Catalog Marketing Surge Is Fueled by Digital's Tracking Crackdown and Costs

AccuList® has a long list of consumer catalog clients, and we've noted renewed interest in traditional print catalogs, especially among direct-to-consumer (DTC) brands. Why? One reason is Apple's crackdown on the ability of consumer data platforms, such as Google and Meta's Facebook, to track and target consumers, per a recent Ad Age report. For example, Insider Intelligence data shows DTC brands cut ad budgets for Facebook and Instagram by almost 8% between January 2021 and January 2022, and increased offline marketing from 12% to 15% of spending. 

Rising acquisition costs for digital channels are another factor driving expanded catalog budgets. A SeQuel Response survey found 44% of  DTC brands boosted direct mail spending in 2022, with more than half blaming the rising customer acquisition costs of digital channels. 

Catalogs also are seen as better retention tools. Ad Age cites menswear brand Todd Snyder's report that its catalog buyers tend to purchase from the brand for longer periods and to purchase more items, and that its annual holiday catalog is used to "bring back lapsed customers." 

Finally, unlike easily ignored digital advertising, catalogs are more likely to capture and keep consumer attention. Kara O'Brien, head of offline marketing at furniture and home goods retailer Wayfair, explained to Ad Age that their seasonal catalog gives "that extra real estate...to tell richer product stories and invite customers into all that Wayfair has to offer. And it has staying power—a tangible print piece is something consumers can keep, bookmark, revisit and even share with family and friends." 

If you're thinking of joining the trend by adding or expanding catalogs in your marketing mix, AccuList can help. See https://www.acculist.com/consumer-catalogs/

13 Ways to Use Direct Mail in 2016 Marketing

Here's a New Year's marketing resolution that we would suggest: Make 2016 a year of direct mail successes. Unsure of how to get the most ROI from "snail mail" today? A recent Target Marketing magazine article by Summer Gould conveniently lists the most effective uses of direct mail--13 ways to leverage this powerful tool for effective acquisition, retention and brand promotion. Here are just the top five: 1) generate traffic to a retail location, website or event; 2) gather sales leads by targeting your most qualified, active audience with a high response tool; 3) counter competitive offers by reaching out to competitor's prospects without broadcasting your strategy; 4) boost customer loyalty with exclusive offers and rewards; and 5) turn customers into sales generators by garnering and rewarding customer referrals. The list includes ways to fit direct mail into partner marketing and multichannel marketing efforts, with e-mail, social media, mobile and more, and ends up at No. 13: build brand awareness with what research shows is the most trusted form of marketing. For all the ways to best use direct mail in your marketing plan, read the complete article at http://www.targetmarketingmag.com/post/13-ways-direct-mail-works-best/

2015 Retail Marketers Boost Social Media Use

Social media advertising, especially on Facebook, has moved up significantly as a favored acquisition tool of retailers, according to the recent State of Retailing Online 2015 survey conducted by Shop.org, Forrester Research Inc. and Bizrate Insights. Per a recent story by Multichannel Merchant, the survey found that 25% of retailers now cite Facebook as a top acquisition platform, although paid search and e-mail marketing still top their list of most effective channels. Among the paid social media tools, 50% of retailers said they are spending more this year than last year on paid Facebook options such as promoted posts and paid ads. YouTube came in second place among paid social choices, with 29% of retailers saying they will spend more on paid YouTube promotion, followed by Pinterest with 27% planning an increase, Twitter 22%, Instagram 20% and Snapchat 6%. For more from the survey, including trends in online marketplaces, search engine marketing and online site merchandising, see http://multichannelmerchant.com/marketing/facebook-is-the-top-acquisition-platform-for-retailers-22072015/

Marketers Embrace 2015 Spending, Including Mail

Direct marketers have finally left behind recession-inspired cautionary spending, with many in a "full-steam growth mode," per Target Marketing magazine's "2015 Media Usage Survey." And the good news for direct mail data professionals like AccuList USA is that direct mail retains a key role in media budgets. Per the survey, about 44% of business-to-business and business-to-consumer marketers reported that their media budgets are staying the same as in 2014, with 32% increasing spending and only 12% planning a budget decrease. Where are they spending? Most respondents (65%) are increasing e-mail spending, and most respondents (61%) plan to increase social media engagement investments in 2015. Search engine marketing (SEM) and optimization (SEO) also both continue as high priorities, especially for acquisition, so that content marketing, video and mobile optimization—each offering strong search benefits—were cited as high priorities, too. However, snail mail is still a critically important channel for most direct marketers. Overall, 30% plan to increase mail budgets and 37% will keep spending the same compared with last year. More than half are still using direct mail for both acquisition and retention. Yes, 11% of respondents reported decreasing direct mail budgets, but, as Target Marketing sums up in its report, that doesn't mean direct mail is withering away but that "newer strategies are factoring into the direct marketing equation, and its share is being spread around to other corners of the media landscape." For more detail, read http://www.targetmarketingmag.com/article/target-marketings-media-usage-survey-2015/

Is Your Marketing Hobbled by These Data Missteps?

