I am often asked why I still hang on to the idea that I am a direct marketer. The words “direct marketing” seem to have fallen out of vogue. As co-author of Successful Direct Marketing Methods, now in its eighth edition, it would be impossible for me to hide this fact. The more I think about it, the more I realize that direct marketing should be celebrated, not looked upon as a discipline out of the early 20th century. The tools and techniques of direct marketing are the underlying principles that modern marketing is built on. 
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What was unique to direct marketing 30 years ago is now mainstream knowledge and practice. Today’s communications need to be targeted, relevant, measurable and accountable. For marketers to get messages read, watched or listened to, they must routinely segment prospects and customers by behavior, demographics, psychographics and category usage. Clients expect even traditional communications to be measured for a specific return on marketing investment.
Today, the velocity of change is much greater than it was in 1975, when the first edition of Successful Direct Marketing Methods was published. Evolving channels such as social networking, search engine optimization, content marketing and mobile marketing are changing the way both B2B and B2C organizations go to market. Additional channels seem to be created every week. Many of yesterday’s “new media” have morphed into the mainstream media of today. And there is no end in sight to the unprecedented period of change and innovation that marketing communications are going through.
Marketing communications today are data-driven, engaging, targeted, include offers, calls to action and provide infinite ways to be tested and optimized. And their success is measured by countless key performance indicators. What often escapes attention, however, is that these are basic tools and techniques of direct marketing that have been proven and refined for more than a hundred years.
Like the channels themselves, the results of modern marketing programs are real-time and digital, so processes can be analyzed, quantified and compared much more easily than with the direct mail of the past. It is clear, however, that many of these channels are built on that same foundation of direct marketing. Like other direct marketing channels, customers are at the center of everything. How they do it, and the extent to which customers are at the center of marketing, are what differs today.
The collective voice of the customer, focused by online social monitoring, now rivals and can drown out the voice of even the biggest corporations. Using blogs and other social networking software, consumers and business users can write, produce, create and distribute audio and visual user-generated content that is sometimes more creative, engaging and edgy than anything an agency could do, or would be allowed to do by their clients.
Facebook, LinkedIn, YouTube, Pinterest, Instagram and Vine provide global spaces in which users can collaboratively produce, edit, package, and critique knowledge on nearly any subject. Organizations accustomed to controlling information about their brand’s benefits, offerings, performance and reputation find that consumers have wrestled such control away. The range of unedited, unembellished and often raw online information is expanding quicker than marketers can observe.
Change has not been one-sided. In this landscape, the tools and techniques of direct marketing are adapting to change. Even direct mail. Marketers are less interested in saturating unknown prospects with communications, reserving their critical investments in personalization, dynamic content and cool new technologies for their high-value, highly engaged, responsive customers. When marketers don’t hear from customers over time, they stop sending direct mail, email, SMS messages or other communications, even when consumers have opted in. Successful marketers are focusing energy on their best and most growable customer segments, while the more costly infrequent or non-responders are left to opt in again or get fewer communications.
Prospecting, lead generation and customer acquisition have become more complex. Marketers are doing more testing, sharpening their targeting skills and negotiating deals on a performance basis when possible. With increased postage, list and communication costs, marketers are searching for new methods of acquisition, nurturing prospects and using trigger programs rather than pushing out large numbers of messages. The goal today is to catch customers just at the right point of the customer journey.
As marketers, we continue to explore the growing richness of interaction and overall effect on the customer experience for every brand, product and service. Pervasive information sharing makes differentiation a key to success. While marketers are made smarter by it, competitors have access to the same information. It is no longer about who can communicate the longest or loudest. Today, it is about who can communicate the quickest and the smartest—providing the greatest value in the eyes of their customers.
It is easy to see how marketing practice has changed, even over the last few years. Direct marketing has been at the center of these changes, even if digital and traditional marketers have not noticed. So, I remain proud to be a standard bearer of direct marketing. You should, too! For me, marketing continues to provide an interesting journey. To learn more about how marketing trends have evolved for 2014 and where to apply these newly evolved best practices in your strategy, take our personalized webinar. During this session, we will help audit your current marketing activities and see what areas can be optimized for greater performance.
Topics: Direct Marketing
