Location-based Marketing

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Location-Based Marketing Strategies

Successful marketers spend hours and days creating the perfect marketing strategy. But, even seasoned marketers sometimes overlook one aspect of their marketing: the locality or geographical area of their prospects. 

Location based marketing could offer a solution to this problem. A location-based marketing effort ensures that your campaigns are relevant to the geographical area or locality you want to target. Also, businesses can increase brand recall and drive more sales with a location-based marketing strategy. Just considering the geographical location of your prospects and analysing their demographic trends can give priceless insights.

Using location data for marketing is so versatile that we are still coming up with new & innovative ways to make use of it. Let us look at some popular location-based marketing strategies and learn how they can work for your business.

What is Location-Based Marketing?

Location based marketing is a marketing strategy that enables business organisations to target their audience based on their physical location. It also goes by the name geolocation-based marketing. You can use both online and offline channels for your location-based marketing campaigns.

You can employ online channels like email and offline channels like direct mail in location-based marketing. The only requirement in both cases is that the targeting uses the prospect’s physical location. 

Using location data, marketers can target customers based on their proximity to the store or events conducted in a specific locality. Furthermore, location-targeted advertising is one of the few marketing strategies that are effective throughout the customer lifecycle, which includes:

• Discovery 
• Purchase
• Engagement 
• Retention

Apart from all this, geolocation-based marketing also helps you with:

• Target specific customer segments with unique offers.
• Improve customer experience by offering relevant products and solutions.
• Appeal to the customers who are constantly looking for instant gratification.

Top 6 Location-Targeted Advertising Strategies For Your Business

Location-based marketing is relatively new to marketers and business owners. Today, we use several IoT or connected devices in our everyday lives. Everything from our wristwatch to our car can now connect to the internet in one way or the other.

“But, why is it relevant here?” you may wonder. More often than not, the connected devices that we use have access to our location data. In other words, the amount of location data is directly proportional to the number of connected devices.

Additionally, you need to ensure you have the right tools for your location-targeted ads, such as PostGrid. Specialised tools like PostGrid gives you access to address and location data that can be crucial for your location-based campaigns.   

Now that we have a good understanding of what is location based marketing and how it works, let’s discuss their different types. We have compiled a list of different location-based advertising strategies or methods you can employ for your business.

1. Geocoding

Geocoding is an advanced location-targeted advertising method that uses offline communication channels like direct mail. It involves determining the physical location of your customers based on their postal addresses.

Geocoding usually comes equipped with advanced direct mail automation tools such as PostGrid. It enables you to use plain postal addresses and get their geographical locations. Using a tool like PostGrid, you can even map these locations and identify patterns.

Marketers can use this geolocation-based marketing to find neighbourhoods with a cluster of prospective customers. You can then conduct events or run direct mail campaigns in these areas to market a product or service you are selling.

Working

In geocoding, the system takes the address data from you. It analyses the address data, including the postal codes, to provide you with the geocodes of an address. The accuracy of the latitudinal and longitudinal values you get can vary based on your tool. With an advanced tool, you get a rooftop level of accuracy, which is as good as possible.

Benefits

• It helps you identify clusters of prospective buyers in a specific area.
• You can map your potential buyers and better understand the demographics.
• It helps you better manage customer data and categorise them into different segments.

2. Geotargeting 

Geotargeting is a location based marketing method that determines the physical location and sends them a personalised marketing message. You can customise the marketing message based on specific geographical areas or localities in geotargeting. 

As with any other marketing strategy, this also has some weak points. For example, geotargeting cannot work if the customer does not give location access to your mobile app. But, generally, users do not have a problem giving location access to mobile apps.

Suppose the customer gives your mobile app location access. In that case, you can use location based marketing to send marketing messages or push notifications. These messages and push notifications are usually relevant to geographic regions or proximity to a store. 

Working 

The working of geotargeting is pretty simple. It uses your target audience’s IP address for pitching relevant marketing offers to the customers. The IP address is unique and identifiable for every connected device. Hence, location data based on IP addresses are reliable for your geolocation based marketing campaigns.

Once the system has the target’s IP address, the system compares it against the physical address of the target. The matching or comparison process includes every detail, including country name, postal code, etc. However, to ensure the accuracy of the process, you need an accurate postal address database.

The most convenient option is to use an advanced address verification software like PostGrid to validate your postal address database. It can validate your addresses against Royal Mail’s official address database and ensure you have the correct information.

Benefits

• Enhance customer experience through superior personalisation.
• Target users based on their specific location, weather, local news, and events.

3. Geofencing

Geofencing is a location based marketing method that creates boundaries within a specific locality. As soon as the target enters this boundary, they become an active target of your marketing strategy.

Once a target turns active, you can start sending them your marketing content or offer or messages. So, let’s say your company has a physical store or outlet in the local shopping centre. Here is how you can use a location based marketing method like geofencing in that case.

Every time a prospective customer walks into the city centre, they receive a marketing message or push notification from your business. You can study your prospects’ buying habits and behaviour and pitch them relevant products/services for better results.

Working 

Geofencing uses GPS technology for creating or setting boundaries within a specific geographic area or locality. This location based marketing strategy detects the prospect’s location using their GPS location. 

When the prospect crosses the boundary set by the business within a locality, they become an active target. The system then sends personalised marketing messages, push notifications, or offers that encourage them to visit the store. 

If the product, service, or offer you send the customer is relevant, then the target is likely to visit your store. 

Benefits

• Cover large areas such as malls and events.
• Target all prospects within a specific area.
• Ideal for boosting your stall/store traffic in events and conventions. 
• It uses real-time location data.
• You can promote customer engagement with your products/services.
• Minimise the engagement of your target with competitor brands.

