Direct mail has increased 137% in the last ten years yet according to a recent study by the Direct Marketing Association – the leading authority in direct marketing – the percentage of people binning direct mail has risen from 63% in 2008 to 74% in 2009.

“It is clear that many companies are trying to save money by using old, out of date or inaccurate data” explains Insight Data’s commercial director Helen Costeloe-Hughes. “Recieving a letter addressed to the wrong person will ensure your mail-out is binned while leaving the recipient with a negative view of your company.  It is a completely false economy to save money by using old data while wasting thousands of pounds on postage. Using accurate, meaningful data will dramatically increase your response rate.”

Meanwhile, other sources state that a 5% “returns rate” is acceptable in direct mail.  So, for every 1,000 mail-outs you send, 50 undelivered is reasonable. “We think this is a poor show and wastes a great deal of time and money” continues Helen; “companies do change management and move premises and both of these result in “undelivers”.  But again, if your data is accurate, this won’t happen.”

Insight Data’s fabricator and installer database contains details of 14,123 companies and the database is updated live in real-time by a full time team of researchers.   Users of the data access the information live via SalesTracker, Insight’s online database.

“Unlike any other data supplier, we actually mail our full database on average every week via our own direct mail division.  This helps us monitor and control data quality so that our clients have the most accurate information.    Our “delivered” rate is 99.8%,  which means just 2 out of every 1,000 mail-outs are “undelivered” explained Helen; “and these are often simply a postal mistake by the Post Office”.

The result? A notable increase in your “return on investment”, as more people will respond to your mail-out.

To help improve your direct mail response further please read some of the other articles on this website.

For more information on direct mail please either send us an online message or call us on 01934 808 293.