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1. Select your lists with care. The list is the single most important factor in direct mail. Take your time in choosing it because the list you ultimately choose will drive all other decisions, including offer and creative. Once you’ve chosen your list, then begin writing and designing your mail piece or e-mail promotion. Always keep in mind that it's possible to achieve decent results with a good list and so-so creative, but a so-so list and good creative will virtually always deliver poor results.

2. Apply the “What's in it for your customer?” test. Sometimes the excitement and anticipation over a product launch and supporting marketing campaign blinds us to the basics. If you can, put away your mailing for a day or two. Then look at it with fresh eyes and see if you can easily identify at least one significant benefit for your customer or prospect. For example, do your marketing materials explain how your customers will save time or money? Or how their jobs will be made easier? Business customers are very busy people and need to know what’s in it for them right out of the gate.

3. Include an offer. Offers create excitement and provide an important reason for your prospects to respond. A letter selling a piece of computer software may not by itself convince someone to buy. But with a free offer—possibly a free brochure or on-line demo—you might at least pique a prospect’s interest enough to get them to inquire or to ask for more information. You owe it to yourself to use offers with every mailing that you do. Prospects respond to offers because they have nothing to lose, and because it's a good way to get more information to help them make a buying decision.

4. Don’t overlook sales letters. While self-mailers are a long-standing business-to-business workhorse, most of the time they come in second to sales letters in generating response. One reason for this is that self-mailers simply look like direct mail and as a result are easily spotted and dispatched to the circular file by ever vigilant “gatekeepers”—administrative assistants, secretaries and other staff who have the task of screening mail for decision makers. Letters have a better chance of succeeding in getting through to your prospects because they tend to look less like advertising.

5. Remember to include customer success stories. Your customer success stories are pure gold. With customers’ positive comments about your products or services, you can create articles and testimonials that can strengthen your marketing materials and help you improve response. Never stop looking for customer success stories.

6. Take advantage of personalization opportunities. Choosing between personalized vs. non-personalized direct mail is becoming an increasingly easy choice. Thanks to numerous advances in printing technology, personalized mail offers more options than ever and as a result pulls dramatically better than non-personalized mail—some marketers report response rates as much as 400% over traditional methods.

Personalization options include inserting prospect names in address fields, in the body of letters, and even in headlines and teasers. The trick here is to work with your printer to explore options that will create the impact you want while also staying within your budget.

Today’s technology also makes personalization a snap when using e-mail. It’s now possible to merge database fields in adding personalization to everything from subject lines to the body of e-mail messages. These types of automated personalization techniques have been shown time and again to increase response rates dramatically.

For small quantities, such as those under 1,000, don’t forget about the ultimate personalization technique: a hand-addressed envelope. This guerilla tactic will always result in a very high percentage of opened mail. What’s more, very few gatekeepers will ever toss this kind of mail, as they have no way of knowing—unless they have the authority to open it—what it actually contains; it could as easily be a personal letter as a sales letter.

7. Use e-mail to your fullest advantage. E-mail marketing today offers business-to-business marketers tremendous value. Compared to direct mail, it’s very inexpensive and generates response rates that are generally higher than other direct marketing choices. What’s more, it’s especially effective in driving sales activity with information-based or related products and services. For example, you can create an e-mail message that links to a landing page or micro site, where the prospect can gain additional information, possibly from a white paper or a technical report. Then they can be given additional choices from this location, such as being able to contact a sales representative for more information, a quote, or for possibly a product demo depending on the complexity of the product or service.

8. Combine or better integrate sales and marketing efforts. Studies show that business prospects may require as many as 7–10 contacts from a company before they’ll make a purchase. However, given the pace of today’s tumultuous business environment, it has becoming increasingly difficult for marketers to contact prospects and customers, who are seemingly busier than ever. As a result, it’s no surprise that some companies that are reporting sales success are those that are managing to come away with the most customer contacts or “touches.”

An approach that some companies have taken to address this “contact” challenge is to remove the barriers that have traditionally divided sales and marketing. These companies are creating integrated sales and marketing models that are combining the strengths of each function to maximize opportunities for touches. For example, in this new model a company could put together a direct marketing program that starts off with a postcard or #10 lead generating mailing. Then it could follow up with an e-mail message (assuming no sale was made yet). This could in turn be followed up by a phone call from a sales representative. In this simple example alone, it is possible for three touches to be made—with opportunities for more through follow-up sales calls or e-mail messages.

9. Consider using dimensional mailings. In certain instances, you may simply want to blow past the clutter—and the competition—to get your message to your prospect. In these instances, dimensional mailings—boxes, tubes or other three-dimensional objects— can be very effective because they demand to be opened and are virtually a sure bet to end up in your prospects’ hands. What’s especially ideal are dimensional mailings or objects that are so novel, clever or compelling that prospects refuse to toss them and instead keep them on their desks or on a nearby bookshelf—which can do wonders for top-of-mind awareness.

A good example of an effective dimensional mailing was one that was recently used by a Midwestern advertising agency targeting corporate marketing executives and decision makers. The agency created what looked like, roughly, a very colorful and elaborate pizza-style cardboard box with partitioned sections inside containing a variety of different size inserts. The theme of the mailing was “Aha!,” and this theme was cleverly carried through all of the materials in promoting the agency’s various services.

The one drawback to dimensional mailings is the per unit cost. However, a great way to minimize this cost is with a follow-up call campaign. One advantage to following up a memorable dimensional mailing with a phone call to a prospect is that you have a natural “ice breaker” for your initial conversation. For example, not many prospects are going to forget receiving a colorful pizza-style box with “Aha!” boldly appearing across it.

10. Test your mailings. Many business-to-business marketers don’t track responses to their mailings. The problem with this is you need to test to find out what works and what doesn’t. In a nutshell, if you don’t test, it’s hard to improve response. And if you can’t improve response, it becomes that much more difficult to acquire prospects and achieve additional sales.