How to Add Innovation to Circulation Planning

As we know, direct mail works. It’s a proven strategy for acquiring new customers. In fact, 74% of marketers say direct mail delivers the best ROI of any channel (source: Lob). However, with today’s economic landscape, we understand that budgets are top-of-mind.

Tighter budgets mean working diligently to keep innovation in your print marketing campaign, which begins with circulation planning. Circulation planning has the power to help clients reach customers effectively, efficiently and strategically.

We thought it would be helpful to share a few approaches to consider.

1. Back to Basics – As more data about your customers becomes available, selections can create more confusion than clarity. Take a step back and simplify selections. Some things to consider are:
   1. What are you looking for with the segmentation? Over-segmentation can impact the statistical significance of results and make future forecasting difficult—segment for a reason.
   2. How are priorities being assigned in your merge? Prospects should allow for random allocation of duplicates unless there is a specific reason not to do so.
   3. Are you accounting for list fatigue? Remember that even the best models can experience fatigue and diminishing results. Have a plan for resting lists and implement depth tests to have results before needing to increase quantities.
2. Don’t Outsmart the Model – Although we may develop personas to understand how various markets are addressed, selection models are designed to find commonalities that we weren’t aware of. To do this, providing as much transactional history as possible is critical as is allowing the model to do its job without over applying what we think it should be returning.
3. Know What the Models are Based On – While we are discussing the use of models, ensure you understand how the models are being built. Coming out of the pandemic, this distinction is critical. Is it looking at the same season in the prior year or the last three to six months? There could be a monumental difference in your outcome. Work closely with your modeling partner to avoid unexpected consequences.
4. Use All Available Channels – There are more ways to speak to a customer (or potential customer) today than ever before – use them! Studies show that converting a prospect to a customer can take 20 or more touches, so use all the options available to integrate multiple touches (both offline and online), while taking care to create a cohesive and consistent customer experience across all channels (source: Comscore). 
5. Remarket Prospects Who Raise Their Hand – Has a potential customer spent time on your website? There are programs that help you target this prospect that came in digitally with a piece of direct mail to increase conversion. These qualified prospects can prove valuable!
6. Test, Test and Test Some More – This is often the first thing to be cut when budgets get tight, but finding opportunities to test campaigns, selections, messaging and formats is essential. Customers and the marketplace are continually changing, so don’t be afraid to repeat tests that have “failed” previously. From our perspective, one of the most dangerous thoughts in business can be: “We tried that before, and it didn’t work.” Clearly define the success parameters of a test and remember that they are not always the same.
7. Don’t Sleep on Multibuyers – Unless you have only one source of names, you will have multibuyers. Make sure to use them! This may not seem “innovative,” but the effective use of these names is often overlooked. Even a brand with heavy seasonality can use these names to target customers out of season and improve their acquisition.

There’s never been a better time to invest in your circulation plan. A successful circulation that targets the right audience and hits a brand’s budget will ensure that campaigns deliver maximum revenue and improve lifetime value. Get started with an audit today.