Direct Marketing

Direct Marketing

Direct marketing is a form of promotion that targets a specific demographic. This can be done in several different ways across many mediums.

Things to consider when developing a direct marketing strategy:

Pick your target market – The key to direct marketing is getting the information you want possible clients and customers to know DIRECTLY to them. This can be an age group, a gender, people in a certain geographical location, or people who share a common interest. Stores may want to send out information and deals to previous customers that they obtained the contact information of.

Choose your medium – The medium will be determined by the budget, the type information sent, and the target market. If it is a younger demographic, direct marketing can be on a digital platform. Emails, phone calls and text messages are ways to send information directly to your customers. For a local supermarket; flyers, brochures or postcards may be more useful. If the target market is parents and older individuals it is easier to access them through direct mail. Also you are trying target local consumers mailing them offers is a simple way to spread the word without needing to know email addresses or phone numbers.

Call to action – Once you know who you want to market to and how, you need to come up with a message. The goal of direct marketing is to call consumers to action. This can be a coupon you would like them to use, information about a phone number or email address you would like to to contact etc.

Measure your results – Direct marketing success is easy to measures because have a record of exactly how many direct marketing pieces were sent out and to who. The call to action aids in measuring a response. You can see how many coupons were used, how many people showed up to the grand opening of the store, or how many recipients called the number that was advertised. By keeping track of these things it is easy to measure how well the marketing campaign was received and review feedback to enhance the next marketing strategy.