One of the biggest benefits that comes with solo mailings is the fact that it is often possible to do very small tests for very modest amounts of money, and still learn a lot about the response rate you get.
Imagine that you have a product that makes you £25 profit on each sale (or indeed a group of products that tend to sell together so your average profit is £25).
It costs something in the order of £45 to mail 100 schools – so clearly you know that if you mail out the 100 schools and get two sales, you have covered your costs. Three sales takes you into profit, and although hardly worth doing when mailing just 100 schools, this would mean that if you mailed 5000 schools you would make £1500.
But that mailing to 5000 schools will cost you around £2000 (less than the 45p each because of the bulk discounts). And none of us likes to risk £2000 until we are quite sure the profit will be there – even when the profit after all the mailing costs are paid is £1500.
So the test is invaluable – and a test of just 200 schools for £90 generally will not put too much of a strain on finances.
And this is the point about solo mailings. Because response rates of 3% can be achieved, it is possible to test with a mailing of just 200 schools for £90. In the worst case scenario you get no sales, and have lost £90. But you might get two sales and get your costs back. OK you don’t have a viable campaign, but you have not lost anything.
And you know you are almost there. A tweak somewhere in the copy, or the realisation that you are only selling to one particular type of school and so don’t need to mail the others could mean that you are readily able to up the response.
This is where solo really scores – for a minimal cost you can experiment, get the advert right, and then roll it out.
Indeed the whole of the marketing operation of First and Best books (our publishing company) was based around this – and the lessons we learned from hundreds of solo experiments are now being transferred to our email marketing campaigns. What we have found is that the way we write the solo mailings, tells us how to write the email campaigns.
If you would like to talk about solo marketing to schools – including doing tests – do get in touch. I am on 01536 399 013.
Tony Attwood
Hamilton House Mailings Ltd