By now you’ve all heard the news I presume. The news from the United States Postal Service that they will stop delivering first class mail on Saturdays (packages will continue to be delivered six days a week) starting this August. Whether this means an increase in other channels such as email, mobile, radio, and so on, is obviously not known, yet.
Rest assured though marketers across the country, those who currently included direct mail as part of their integrated marketing strategy, are busy making plans for the switch.
At least they better for be for August will be here before they know it.
A little over a year ago I wrote a piece entitled Direct Mail: Alive And Kicking. In that article I touched on survey conducted by Target Marketing magazine, the channel that delivered the strongest ROI for customer acquisition for B2C marketers was direct mail. Direct mail also scored the highest among B2C marketers for customer contact and retention.
For years I’ve written about how the 4 Ps of Marketing, Product, Place, Pricing, and Promotion represented a dated perspective of customers and markets. In an era of connected consumerism, one could argue the merits of any of “Ps” and whether or not they’re still relevant. I suppose that’s a debate for another time. Instead, I’d like to introduce of two additional Ps that will propel a decades old concept and modernize it for a social economy.
Slow media is patient. It’s not on a deadline. It isn’t measured in column inches. It can be calm instead of sensational, deep instead of superficial.