where we have concerns about wrapping and character length, we may ask for very specific ranges, based on our data analysis. This allows us to have a look at particular sets of “worst case scenario” records. If they look fine, we know everything else will too.

Conclusion

Variable print is a wonderful technology, and one which we always endorse (assuming that a budget can afford it). That being said, however, it’s very variability does ultimately make it a bit more complex than regular printing, and their is certainly more opportunity for error. Some of the shots we saw above are perfect examples.

This certainly doesn’t mean that we shouldn’t use variable print. It simply means that we must be somewhat more vigilant in the way that we approach it. For every project, we need to consider all of the different factors that will be effected by the variability, like the relationship between line length and copy. Then, it’s just a matter of taking the appropriate measures to ensure that all possible mishaps are effectively prevented.

Hopefully, this article will help you do just that. As always, if you have any questions or concerns about this, or any other mailing related issue, please do not hesitate to contact us.

Before long, fingers start being pointed and accusations (veiled or otherwise) start being hurled like rotten tomatoes, as attention invariably comes back around to the apparent (though shocking) failure of the creative. But before we bring down the headsman’s axe or do anything too hasty, maybe there is something else that could be the cause of this apparent failure.

Maybe we should turn our attention to the data.

We often hear the much-heralded phrase “Good data is a key ingredient to the success of any direct marketing campaign” (or at least something very similar). But just how important is good data, really?

The easiest way to answer that might be with another question. Who would mail their best marketing piece to a list that is only 1/3 (or 33.33%) accurate? The answer is obvious: no one would do that intentionally. Yet, though it is perhaps somewhat shocking, when we take into account that about 20% of Canadian households and businesses move every year and about 44% of the addresses on uncleansed mailing files contain one or more errors, it becomes almost frighteningly apparent how something like this could actually happen.

Let’s break this down a little more.

If we apply these statistics to a file of 50,000 consumer records, this means that, in just one year, 10,000 of these consumers will move to a new address! We might be able to follow this trend forward and say that a total of 30,000 would move over 3 years. However, assuming that some of those frequent movers are actually the same people, let’s drop that number and suggest that 20,000 might move over a three-year period.

That’s still a pretty hefty chunk of the data file!

Of course, there may be some who would argue that, if a piece is promoting a service such as carpet cleaning, swimming pool maintenance, roofing services etc. then it could still be relevant to the current occupants, regardless of who the piece is addressed to. There may be some truth to this. However, as part of common courtesy, many people simply will not open mail that is addressed to others, so if an envelope is used, the overall effectiveness of the mailing could still be effected. Something like a postcard might convey the message regardless, but, it’s still not the same as receiving something with one’s own name on it.

Now, if we look at the address accuracy challenge, our statistics tell us that, on a file that has not been processed through an address accuracy and correction program, an average of 44% of the addresses will have errors in them. So now we have a file where we are mailing to only 60% of the correct consumers and, of these, only 56% of the addresses are correct. This means that only 33.6% of the records contain the right consumers at the right addresses, which is pretty close to the 1/3 that we cited above!

When we consider the foregoing, is it any wonder that even some of the most brilliant campaigns just don’t do as well as expected? In the direct marketing industry, a 1% response rate is considered to be very good, so let’s assume that this is the target goal for our 50,000 piece mailing. If only 1/3 of our records are actually accurate, then 1% of the accurate records is approximately 167, which of course translates to only 0.334% of the total file, a number that falls well below the target.

Okay, we’re done with the math now. Hopefully, though, you can see how weak data can completely derail a great direct marketing campaign, and cause you to basically just flush money down the drain.

Now, I want to stress that an inaccurate address is not necessarily an undeliverable address. Accuracy is measured by means of automated comparisons against a Canada Post master file. And an address that may be deemed inaccurate through this process could be correctly interpreted by a postal worker, resulting in the eventual delivery of the piece (though possibly with delays).

Having already seen the negative influence that bad data can have, however, do you really want to take the chance and hope that your pieces with inaccurate address data might get delivered? I certainly wouldn’t.

Given all of this, it’s incredibly alarming that, in some cases, we have seen a blatantly blase attitude towards data. Some marketers just seem to think that, as long as all information exists somewhere on the database, that everything will just fall into place. That’s just not the case. It’s like opening a box of IKEA furniture, throwing all the unassembled pieces into a pile and somehow expecting it to magically pull itself together. And that, of course, is assuming that all of the necessary information is actually present. It becomes even more of an issue when key address information is simply missing.

Fortunately, as noted in Monday’s post Say Good-Bye to Inaccurate Data, Canadian mailers now have a solid line of defense against stale and inaccurate data with Canada Post’s Smart Data Cleaner services. Additionally, for those that need help, vendors such as ourselves are available to assist with formatting data into acceptable Canada Post formats as well as integrating updated data back into client databases.

For quite sometime now, we at Highland Marketing have been telling our clients and associates that the two keys to successful direct marketing are good creative and good data. It’s not an either/or kind of scenario. Both of these need to be present and accounted for. Yet, it seems that the bulk of the attention keeps falling on the side of the creative.

Hopefully, this article has shown the fundamental problem with this way of thinking, illustrated how weak data can actually kill even the best creative, and motivated you to take a closer look at the accuracy of your own mailing file!

Further Resources

After all of this discussion, we certainly don’t want to leave you worrying about your data, without offering some resources for helping to improve it. To start, we have written some other blog entries that focus on data:

• Say Good-Bye to Inaccurate Data
• Good Planning, Good Data, Good Results
• Being Creative with Variable Print
• 5 Reasons to Seed Yourself

We have also prepared several resource documents that can help instruct you in both the basics as well as some of the finer points of working with data

• Database and Address Accuracy Primer
• Making Your Data Letter Perfect

Finally, if you are unsure as to the current state of your data, we are also offering a free, no risk assessment of your Canadian mailing data. Please feel free to contact us to take advantage of this offer.