In Mailing System Technology's April 2014 newsletter (subscription highly recommended!) I wrote about the need for direct mail companies to adapt to the changing marketplace or suffer a slow, painful business death. You can read that column for more context at http://tinyurl.com/JoyGendusa, but for the purposes of this article, all you need to know is that at the end, I offered a solution: a new direct mail product that uses Google to give customers an integrated online (Google) and offline (postcards) marketing system.
Imagine all the lead generation power of direct mail coupled with ultra-affordable and automated online follow-up. The product is called DirectMail2.0.
Is DirectMail2.0's Profit-Boosting Power Sustainable?
In the first 12 months of using DirectMail2.0, I added $933,000 to my overall revenue from this product alone. My best 12-month period (in terms of revenue added by DirectMail2.0) is $1.4 million, and this contributed directly to my best-ever overall revenue year (2014), in which we finally broke $22 million! The reason is simple: DirectMail2.0 works. Customers actually get better results, so they reorder more often (and usually spend more when they do). Actually, those clients that use DirectMail2.0 reorder 70% more than those clients that don't!
DirectMail2.0 from the Client's Perspective: Money Talks
Dr. Amit Khanna, a dental practitioner in Hollywood, MD, is an excellent marketer and a disciplined mailer. If it works in the dental marketing game, Dr. Khanna knows about it, and uses it! He was one of the first clients to hop on board the DirectMail2.0 train. Here is how his mailing history looks:
2009-2010: Mailed 6,000 postcards monthly
2011-2013: Mailed 12,000 postcards monthly
2013-Present: Added DirectMail2.0 mailings
After implementing DirectMail2.0, his new patients per month jumped 57%! Yes, increasing his postcards mailedââ number made a clear and impressive difference, but that yellow part of the graph is the most important for our purposes.
Let's break that part down financially from the client's point of view, since that is the real deal-maker for reorders.
· Mailing 12K/month: An average of 83 new patients/month
o Each patient costing $1,453.50
· Mailing 12K/month WITH DirectMail2.0: An average of 154 new patients/month
o Each patient costing $553.79
To understand Dr. Khanna's overall return on investment (ROI), we first have to figure out the lifetime value of each new patient:
· First-year patient value: $2,000 each
· Patient value the following years: $300 each
· Average number of years a patient stays with him: 6.4 years
· Lifetime value of each patient: $3,920
o 2,000 + (300 x 6.4) = 3,920
Now comes the fun part! Let's talk money:
If you take the aforementioned 83 new patients per month (without DirectMail2.0) and turn that into revenue per patient in the first year, Dr. Khanna will recognize $325,3560 on average per month.
Post-DirectMail2.0 however, with the increase to 154 new patients, the good doctor is looking at $721,280 on average per month!
Can I get a witness? Just adding DirectMail2.0 almost immediately brought his revenue to an entirely different plane. That speaks volumes about why DirectMail2.0 increases reorders. Who wouldn't reorder with results like that?
So What Does a 70% Reorder Rate Mean for Your Revenue?
Let's look at a couple more examples from a print/mailer profitability standpoint, because I know you all want data and hard numbers:
ABC Spectrum Preschool
Dr. Jacob Plawner
· First order: 17,000 pieces - $2,000
· Second order: 48,000 pieces - $7,085
· Third order: 108,000 pieces - $13,916
· 1,372% increase in marketing spend!
Imagine all the lead generation power of direct mail coupled with ultra-affordable and automated online follow-up. The product is called DirectMail2.0.
Is DirectMail2.0's Profit-Boosting Power Sustainable?
In the first 12 months of using DirectMail2.0, I added $933,000 to my overall revenue from this product alone. My best 12-month period (in terms of revenue added by DirectMail2.0) is $1.4 million, and this contributed directly to my best-ever overall revenue year (2014), in which we finally broke $22 million! The reason is simple: DirectMail2.0 works. Customers actually get better results, so they reorder more often (and usually spend more when they do). Actually, those clients that use DirectMail2.0 reorder 70% more than those clients that don't!
DirectMail2.0 from the Client's Perspective: Money Talks
Dr. Amit Khanna, a dental practitioner in Hollywood, MD, is an excellent marketer and a disciplined mailer. If it works in the dental marketing game, Dr. Khanna knows about it, and uses it! He was one of the first clients to hop on board the DirectMail2.0 train. Here is how his mailing history looks:
2009-2010: Mailed 6,000 postcards monthly
2011-2013: Mailed 12,000 postcards monthly
2013-Present: Added DirectMail2.0 mailings
After implementing DirectMail2.0, his new patients per month jumped 57%! Yes, increasing his postcards mailedââ number made a clear and impressive difference, but that yellow part of the graph is the most important for our purposes.
Let's break that part down financially from the client's point of view, since that is the real deal-maker for reorders.
· Mailing 12K/month: An average of 83 new patients/month
o Each patient costing $1,453.50
· Mailing 12K/month WITH DirectMail2.0: An average of 154 new patients/month
o Each patient costing $553.79
To understand Dr. Khanna's overall return on investment (ROI), we first have to figure out the lifetime value of each new patient:
· First-year patient value: $2,000 each
· Patient value the following years: $300 each
· Average number of years a patient stays with him: 6.4 years
· Lifetime value of each patient: $3,920
o 2,000 + (300 x 6.4) = 3,920
Now comes the fun part! Let's talk money:
If you take the aforementioned 83 new patients per month (without DirectMail2.0) and turn that into revenue per patient in the first year, Dr. Khanna will recognize $325,3560 on average per month.
Post-DirectMail2.0 however, with the increase to 154 new patients, the good doctor is looking at $721,280 on average per month!
Can I get a witness? Just adding DirectMail2.0 almost immediately brought his revenue to an entirely different plane. That speaks volumes about why DirectMail2.0 increases reorders. Who wouldn't reorder with results like that?
So What Does a 70% Reorder Rate Mean for Your Revenue?
Let's look at a couple more examples from a print/mailer profitability standpoint, because I know you all want data and hard numbers:
ABC Spectrum Preschool
First order: 2,700 pieces - $1,238Second order: 12,000 pieces - $3,069PLUS $600 in maintenance fees since first order
That's a 243% increase in marketing spend!
· First order: 17,000 pieces - $2,000
· Second order: 48,000 pieces - $7,085
· Third order: 108,000 pieces - $13,916
· 1,372% increase in marketing spend!
Bottom line: DirectMail2.0 adds more money to YOUR bottom line. And the onboarding process is dead simple: They"ll get your online account set up with your company's branding so that it looks like YOU are the direct line to DirectMail2.0, and they"ll train your sales people on how to set up and run top-notch DirectMail2.0 campaigns.
Joy Gendusa is the Founder and CEO of PostcardMania. With nothing but a phone, a computer, and a postcard marketing plan, Joy took PostcardMania from a one-woman startup to an industry leader earning over $22 million in annual revenue. PostcardMania was also selected as the first beta company to test DirectMail2.0, improving their revenue by more than $1 million in the span of just 12 months. To become a DirectMail2.0 beta company, schedule a demo at www.directmail2point0.com or call 866-382-3450.
