We recently explored key metrics to track as part of your direct mail campaign, to ensure you are monitoring how your campaign is performing throughout as well as if it’s been successful.
Now you know what to track, we wanted to share some information on how to do the actual tracking! You may be familiar with the concept of tracking marketing efforts online using things like tracking links, but tangible direct mail requires a different approach. Below we outline three of the top ways to track the success of your direct mail campaign.
3 Ways To Track Direct Mail Marketing
There are a few quick and easy ways to track the success of your direct mail campaign, and they all revolve around implementing unique identifiers of various sorts. While the method(s) you use will vary depending on your offer and workflow preferences, the top ways to track direct mail can be generalized as follows. These tracking methods are extremely important as they allow you to calculate important KPIs and examine your campaign's success later.
Use a Unique Coupon Code
If your direct mail campaign is advertising a product that involves making a purchase, it’s likely your mailer may include a coupon to incentivize new customers to try your business or to make a repeat visit. Whether this is for retail, dining, a service or anything else, coupons are always an effective way to get people in the door.
When implementing a coupon, the easiest way to track the success of your campaign is to include a unique coupon code for the campaign! Whenever someone uses this coupon in-house, mentions it on the phone, or enters it online, you’ll be able to directly associate their purchase with the fact they received the direct mail piece.
Use a Unique Landing Page
A landing page, or a website page, is indicated by a URL or the address entered at the top of your browser. When sending out a direct mail piece that directs recipients to visit a website page, it’s important to send your prospective customers to a unique landing page -- one with a different URL than your main site. For example:
Website Home Page: https://dbmmail.com
Unique Landing Page: https://direct.dbmmailandcreative.com/targeted-direct-mail-company/
The special, customized portion at the end of the URL allows you to track visits to this page, and subsequently actions users take after visiting this page, and attribute them back to the campaign. Using a unique URL keeps the page views separate than those of your main site, so you can easily see who is visiting as a result of the direct mail campaign. Of course, it is likely people will simply “Google” your business once they receive the mail and override this step, so be mindful that a lift in overall website traffic should be considered in this metric.
Use a Unique Phone Number
Yes, that’s right, a phone number! While phones aren’t as popular as they once were, for some businesses they are still very much an essential part of daily operations (think restaurants, apartment leasing offices, new home sales centers). If you want to track the results of your direct mail by calls received as a result of the campaign, there is in fact a way to do it. You can set up a dedicated linefor call tracking, specific to the campaign, so you’re able to count all calls coming in as a result. The key here is that this phone number is different than your main number so it’s easy to attribute which calls are coming in as a result of the mailer versus standard calls from people who found you online or via some other method.
In Conclusion
We can’t stress enough how important it is to implement the correct tracking for your campaign upfront, to ensure you know if it’s working and just how well. Any form of marketing is only as powerful as its results, and if you don’t know if your campaign is working, you cannot iterate on it or make adjustments to improve -- or know that you should run a similar, repeat campaign in the future if it’s extremely successful.
If you’re unfamiliar with tracking, fear not. DBM is here to help, and we can assist you with implementing tracking in any of the ways listed above and at any phase of your campaign!
Ready to get started? Have a question about tracking? Shoot us an email now!