Direct mail remains an effective marketing strategy, despite the overwhelming digitization of the world at large. In fact, a direct mail marketing campaign can actually be more successful than an email marketing campaign. While email might be a more common form of communication than standard mail, approximately 90% of direct mail is opened while as little as 20% of marketing emails are opened.
When it comes to direct mail, postcards are one of the most effective types of direct mail because they are able to draw the attention of potential customers without having to be opened first. Keep reading to learn more about 5 things you can do to make your business’s direct mail postcards stand out.
1. Keep it Simple
When you send out direct mail postcards, you might be tempted to include as much information and as many graphics as possible in an effort to draw the attention of potential customers and encourage them to engage with the postcard and your business.
However, it is much more effective to keep your postcards simple. If your postcard is overly busy-looking or contains too much information, potential customers are likely to get overwhelmed and ignore the postcard altogether before they even finish reading your content. Keep your content brief and to the point, use an easy-to-read font, and use images and graphics but use them sparingly.
2. Get Creative
As stated previously, it is important to keep your direct mail postcards simple enough that they don’t look too busy or are distracting or confusing to your potential customers who read your direct mail content. However, it is just as important to get creative with your postcards.
If you send out black-and-white postcards with no graphics or images, your potential customers are likely to just throw them away. Include colors, attention-grabbing headlines, relevant graphics, and images, etc. Getting creative with your direct mail postcards is an effective way to draw more attention to them and encourage potential customers to engage with them.
3. Choose Size Carefully
When it comes to postcards, size matters. Sending out direct mail postcards already gives your business a leg up with your direct mail marketing campaign because postcards don’t need to be opened and are therefore even more likely to be read than standard mail in an envelope. You can give your direct mail marketing campaign an even better chance of succeeding by sending out larger postcards.
Larger direct mail postcards are 15% more likely to be read than smaller postcards. They stand out in the mail because most businesses send out standard-size postcards. Plus, larger fonts on larger postcards are easier to read—which means potential customers are more likely to read the postcard all the way through because reading large fonts does not take as much effort and concentration as squinting to read small fonts.
It is important to make sure that the size you choose for your direct mail postcards is USPS-approved. Standard postcards that are approved by the USPS measure 8.5” by 5.5” and USPS-approved extra-large postcards measure 11” by 5.5”. Make sure you choose one of these two sizes—preferably the larger size—for your direct mail postcards to ensure that they are successfully distributed and not blocked by USPS before they are ever delivered.
4. Include a QR Code
In the tech-focused modern world, you should add some digital features to your postcards to capture readers’ attention. Including QR codes that link to your business’s website and social media platforms—or expanded multimedia content that you weren’t able to fit on the postcard—on your direct mail postcards pique readers’ curiosity.
Plus, potential customers are much more likely to visit your website or social media platforms if they are presented with a QR code that links to them. Including a QR code on your postcard can help drive more traffic to your business’s website and social media platforms and shows that your business is modern with digital platforms.
5. Add a Call to Action
There’s almost no point in sending out postcards if you don’t include a call to action on the postcards you send. It is important that potential customers who read your postcards know exactly what to do moving forward to engage with your business.
Keep your call to action simple and brief to avoid confusion, but make sure that it stands out on your postcards—put it in an attention-grabbing color, outline it, make its font larger than the rest of the fonts on your postcards, etc.
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