Why Should You Track Your Mail?
Stupid question, huh? The real question is, "Why would you spend thousands, tens of thousands, or even millions of dollars on a mailing and choose not to measure how it was delivered?"
The list of mail tracking benefits is long, and growing:
- Coordinate other marketing channels
- Prepare for response
- Identify and resolve delivery problems
- Attribute response based on delivery date
- Measure response rates almost instantly
- Calculate accurate response rates
- Document compliance and due diligence
The list goes on, but every item points to the same conclusion:
Mail tracking reduces uncertainty.
Imagine running an email campaign and having no idea whether the emails were delivered. Imagine buying digital ads and not knowing whether they were displayed. You don't need to imagine that because those channels are measured.
Postal mail doesn't come with those metrics automatically. Without tracking, a mailing effectively disappears into a black box between induction and response.
Before mail tracking was available, of course, direct mail existed. It went like this:
- You mailed 100,000 pieces (or a million, or a thousand).
- At some point later:
- The phone rings.
- Orders come in.
- Donations arrive.
- People show up at the event.
- The mailing "worked."
- So, you know the outcome, but there is a lot more you don't know:
- Whether 98% of the mail was delivered or 82%.
- Whether delivery took 3 days or 13.
- Whether a production error delayed 20% of the mail.
- Whether the response spike coincided with delivery.
- Whether the campaign succeeded because of the mail or in spite of the mail.
Every other marketing channel comes with metrics built in. Direct mail does not. Mail tracking fills that gap.
The value of mail tracking isn't knowing where the mail is today. It's understanding what happened yesterday so you can make better decisions tomorrow.
You can certainly mail without tracking. People did it for generations. But that's a little like seeing the final score without watching the game.
You may know who won.
You won't know why.
Curious on how SnailWorks can help you? Book a demo here.