When the world has moved to more of a digital centric ideology, how do you cut through the clutter? You go old school. That’s right, ink on paper cuts through the digital landscape and reaches recipients. What’s more old school than the catalog in the mail! When a catalog is sent to a recipient, you may be reaching out to one of 90 million Americans that make catalog purchases.1
I don’t know about your house, but in mine, my child gets very excited when a new catalog comes in the mail. Obviously, nothing can hold a candle to the toy catalog. Lay out on the floor with some markers to highlight the toys that will make it on the Christmas list this year. While our children aren’t the ones making purchases, they are who shows these catalogs to the people in their lives that do make purchases. It has been noted that catalog readers spend on average 15.5 minutes reading a catalog. Readers flipping through the pages think it is fun, inspiring and relaxing.2
One of the best ways to sharpen the proverbial blade we are using is through personalization. Personalized direct mail, which includes catalogs, drives response rates to be 8 – 12x higher than email and over 30x higher than social media and web ads alone.3 ROI for multichannel marketing campaigns that include a direct mail element are 12% higher than those without.4 When email inboxes are already extremely full, personalized direct mail can be seen as a way to cut through the noise.
Now, I know everyone has heard the argument to save paper and go digital, but contrary to popular belief, the print industry is a very sustainable industry. In the U.S., net forest area has increased by 2% since 2007 growing from 752 million acres to 765 million acres. In Canada, the forest area of 857 million acres has been quite stable over the past 225 years. Tree harvesting in the U.S. actually occurs less than by natural events such as insects, disease & fire.5 While paper is a sustainable resource, in the U.S. less than a quarter of all U.S. electronic waste is recycled. Guess what happens to the rest, it makes it to landfills or the incinerator.6
So here at NextPage, we say buck the trend, go old school and add a personalized printed piece to that next digital communication. You never know what percentage of the population will get their minds changed by the tactile feel of putting ink on paper.
1 https://catalogmailers.org
2 https://www.uspsdelivers.com/10-reasons-why-catalogs-are-a-marketing-powerhouse/
3 https://www.compu-mail.com/statistics/35-direct-marketing-stats-for-2018-2019
4 https://www.royalmail.com/business/system/files/Mail-in-uncertain-times-august-2017.pdf
5 https://twosidesna.org/paper-production-supports-sustainable-forest-management/
6 https://time.com/5594380/world-electronic-waste-problem/
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