The Backbone of Your Marketing Campaign: Creating Direct Mail Lists

Your direct mailing campaign is only as good as the list you’re sending it to.

You could build your own direct mail lists. Or, you could use brokers, compilers, and expert services. Either way, you’ll want a list that’s hot, hot, hot and responsive to your campaigns.

How do you go about getting and/or building a list for your direct mail campaigns? Try some of these strategies!

Use the Data You Have

Look no further than your customer list when building your direct mailing list.

Your customer list would include:

• Names
• Addresses
• Purchases

These three data points provide enough to launch a campaign. You know they’re acquainted with your brand. Plus, they’ve bought from you before. You’re nudging them to repeat business versus going after them cold! In addition, studies have shown the highest response rates from direct mail come from your current and past customer lists. They know your business best and welcome receiving new offers and information.

Set Up Lead Funnels

Funnels attract and collect visitor information — build them using forms like:

• Website contact
• Service request
• Live Chat
• Click-to-call
• Directory listings
• Contests

Use a two-stage confirmation when people sign up or exchange information. It involves sending a follow-up to confirm their info and agree to the mailing terms. This ensures they are open to you mailing them and makes the leads “hot” since they’re responsive.

Use Lead Magnets

You can improve the effectiveness and reach of list building efforts by using a lead magnet. A lead magnet is a freebie or resource enticing info exchange. It may also include tangible or non-tangible items.

Lead magnets could include items like:

• eBook or online course
• Stickers, t-shirts, or cups
• Coupons or freebies

You get the idea, right? Give away something of value in exchange for their information. Then, validate the information by sending a test campaign. Those who respond goes into the final direct mailing list.

Seek List Brokers or Compilers

Buying or renting a list is a quick and efficient solution to assist in finding new prospects.  The best prospecting list is one that looks like your current customers.  You want to find like people, so profile your client base first and try to find like people.   You have the ability to target a specific type of prospect by…

• Demographic Information
• Geographic location
• Lifestyle Interest
• Business type
• New Homeowner

The lists are compiled from all sorts of data bases but mainly credit bureaus, warranty responses and public records.  It’s important to inquire about what type of guarantee the list vendor has on the accuracy of their data and how frequently they clean and update their files with the National Change Of Address.  You want to make sure any list you purchase is cleaned within 30 days of your purchase.

Mailing lists are never 100% accurate from any source but do your due diligence before investing tons of money into a list source.

Clean your List

Keep your list Clean.

It is important to keep up with your mailing list and prune those that are unresponsive.  When doing a direct mailing, your mail house should be NCOAing and CASS Certifying your data file every time you do a mailing to help you in this process but you need to be sure to get those moves that were updated in your mailing so you can update your database.  If you don’t, after a certain period of time those records will not get flagged and you will be mailing to the wrong prospect.  You should also be removing any undeliverable pieces you receive back, along with outdated users.

You could also include a call-to-action with a campaign to help your manage your data base.  Those who respond go into a new hitter list for a specific type of follow up mailing and those that don’t respond, get into a cold file that receive a different type of offer in the next mailing.  Having your offers match your mailing list is key to generating a higher response rate.

We Can Help Build Your Direct Mail Lists

Over 45 years of experience in print and direct mailing makes us experts. We’ve helped countless businesses build and launch successful campaigns.

Above all, we’d love to work hand-in-hand building your direct mail lists. In addition,, help you see success through this powerful form of advertising and marketing.

Browse our mailing services. Then, call us at 888-430-6245 for a quote.