I’m constantly trying to add new things to our marketing mix. I feel like I’ve talked a lot about direct mail on The B2B Lead but we still haven’t given it a shot here at ReachForce. Before email marketing, direct mail and events were our only options to directly reach a prospect. I’m wondering… is everything done online only now? Do people even pay attention to or read physical mail anymore? I’m not sure, anyone done a B2B direct mail program lately? Did you get the ROI you were hoping for?

We all know physical mail costs more than communicating online but is it possible to stand out in the crowd? As I went back to a box of old ideas, I ran across a few ideas I pulled out and thought about giving another try.

• Got an event invite? – Try sending your invite attached to a helium balloon and put the whole thing in a FedEx box. I haven’t tried it myself but I think this is a great idea. Helium balloons last a couple of days. This ensures your invite sticks around for awhile not to mention it will literally jump out of the box when they open it.
• Mailing to a small group or a very targeted high impact program? Try handwriting the address instead of printing it. There are services/people out there that will do this for you. You might also consider using stamps instead of metered mail.
• Send or use something useful – I got a wine bottle opener from an advertising agency with a tag attached that said ‘OPEN’ on one side and on the other side they reinforced the ‘OPEN’ theme by listing a series of things like –“We’re open to the most innovative and effective approaches to building companies and brands.”
• And there’s still always the hook of “I’m sending you half of something. To get the other half you have to contact me.” We actually just did a small test batch of these just recently. We sent ReachForce branded remote control cars and motorcycles to the VP of Sales and the VP of Marketing in a few target companies. We mixed up the remotes so they had to chat about them to switch the remotes back. We are now following up with these people with an “everyone benefits if you work together” message. We’ll see how it works out…..

Anyone got any other good direct mail ideas? Is direct mail part of your marketing mix or is it considered old school now? Jump in and share…