Direct Mail Outcome by using Multiple Data lists

Mailers Tip Tuesday! Amortize Your Direct Mail Outcome by Hedging Your Mailing using Multiple Data lists

When mailing with a new consumer or business list, don’t put all chips on black — comingle your unsolicited direct mail approach without sacrificing returns.

It’s tempting when you have a marketing budget to “buy a list” and send 10,000 cards or letters to everyone on that list. There’s a better way, and here’s how to do it.

Example A: You’re a commercial landscaping firm looking for new work to pay for new equipment.

Example B: You’re a countywide SPCA/animal welfare org looking a year ahead for building your base prior to a major capital campaign coming a year away.

Example C: You’re a dance troupe putting on a major performance and trying to reach as many “cultural enthusiasts” as possible.

For the Landscaping firm, it’s tempting just to do an EDDM mailing. However, there are just too many homes to reach in your service area, and not everyone needs landscaping, or worse, maybe 10% of the deliverable addresses are apartment dwellers. Here, you should consider two (2) mailings: test out EDDM to rural routes only, and do a separate mailing to “homeowners only”. You can even use the same size 6″ x 11″ card (with slightly different designs). If you get better results from “Real Property Owners”, skip the EDDM next time.

For an animal rescue or animal welfare org, if you’re looking at renting a list for “charitable givers” and “pet enthusiasts”, also include other data for “dog owners”, older “lapsed givers” from your own data repository and even look at residential homeowners within 2-3 miles proximity who probably know who you are, especially if the average home has at least 1/4 acre of land. You might think that mixing in homeowner data doesn’t reveal an obvious link to an SPCA charitable giving strategy, until you know that according to the APPA (American Pet Products Association) 66% of all homes had pets of some kind (as of 2023) with dogs being the #1 pet [1]; and, the percentage of homes with pets in rural areas is approximately 70% [2].

For the dance performance theater group, yes, do mail to “cultural enthusiasts” but we at Cornerstone Services (www.crst.net) have also found there to be much non-competitive cooperation amoung regional performance non-profits, with many of them willing to lend out their membership lists for non-appeal related purposes; when we receive multiple lists for a singular mailing, the CRST Project Management team distills the data to singular households after removing or consolidating all the duplicates. Further, as a courtesy, we provide back Data Quality Reports to the arms-length ballet, dance, and performance groups in consideration of their lending a hand towards the artistic effort.

Cornerstone manages real property data and finds that mixing a good portion of residential or commercial real property owners is a “safe bet” and has strengthened outcomes.”

[1] APPA Statistics found here: https://americanpetproducts.org/research-insights
[2] Forbes, Jan. 2025: https://www.forbes.com/advisor/pet-insurance/pet-ownership-statistics/

Visit Us:
🌐 CRST.NET

🌐 CRSWEB.COM

📧 info@crst.net | ☎️ (845) 255-5722

#MailersTipTuesday #directmail #directmailmarketing #DirectMailTips #MailingAnalytics #MarketingHacks #DirectMailMarketing #MailCampaign #EnvelopeTips #MailTracking #crstnet #crstweb #DataDrivenMarketing #MailingListsStrategy #EDDMStrategy #MarketingROI #TargetedMailing #DirectMailStrategy #DonorOutreach #AudienceSegmentation #SmartMailing #MultichannelMarketing #FundraisingMail #NonprofitMarketing #PropertyOwnerMarketing #CommercialOutreach #PetOwnerMarketing #PerformancePromotion #USPSMarketing #MailingSuccess #crstdirectmail #crstprojects