Meanings of Direct Marketing 3

Is a customer database very important for direct marketing?

Direct marketing without data does not work. Direct marketing relies on a lot of data and information. These give you information about this and also what you need to know about potential customers or your existing customers. It is not possible for you to establish direct contact with them without data. The longer a customer relationship lasts, the more data you can collect about the customer. You can see how often he has ordered from you, how satisfied he was with the delivery and how often there has been a complaint . Not only do you need to collect this information, you also need to measure it. Without measuring it is hardly possible for you to use direct marketing in a very targeted manner.

To collect all of this data, you need an appropriate database. This can be very different depending on the industry and your business area. It is also important that you make a distinction between B2B and B2C here . In any case, your database needs to have some important characteristics.

Demographic information: age, marital status, gender
Geographical information: address of the recipient
Psychographic information: wishes, preferences, knowledge, motives
Sociographic information: level of education, purchasing power, income
Information behavior : type of media use, behavior in communication
Information about buying behavior: average purchase value, purchase frequency, brand loyalty
Information about usage behavior: type, environment, intensity

The challenge of the data basis

Collecting and maintaining customer data is of course very important to you. But that does not mean that you can or are allowed to collect all the data and use it later for direct marketing. In most cases, direct marketing always requires the addressee to give his or her consent must give. For you, this means that in order to operate successful direct marketing, your data must also be of very high quality. You have probably heard of the fact that you can also buy data for direct marketing. There are offers on the market from so-called professional address sellers. Here you often pay around 400 euros for around 1,000 addresses. But to go this way is not recommended. You can hardly make a judgment or an evaluation about the quality of this data.

Tip:

In order to get high-quality address data, it is advisable to work with an advertising agency.

Many reputable advertising agencies are members of the direct marketing association. Each agency gets access to the Robinson list through membership in the association . This list includes all people and companies who do not value direct marketing. This increases the quality of your address data for you.

According to Wikipedia, the Robinson list is a protection list with contact details of people who do not want to receive unwanted advertising. This relates to advertising by post, e-mail, smartphone, landline phone and fax.

SEO and direct marketing – is that possible?

You can also use direct marketing very well for SEO . With direct marketing you address potential customers directly, advertise your products or services and thus arouse their interest. However, you should aim to bring these interested parties to your website with the help of the response element. This will help you to generate traffic and, if possible, move interested parties to a call-to-action. This does not always have to be the purchase of a product or the use of a service. It is often enough to register for a newsletter to win this prospect as a customer later.

Examples of direct marketing

There are many examples of direct marketing. In everyday life you are likely to be used it a lot yourself. Here some examples:

the good old catalog from the mail order company that is sent to customers
Implementation of a competition through an online shop
Shipping of free samples after purchasing a perfume
Newsletter to customers of insurance companies
Invitation from the car dealer to introduce a new model

advantages and disadvantages

Advantages of direct marketing	Disadvantages of direct marketing
You can measure your marketing activities directly whether they are successful. In contrast to other advertising, for example TV or radio, you can significantly reduce wastage. This has a positive effect on the efficiency of your advertising budget . With direct marketing you can bind your customers better and closer to your company.	Unfortunately, direct marketing still does not have such a good reputation in Germany. With direct marketing you can give customers the feeling that they are disturbed, annoyed and that they perceive your advertising as intrusive. With too much direct marketing, your company’s image can suffer.

Conclusion

With direct marketing you can address customers or potential customers directly and individually. Compared to other marketing methods, you have the option of sending significantly more relevant content to addressees. This also enables you to better achieve certain goals such as new customer acquisition, customer loyalty and customer proximity. Direct marketing is a very good tool to build a long customer relationship. In addition, you are always able to measure your marketing success. No other instrument makes it possible to collect as much data and information about the customer as is the case with direct marketing.