Getting a customer’s attention is really hard these days. People just scroll ads and ignore emails. They jump from one thing to another fast. That is why direct mail is becoming popular again. The effectiveness of direct mailing is now coming back because a customer will literally touch the mail that will come to his home. The beautiful mail such as a postcard or a catalog may catch the attention of a customer.

Good direct mailing is not only about stuffing something into the envelope and delivering it. Nowadays, agencies gather information on customers, target them and generate interesting ideas using technologies in order to add value to their work and make their campaigns more personalized and effective.

Top direct mail & customer acquisition agencies featured in this Business Fortune list understand that customer acquisition takes more than one clever campaign. They consider the interests of people, how they react and what motivates them to proceed further. Additionally, many use direct mail in combination with digital marketing in order to launch effective campaigns. And here we have agencies who provide innovative solutions to the field of direct marketing.

Top Direct Mail & Customer Acquisition Agencies to Watch

Gundir

Gundir works on a direct mail campaign focusing on how the postcard looks. But the first step is the answer to the key question, "Who is the target audience?" It understands the needs of client, its goals, the sales funnel, and other important factors before it delves into the numbers and selects the audiences with the highest probability to respond. Only after that creative process begins. The message, design, offer, and audience all need to work together. Gundir then tests different approaches, studies what happens, and uses those findings to improve the next campaign. It is this test, learn, validate, and scale mindset that makes its approach interesting. Rather than asking clients to simply trust that a mailer will work, Gundir tries to show them why it works and where there is room to improve.

PostcardMania

PostcardMania takes a more straightforward approach. The company understands that many businesses do not have the time or marketing team to figure out every part of a direct mail campaign themselves. So, it makes the process easier, from choosing an audience and creating the mail piece to sending it and tracking the response. What makes its approach particularly interesting is that the campaign does not necessarily stop when the postcard reaches someone's mailbox. PostcardMania can connect the mailing with digital advertising, allowing businesses to keep showing related ads to the same prospects online. In simple terms, the postcard starts the conversation, while digital advertising helps keep it going. That combination gives businesses a way to connect the physical and digital sides of customer acquisition instead of treating them as two separate worlds.

Marketing Kitchen

Marketing Kitchen approaches direct marketing from the perspective of getting the details right. Data has to be handled properly, materials need to be produced, addresses need to be accurate, and thousands of pieces may need to move through the system without mistakes. Marketing Kitchen brings these steps together under one roof, helping clients move from planning and data to printing, fulfillment and delivery. That gives brands and agencies fewer moving parts to worry about. Its value is really in that behind-the-scenes discipline. When the creative idea is ready to go, Marketing Kitchen focuses on making sure the campaign actually reaches people the way it was intended to.

Share Local Media

Share Local Media treats direct mail much more like a performance marketing channel than an old-fashioned advertising tactic. The team starts by looking at the numbers: who are a brand’s best customers, where can similar customers be found, and what is the cost of reaching them? From there, it builds a plan around targeting, creative, format, and testing. And it does not expect the first campaign to be perfect. That is where the company's test-and-learn approach comes in. A brand can try different designs, offers, formats, paper, or audiences, see what performs, and then put more money behind the winners. Its work with brands such as Frank & Eileen shows this approach in practice, with campaign learnings being used to improve future acquisition efforts.

Riger

Rather than seeing direct mail as an activity that can be considered separately, Riger places it within the overall context of marketing. This implies that one must think about the target audience, the message, the brand and what needs to happen once the mail is received. The broad experience of the agency in various industries helps to make it flexible enough for adjusting to the specificities of each particular audience. What is especially fascinating about the agency is that it does not concentrate merely on creating something attractive in terms of the mailbox. Rather, the ultimate aim is to create communication that provides reasons for the receiver to notice and react.

How to Choose the Right Direct Mail & Customer Acquisition Agency

• The selection of an agency is very serious for your campaigns' performance. The cheapest option is not always the best one and a big agency is not automatically the right fit either. First, you should start with identifying your needs.

• Check experience. It is important to work with an agency that has dealt with businesses like yours before. Find out more about their past campaigns, industries they are experienced with, and types of customers.

• Go beyond printing and mailing. A good agency should help you with audience selection, data, creativity, personalization, campaign planning and measurement. If the agency takes care of the former and nothing else, you will have to collaborate with a number of other organizations as well.

• Ask how they measure results. Your direct mail campaigns should not operate on guesswork. Try to find out how they track response rates, lead conversions and ROI.

• Find out how they manage data. With customer data, you will be able to address relevant messages to the relevant audience. Check how they work with targeting, segmentation, personalization and data protection.

• Take into consideration digital integration. Many successful campaigns today combine direct mail with email, social media, search or digital ads. Hence, it is useful to see how the agency is familiar with digital marketing techniques.

• Carefully analyze their prices. Always ask for a detailed breakdown of design, printing, postage, data, fulfillment, and other expenses involved in a campaign. It will simplify the process of comparing different agencies.

Last but not least is the communication. You need an agency that listens to you, clearly explains everything to you and is ready to try new approaches. Good agency is a kind of an extension of your marketing team.