Some of the best practices in creating a donor appeal campaign includes segmenting the target audience into New Grads, New Grad Renewals and Regular Renewals. The direct mail piece can be versioned for these segments. If an offer is part of the campaign, this too can be versioned among the intended recipients. For instance, more recent grads can receive an offer of an ITunes gift card, while older graduates can be given a premium item of greater value that is reflective of their past giving amounts. This can all be communicated on the direct mail piece. The mailers can be further segmented into age, gender, degree and geographical groups as well. All of this data is usually readily available to an organization.

With the proper segmentation, personalized direct mail can increase acquisition and retention rates and ultimately go a long way towards meeting the fundraising goals of any academic institution.

One thing that an organization may want to try is the introduction of variable data into the newsletter to see if this can breathe life into an underperforming asset. You may have heard the phrase, variable data, but what does it really mean?  Variable data printing is a form of digital printing in which elements such as text, graphics and images may be changed from one printed piece to the next, without stopping or slowing down the printing process and using information from a database.  It’s more than adding a name or address, it’s a personalization process that enhances communication. 

The biggest overall use of personalization within member based associations is the ability to vary communications dependent on the primary reason why a member belongs to an association. Members often join associations for reasons that vary from networking, education, government advocacy and/or access to group benefits.  Some other uses are:

• Using personalization in  communications based on a members previous use of association resources
• The use of variable print to increase member interaction at member events (i.e. personalized networking cards, name badges, or event registration forms)
• Using personalized url’s (purl’s) to pre-populate member surveys which will increase participation
• Using variable data when requesting a member’s participation in legislative call to actions and legislative communications (i.e. printing the name and contact information of the appropriate Congressman for the recipient)
• Using variable data when sending out dues renewal information (the previous year’s payment history can be communicated)
• Using personalization to vary printed communications between long time members, reconnecting with past members who have dropped off  and prospective members

Introducing a full variable data newsletter to your entire database may seem overwhelming and, at first glance, more costly than a conventional newsletter.  A suggestion would be to test the introduction of the variable data. One way to do this would be to print half of the newsletters as a static version and the other half as a personalized newsletter.  Adding varying levels of personalization is also a way that one can test the waters of personalization versus response rates. If you feel your organization lacks the necessary data to add personalization to its direct mail efforts, doing a test mailing is one of the best ways to kick start your efforts.

Contact us if you have any stories about how variable data has worked for you or if you are interested in learning more about this personalization process can help your organization.

Personalization can, and should be, more than just the use of the recipient’s name throughout mailer.  Data fields, blocks of copy and  images can all be variable or unique to each individual piece.

Following are some suggested uses of personalization based on a direct mail campaign for subscription renewal.

• Use personalization to version the piece between renewal donors (those who have made a donation in the previous 12 months), acquisition donors (those who have made a donation previously but not in the past 12 months) and non-donors (those who not have never made a donation)
•  Use subscriber’s previous season ticket information to map their seat information for easy removal. (i.e. number of subscriptions, seating locations, ticket prices)
•  Use color coding to point recipients in the right direction.
• Vary the suggested donation amount dependent upon previous donations.
•  Print a different message dependent upon the targeted group.
• Utilize a personalized url (purl) to pre-populate a landing page for those who reply online.

Using personalization in the proper manner can remove or minimize the friction involved with renewal or donor requests and ultimately increase the response rate , hopefully increasing  the incoming revenue to the organization.

Consumers and businesses alike are being bombarded with content.   An argument can be made that they suffer from digital fatigue.  With the dizzying array of marketing channels now available and the explosion of digital and social as media, companies are scrambling to learn new forms of communication often at the expense of presentation. In other words, the medium becomes more important than messaging.

As I step back and look at communications trends in business, I see marketers quickly scrambling to learn new technologies sometimes at the expense of basic principles of marketing. Fear of irrelevance in terms of digital parlance has made many irrelevant to their core audiences. Simply put, content is there, but it stinks. Has anyone scanned a QR code lately?

Regardless if the medium is paper or digital, it is still important to ask the following questions in order to cut through clutter and engage your audience:

-Have the fundamental elements of good design changed? (Am I employing good design?)

-Have the fundamental principles of marketing changed? (Is my offer valuable to my audience?)

-Has our visual interpretation changed? (Do they understand me?)

While the methods of delivery are almost too numerous to count, the goals and basic principles typically remain unaltered.  Excellent design, a timely offer and a message that leads me to believe my needs will be met will be remembered, even amidst the clutter.

