The Toppled Bollard: radical direct marketing in practice

“We tried direct mail – it was a total flop” was the first ever humorous letter I tried.  Unfortunately I have lost details of the date but it was sometime around 1990.

The reason that the date has long since left me was that the letter was such a huge success we kept running it (often with variations) for years, while experimenting in between with new versions.

I’m putting it up today for no reason other than the fact that I have just located on my computer from that era this copy.  I think it still is quite fresh and interesting, even after all these years – but then I would say that, as I wrote it.

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We tried direct mail – it was a total flop”

Last week I attended one of those lunch time presentations on the future of the economy.  Inevitably I was positioned next to a businessman who I didn’t know, (but who for the sake of argument I’ll call Brown).   In between the speeches we got to chatting, as one does.

On hearing that I ran a company that sold mailing lists Brown told me that his firm had tried direct mail once but it had been an absolute disaster.    (He is one of those guys who has the ability to speak in bold italic underline).   Determined (as always) to consume any meal I haven’t paid for I refrained from leaving at that point, and asked Brown what line of business he was in.

“Plant hire,” was the answer.  Clear and concise.  No messing with that.

“So I guess you have a very clear idea of who your potential customers are,” I ventured, tucking into the lamb and hoping desperately that it wasn’t Hamilton House that had supplied the list in the first place.  I don’t do refunds over a free lunch.

To my relief he agreed that he not only knew who he needed to reach, he had used his own list of all 400 or so of these possible customers.

“So you mailed all 400 potentials,” I said.  (You could tell I was getting nervous by the way I started each paragraph with ‘so’).  “What was the result?”

“Pathetic,” said Mr Brown.  I looked up, thinking for a moment he might have been commenting on the quality of the red wine of which I had taken a gulp, but sadly he was still on the subject of direct mail.  “We picked up four new jobs – that was all.”

“And am I right in thinking that each job you get tends to lead to quite a sizeable profit?”   He nodded, taking a swig from his glass.  I waited, but the failure of the recent French grape harvest appeared totally to pass him by.

“Ah,” I said, starting to sound somewhat like Sherlock Holmes, but at least avoiding another ‘so’.  “That mailing to 400 potentials probably cost you around £200 including printing and postage.  But those four jobs must have made you thirty times that.  So why didn’t you repeat the promotion?”  OK, I said ‘so’ again, but at least I had reached a positive conclusion – which I thought was rather clever.

“Because the chairman said four replies is pathetic – and it is.”

And there was really nothing more I could say.  I doubted that I was going to be able to convince him of the dubious nature of the wisdom of chairmen, nor to show him that he really could grow the company with an advertising budget that probably cost less than the company’s coffee bill.  I gave him my wine and made my excuses.

Tony Attwood

PS: If you’d like to try using direct mail, or would like lessons in how to talk in bold italic underline, please do give us a call on 01536 399 000 or fill in the card.

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