Make sure your "data-driven" marketing isn't undermined by data mishandling. A recent Adweek article outlined five of the most common blunders. At the top of the list is failing to take advantage of the deeper demographics being culled in this big-data era. Going beyond age and gender can reap big returns. An example from the article: The Neustar Global Media Intelligence Report for 2013 found retail marketers that targeted campaigns according to attributes like home value and brand of car earned a 500% performance lift over non-targeted campaigns. Second, marketers can focus on the wrong metrics, choosing "vanity metrics," such as Facebook fans, instead of behavioral data linked to conversions, such as navigational paths and brand preferences. A third data misstep is focusing on shiny new digital data without integrating offline inputs (such as retail stores), creating a false picture of marketing's multichannel ROI. Fourth, marketers can get stuck looking at past data to the neglect of predictive modeling and forward planning. A forward-thinking success story from the article: American Express used predictive analysis and behavioral data to identify at-risk customers, for a 740% increase in attrition-combating efficacy. Finally, organizations can fail to invest in crucial data management and analysis skills, and surveys of executives find a majority admitting as much. Do you recognize areas for improvement in your own organization? For the complete article, with links to relevant studies, see http://www.adweek.com/brandshare/5-ways-marketers-are-mishandling-data-156449

Proven Tactics Trump Marketing Tricks in B2B Sales

While new business-to-business marketing tricks get press, marketing basics, not some technology sleight of hand, remain the surest way to find, win and keep customers. And we thank Larry Kim, founder and CTO of WordStream, a search engine software firm, for that reminder in his recent article for Inc. magazine. Kim cites five basic strategies that have delivered B2B sales increases for his company: First "be a thought leader" to provide potential clients with information that underscores your expertise and authority via multiple channels, including website, blogging, podcasts, video, conference presentations, Twitter chats, you name it. Next, build brand ambassadors inside (employees) and outside (clients); encourage social media as one way for ambassadors to get the word out. Third, develop a profile of your ideal client and find out where to reach them and what message connects with them; since it costs five times as much to acquire a new client as it does to generate business from existing customers, targeting high-ROI prospects is essential. Fourth, Kim advises to "be real" in marketing and lead nurturing -- the tried-and-true tactic of underpromising and overdelivering. Finally, learn target prospects' paths to purchase in order to provide needed information in preferred formats and channels at the right timing for onboarding clients. Yes, it's common sense, but, alas, it's not always common practice! For the complete article, go to http://www.inc.com/larry-kim/how-we-got-thousands-of-b2b-clients.html

How Share-Worthy Online Content Wins B2B Buyers

When 88% of business-to-business consumers say online content has played a major to moderate role in vendor selection, B2B marketers need to make sure they are creating compelling online content, and then promoting and targeting effectively. That 88% figure comes from a recent report by The CMO Council and NetLine, as reported by MarketingProfs. The study also found that 94% of B2B buyers, influencers and researchers are not just giving online content a quick look, they are curating and circulating information internally before purchasing B2B goods and services. Targeting and quality of content then should take into account the most common sharing cycles -- led by a from-the-middle-out strategy as execution-level execs use content to educate senior managers about their buying decisions (35%), followed by a from-the-bottom-up pattern as junior execs share with senior management to get buy decisions (30%), and rounded out by a from-the-top-down cycle as senior managers hand content to lower levels for purchase actions (29%). What content is dubbed the most valuable? Research reports and studies (65% of respondents), followed by technical spec sheets and data sheets (50%) and analyst intelligence and insights (46%), according to the survey of 352 B2B buyers (mostly from large companies). Equally important to know for marketers is how potential buyers find online content. The majority (68%) cite search engines and portals, with vendor websites (40%) and trusted sources/peers (25%) rounding out the sourcing. For more on the study, see http://www.marketingprofs.com/charts/2014/24769/how-b2b-buyers-consume-vendor-content

