Rarely are single-channel campaigns the most effective campaigns. Consumers engage with a number of mediums on a daily basis, and the best way to reach them is to communicate across channels – omni-channel marketing. But businesses often struggle to integrate two mediums in a truly cohesive manner.
Two seemingly difficult marketing channels to combine, direct mail and paid social media, are also two of the best to marry together for powerful marketing campaign.
Learn how hyper-personalized direct mail converts offline prospects to online customers:
Even if you’ve focused on offline marketing, it doesn’t mean making the jump to digital and social marketing will be difficult. And those efforts have become even easier with the introduction of Facebook’s new Direct Response Advertising platform. With the ability to better target your audience and gain valuable insight into what messages resonate, you can create stronger brand connections.
How does this all work?
Using Your Offline Mailing List Online
The Direct Response Advertising platform from Facebook allows you to upload your contacts’ physical mailing addresses, bringing disconnected channels together:
- Upload your direct mailing list to the Facebook Business platform
- Facebook matches your information to its users
- Create, a run hyper-targeted ads to your prospect
As the social media giant instructs, “Merging your existing direct mail list with Facebook Ads helps you reach people when they’re most engaged, on their desktop or mobile devices.” By combining direct mails unique ability to capture prospects’ attention with unique targeting of social media, you increase the likelihood that your prospects visit your site.
There is also the reality that some people prefer digital channels over offline. Direct mail won’t resonate with everyone. But with 757 million worldwide Facebook users, there are many opportunities to connect with your prospects through social.
Leveraging Facebook Ads for the Benefit of Direct Mail
In the same way you can use direct mail to better target your prospects online, you can also improve your direct mail marketing by leveraging your social media and digital efforts.
After you’ve engaged a prospect with a compelling Facebook ad, you can direct them to a dedicated landing page that speaks more directly to your offer and includes a landing page with a field for their mailing address.
Of course, not all landing pages should ask prospects for their physical address. We consumers greatly value the privacy of our address, and we’re unwilling to provide it without proper incentive. So if you’re going to ask a prospect to give you their mailing address, your offer needs to be of equal value (in their opinion).
If you can successfully communicate the value of your offer and secure your prospects’ address, you can then use it to send them a mailer with the same look and feel of your Facebook ad. Because you’ve already engaged your prospect online, direct mail is an opportunity to build on your budding relationship. And this cohesive and clean connection will strengthen your brand message.
Get Better Insight Into What’s Most and Least Effective
One of the most beneficial elements of social media marketing is the extremely valuable insight it provides. Learning what resonates with your target audience is imperative to the success of your campaigns. Whether you use the newfound knowledge to tweak your current campaign or strategize the next one, it’s this insight that must drive your efforts.
Facebook empowers you to hyper-target your prospects using basic demographics, education level, hobbies, interests, purchase behavior and much more. Rather than casting a wide net and crossing your fingers, you can drill down to your perfect prospects and speak to them directly.
Once you’ve targeted the right people, you can then:
- Run several ads at once within the same campaign
- Track which messaging and visuals are working best with your audience
Don’t limit yourself in what you test either. Consistently test as many variables as possible. You also don’t want to rely on insights you learned months ago to craft what your upcoming campaign. The most successful campaigns are born from constant learning and tweaking. Never stop.
Make Your Marketing More Personal
With the new advances and capabilities on social networking platforms, it’s even easier to integrate direct mail and paid social campaigns. But a seamless and easy integration of these mediums will only do so much if you don’t personalize your messaging.
Whether communicating with prospects on their News Feeds or mailboxes, you need to speak to their unique pains and needs. Making these personal connections is key to maximizing the impact of your campaigns. But how can you both personalize your marketing and maintain efficiency and budgets?
Click below to read our free guide, Human to Human Personalization at Scale.