For those of us with tight marketing budgets, this movie can serve as a reminder of the things that we can do to improve our campaigns and compete against larger organizations that have bigger budgets. As in the movie, the key is analyzing the data and looking for pieces that can be an indicator of success or failure. Finding failure in a campaign is not necessarily a failure in and of itself. It allows you to not repeat the same mistake in future campaigns.

During the movie, the A’s identify two factors (on-base percentage and slugging percentage) that they feel are better indicators of long term offensive success. By doing this they go against the common wisdom of baseball insiders with years of experience. Success in a marketing campaign can be achieved in the same way. Searching the data with a fresh perspective may allow you to gain insights that can translate into long-term success for future campaigns.

Paper is a biodegradable, renewable, recyclable and sustainable product made from trees.  Trees are a harvestable crop, no different than wheat or corn and vital to the American economy as well as the environment.  Not printing that email does absolutely nothing to save the planet or forests.  Think of the impact if everyone did the same!

Instead of purchasing individual applications or even a Creative Suite 6 bundle (such as Design & Web Premium for layout work or Production Premium for video), Creative Cloud lets you access everything for a monthly fee.  Our Prepress Department  supports any design work using this new version and always has the most recent versions of the applications used in our industry.  More information about  Adobe Creative Cloud is available at:

https://www.adobe.com/products/creativecloud.html?promoid=JQPEQ

The environment created must reflect your brand, create awareness and position your product, be relevant to attendees and generate traffic. All of this must be done in an area that may be as small as 6’x8’.

In my opinion, one of the mistakes that many companies make when designing their space for the standard 6×8 booth is to cram too much information in their display materials. It typically takes about 5 seconds for someone to walk by your booth. A backdrop that is full of text and graphics will make it difficult for an attendee to discern your message. If the attendee is not sure of what your company has to offer they are more likely to continue on to the next booth. In other words, keep it simple.

Depending on your budget, the area can include different types of signage. The least expensive is a retractable banner stand. These come in a variety of sizes and shapes. The signage can be printed on a flexible material that can be customized for each show and attached to the hardware that can be used for future shows.

One of the things that you can do to easily enhance your booth is a custom printed table cloth. Most trade shows supply a standard cloth with a generic black and white sign containing your company name. A bright colored table cloth with your logo printed on the front will help you standout from neighboring booths.

Most trade show booths come with a 6’ foot table as part of the space. I personally like to put the table at the back of the booth rather than the front. By putting it at the back of the booth allows you to design a tabletop backdrop that can be set against the back of the table. Any brochures or premium items can be set in front of this. The tabletop backdrops are less expensive than the full-length backdrops. Some trade shows can have very tight aisle ways. By setting the table towards the back, it allows an attendee to step into your booth, away from the traffic and creates an open space. Lastly, by having the table in the rear, you can also add a full length retractable banner at the front of the booth. For a successful trade show use less graphics, create an open environment and keep smiling!
 

Well to quote Mark Twain, “the reports of my death have been greatly exaggerated”.  This certainly applies to printing in today’s business environment.   Print is alive and well and consumers continue to view mail as a highly relevant and significant part of their lives.  Consider the following:

• 70% of Americans including 69% of 18-24 year olds state they prefer to read print and paper communications rather than reading off a screen.
• Consumers in the 18-34 demographic prefer to learn about marketing offers via postal mail and newspapers rather than online sources like social media sites.
• 74% of college students prefer a printed textbook when taking a class.   And research shows that people learn more effectively from print than a computer.  (Sources: PIA and Paper Because)

This is not to bash digital media and marketing.  Digital is a significant part of advertising that can’t and shouldn’t be avoided.  For the first time, web usage is overtaking TV viewing with online channels like You Tube.  There are over 1 million new blogs posts every day. Marketing as a science has changed.

So it’s all about the mix.  We used to think in terms of traditional vs. digital marketing, traditional being TV, radio and print and digital being search, social, mobile and video.  But if you think about marketing putting the customer at the center, digital becomes another tool to reach the customer. 

Companies and marketers talk a lot about integrated marketing.  This has been used to describe actions such as adding a website URL to an ad or sticking a QR code on a print piece.  Real integrated marketing is more than that.  It’s also been referred to probably more accurately as unified marketing.  This is a framework where all marketing tactics traditional and digital play a role and it’s based on the customer’s behavior.  It also means that digital is used to make traditional better.

And it also means seeing a lift in your marketing results.  Statistics by vertical market are available in a white paper on our website but the lift can be significant.