Forrester Urges Refocus on Customer Needs

It's time to make some New Year's marketing resolutions. A recent Forrester Research report prompts one good goal for 2014: Put customer needs ahead of the latest "shiny object" technology or channel. Complexity, technology faddism, and a disconnected entrepreneurial culture are slowing marketers down, yielding bad data, duplicating integration costs, and ultimately creating a poor-quality experience for customers, researchers warn. Forrester urges marketers to adopt a clear strategy focused on customers’ needs, and suggests these steps to success: Select a target customer and focus on a customer life cycle stage; identify the fundamental customer need(s) to fulfill and what benefit(s) customers want next; explore how to deliver these benefits in a technology-agnostic manner; then select the desired delivery method to develop, commission, or license; and make sure to set key performance indicators (KPIs). Pretty basic, right? But some marketers, overwhelmed by emerging technologies and channels, and fearful of being trumped by competitors, are forgetting basics in the rush to embrace hot new marketing tactics. By failing to aim at the only target that counts--the customer--they risk costly marketing misses. See the MediaPost article on how to refocus on customers in the year ahead: http://www.mediapost.com/publications/article/211410/forrester-offers-seven-steps-to-better-marketing.html

Catalog Retailers Lead in Online Conversion

Catalog and call-center retailers outperform retail chains, manufacturers and web-only retailers in one important e-commerce metric: conversion rate. That's according to data from the "2013 Internet Retailer Top 500" guide. As a group, catalog and call-center retailers had the highest average conversion rate of 5.1% in 2012, an improvement from 4.7% in 2011. In fact, they have consistently held the highest average conversion rate among the merchant types in the 10 years since Internet Retailer published its first guide to e-commerce. One reason for the higher conversion is that these retailers typically send catalogs focused on specific products, such as gifts or pet supplies, to consumers who buy those products and so intend to make a purchase when they visit the retailer’s e-commerce site. For more, see the Internet Retailer story at http://www.internetretailer.com/2013/04/29/catalogers-book-highest-conversion-rate-top-500

Online Shoppers Need More Info to Trigger Buys

If you want online shoppers to purchase, you need to offer them a lot more information from a lot more channels than in the past. A recent Multichannel Merchant article from ExactTarget made that point with a quote from ExactTarget’s President of Convince & Convert Jay Baer: “According to research conducted by Google, in 2010, consumers needed 5.3 sources of information before making a purchase. In 2011, just one year later, they needed 10.4 sources. In just 12 months, the amount of information needed to pull the ‘buying trigger’ doubled. Why? Are we less decisive? More risk adverse? No. We need more information because we have more information.” The article suggests that one solution to the rising demand for information is "cross-channel marketing," meaning building marketing strategies that enable you to interact with consumers across the channels that consumers use most. Some ideas with informative/engagement impact include e-mailed in-store receipts, Facebook opt-in campaigns, digital alerts on new pricing, new models or low inventory. For more, see the article at http://multichannelmerchant.com/lists/how-to-spring-clean-with-customer-acquisition-23042013/

Survey Finds E-mail Best at Driving Shoppers

Marketing messages received via e-mail are most likely to get us to shop, according to a new survey from ExactTarget. Some 66% of respondents said they'd made purchases as a result of ads or offers received through e-mail. Of course, direct mail was right on the heels of e-mail, with 65% saying they'd purchased thanks to a direct-mail message. But the trailing media in the race for shoppers may be more surprising. Only 24% cited telemarketing, and just 20% gave credit to Facebook, even though ExactTarget counted friend or family recommendations on offers as "marketing messages." For more on the study, see http://articles.businessinsider.com/2012-04-04/news/31286188_1_web-friend-social-media-direct-mail

Survey: E-mail, Direct Mail Lead Acquisition Push

Aggressive customer acquisition is at the top of the agenda for marketers in 2012, according to the "2012 Annual Media Usage Survey" by Target Marketing magazine. While the survey's 365 respondents planned to spend across a range of acquisition channels, e-mail continues to lead, with 86% of respondents planning to use it. Direct mail came in second, with 69% using it for acquisition in 2012. For more, see
http://www.targetmarketingmag.com/article/target-marketings-sixth-annual-media-usage-forecast-2012/1

Acquisition, Data Integration Lead Marketing Agenda

In good and bad times, all marketing roads still lead to data. In a sign of improving economics, acquiring new customers is now the top challenge for marketers, according to the 2011 mid-year marketing trends report by Kern Organization, a Los Angeles-based direct marketing agency. Recession-battered firms previously were focusing more on retention. Some 90% of the 400 top marketing executives surveyed agreed that better integration of offline and online data collection with analytics is key to success now. For details, see
http://www.prnewswire.com/news-releases/2011-mid-year-marketing-trends-study-reveals-top-three-marketing-challenges-130618818.html

Don't Lose Sight of Profit While Chasing Prospects

Marketers who focus their analytics on prospecting are making a mistake, warns Forrester Research's Srividya Sridharan. By putting too much stress on channel metrics, they can neglect the retention and long-term value measurements that generate lasting profitability. For more, go to http://chiefmarketer.com/database/mining/best-practices/analytic-acquisition-forrester-0811rhl3/?YM_MID=1251732&YM_RID=ccplato%2540yahoo.com