By all accounts, marketers that execute multichannel campaigns experience a significant lift in response rates over those who do not. Organizations that create a seamless, relevant, and pleasant user experience across all channels will have the best success. According to an article in Target Marketing, perhaps the most-effective demonstration of the offline-online marriage is the use of Personalized URL (PURL) campaigns.
The beauty of using variable data in direct marketing is the ability to drive cross-channel interaction through highly relevant messaging both online and off. Tools such as PURLs as well as Quick Response (QR) codes, as used in variable data printing, create inbound touch points that help form and strengthen personal relationships.
“Direct mail is no longer just a mail piece,” states Gary Reblin of the U.S. Postal Service in an interview with Direct Marketing News. “If you want it to be more effective by integrating it with other channels, then you need to think about the whole experience.”
QR codes and PURLs make channel integration possible by leading recipients to personalized landing pages where they interact online with marketers in order to receive relevant coupons or product and service offers. QR codes can also include a click-to-call feature thereby adding the telemarketing channel to the mix.
Including QR codes and PURLs on direct mail pieces enable organizations to:
- Create campaign- and viewer-specific landing pages that remove the distraction of a full company website
- Track individual choices and behavior
- Generate quality leads thereby improving conversions
- Gather additional customer data for future communications
- Plan campaigns around time sensitive and seasonal offers
- Elicit personal opinions and preferences through surveys
- Cross-sell relevant products
Connecting prospect data with custom print, email, and online messaging now forms the foundation of the most-successful marketing campaigns. QR codes and PURLs are a great way to increase audience engagement without the possible annoyance factor caused by over saturating prospects with outbound promotions.
Follow this 10-point checklist to get the most from QR codes and PURLs:
- Make them campaign specific.
- Analyze and integrate specific prospect and customer data to create relevant messaging.
- Provide compelling incentives with a clear call-to-action message.
- Develop dynamic landing pages with variable content.
- Integrate direct mail and email where possible and time email delivery to correspond with direct mail drops.
- Design graphics with the same look and feel across all media for each campaign.
- Utilize PURLs to capture additional information about respondents in order to personalize future promotions.
- Offer free gifts that visitors will appreciate based on information they provide on landing pages.
- Cross-sell products and services based on self-declared and demonstrated interests.
- Monitor real-time reports to inform and adjust ongoing-marketing tactics and strategies.
Overall, PURL- and QR code-driven multichannel campaigns will deepen customer relationships to achieve stronger loyalties. The key to successful campaign and response management is to align your program with a direct marketing service provider that can operate swiftly in both the print and digital realm.
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