Get Those Direct Mail Sales GoingDo you want your direct mail sales to soar? There are a few things you can do to get a better response from your direct mail sales. After all there is nothing worse than spending a ton of money on a direct mail campaign and finding that it is a total flop. There are different rules that apply to different situations. If you are trying to target the end consumer, or another business you will generally focus your direct mail sales differently. You can use techniques for business sales in direct consumer targeting and vice versa and sometimes these techniques will make you stand out from the rest and be a little different.
To succeed with direct mail sales especially when advertising to other businesses, you need to meet the needs of three elements. If you are selling to other businesses then you probably have a sales group, and you go about your sales by creating a sales lead and then a sale. That means that not everyone that calls is going to be a sale, only a percentage of those people that call will end up in a sale. With a direct mail campaign you need to find out what your qualified lead rate is. The qualified lead rate is the percentage of inquiries that are made from your direct mail campaign. These inquiries can lead to direct mail sales. That means you need to know how many of those leads are qualified leads. You could receive 100 calls but only 25 of those people were qualified to make the purchase. That means you have 25% answer rate, and much of that 25% will result in direct mail sales. Appointment Setting This is the number of prospects who have responded and where you have been able to get an appointment or who have signed up for a demonstration. The normal percentage rate that gets to this stage of your game is 30%. Your Sale! Your sales amount to however many final sales your staff makes based on the appointments. You are looking for a 50% sales rate. So when you are selling to another business the question is not what is your response rate to a direct mail campaign, but what kind of direct mail sales your campaign produces. The response rate you get from your direct mail campaign will give you leads, how many direct mail sales your campaign produces depends on how much your other departments support those leads and how good you are at closing. The purpose of a direct mail campaign is to get you sales, but it is important to remember that you will only get between a 2 and 3% response rate, and of those that do respond not all of them are qualified customers, and then not all of those will actually make a purchas. That is why it is so important to plan out your direct mail campaign and get all of the elements right so you can make those direct mail sales. |