4. Beaconing

It is a geolocation based marketing method that uses Bluetooth or WIFI networks and connected devices. These connected devices act as a beacon, but they can only work with some predetermined applications.  

Beaconing is a perfect way to target existing customers within a geographic area. However, unlike what we saw in geofencing, the geographical location, in this case, is relatively small. Just think about your devices’ range of Bluetooth and WIFI networks to get a realistic image of the beacon’s catchment area.

For example, a prospect walks around a big furniture store, and they reach the bed section. At this point, the store can send or inform the details of the sales offer of bed frames. 

Working

This location-based marketing involves the beacon or the customer’s device sending a signal to your (business) device. Once your device receives the signal or information, it prompts a server to send the appropriate content to the device. The content sent to the customer’s device could be an email, a push notification, etc. 

Benefits

• It provides a more direct communication channel with customers.
• Ability to track customers indoors, which implies high precision.
• It enables you to get a better understanding of customer behaviour.
• The prospect does not have to be online to receive the notification.

5. Mobile Targeting

Mobile targeting is a location-targeted advertising strategy that involves targeting your customers with ads specifically for mobile devices. It is no secret that the general public hates ads, and they will go out of their way to avoid them. 

Hence, with mobile targeting, you must make the ads context-specific. But, doing this is easier said than done. Basing your ads on time, device, location, etc., can significantly help you enhance your results.

Social media ads are a perfect example of this type of location based marketing. You can target your marketing efforts based on location data with social media ads. It is especially effective to push customers into visiting your store, nearby events, and more.

Working  

Mobile targeting works with the help of segment creation in your mobile ad platform. Here, you can define the qualifications of your target audience. Facebook ads are a perfect example of advanced mobile targeting. It enables you to narrow down on the ideal prospect for you. 

However, with a location based marketing strategy, the marketing process is initiated only when the customer enters a specified area or comes in proximity to your store.

Benefits

• It enables you to target prospects directly on their devices.
• Mobile targeting is ideal for creating more personalised connections.
• It often leads to a higher ROI for your ads as it is highly targeted.

6. Geo-Conquesting

With geo-conquesting, you get geolocation based marketing that can help you get the upper hand over your competition. How does it do it? Geo-conquesting diverts prospects from your competitors using location data. 

The logic behind geo-conquesting is much easier to understand than you might think. Suppose you are a realtor and want to get the upper hand against your competition. Here, you can set up a boundary around a busy open house your competitor is executing. 

So, whenever a potential real estate buyer comes near the property, you can send them offers on similar properties at a lower price. You can even set up another open house around the same time as your competitor’s open house to create a sense of urgency.

Working

Like geofencing, geo-conquesting is also a location based marketing that employs GPS technology. But instead of setting up a boundary near your store, you set it up around your competitor. Everything else in geo-conquesting is similar to the other strategies we discussed above. 

As the prospect comes close to your competitor, they start receiving marketing messages that divert them to you.

Benefits

• Enables you to earn more market share.
• Allows you to get new customers for your business.
• It lets you target genuinely interested prospects in your product/service.

Conclusion

Location based marketing offers a lot of benefits to business organisations. It enhances the user experience, increases foot traffic, delivers relevant ads, and even lets you divert customers from your competition. 

However, more often than not, location-based marketing strategies can only work as well as the tools you use. Take PostGrid, for example. It enables customers to conduct easy and convenient geocoding to reveal valuable information about their target audience.

Furthermore, geocoding is only a tiny part of what PostGrid can do for your business. PostGrid’s direct mail automation tool lets you personalise, print, and deliver marketing materials to your customers. Similarly, you can use other advanced tools to implement different geolocation based marketing campaigns.

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The post Location-based Marketing appeared first on PostGrid UK.

source https://www.postgrid.co.uk/location-based-marketing/

source https://postgridunitedkingdom.tumblr.com/post/682074205205970944

Managed Print Services

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How To Save Time, Money, And Resources Of Your Business Using Managed Print Services

Manually managing bulk printing needs for a business organisation is like having a trolley for shopping with one wheel not working. Just like that one stuck wheel makes your entire shopping experience lag, a manual printing process can also drag your business operations behind.

It is no wonder that more and more businesses are now turning to Managed Print Services or MPS for easy printing within their business organisation. But, many companies are still not entirely aware of how MPS works or how they can benefit from it.

What are Managed Print Services?

Managed Print Services or MPS are the printing service offered by a third party that enables companies to optimise their document output. Although it may sound pretty simple, the processes carried out by an MPS provider are far from simple. 

Some of the main processes that MPS undertake for optimising your business’s print output are as follows.

• Requirement assessment
• Selective/general replacement of hardware
• Servicing of print equipment
• Restocking of print supplies
• Operating new, existing, and third-party print equipment

In other words, the MPS will take over a company’s all print and print-related equipment. It can include printers, scanners, copiers, and any dual or multifunctional devices if you have any. Furthermore, the Managed Print Services also takes control of your workflow and document management solutions for optimising your print output.

How To Save Money Using Managed Print Services?

MPS can save businesses a significant amount of money by optimising their print output, especially if they employ bulk mail campaigns. What is even more exciting about MPS is that companies of all sizes can use it. So, it doesn’t matter if you are SME or a large enterprise; you can still benefit from MPS.

Want to learn how to execute flawless bulk mail operations for your business? Check out our blog, “Bulk Mailing Services: An All-in-one Guide to Boost Response.”

Here are some ways print management services can help your business save a chunk of revenue.

• Minimise Wastage Of Ink Toners: When you use an MPS system for printing, there is little to no chance of wasting ink toners. There is no scope for useless printing with an optimised printing process, saving your expenses on ink toners.
• Minimise Wastage Of Paper: Just like the ink toners, the wastage of paper also gets minimised with an optimised printing process.
• Minimise The Number Of Print Devices Required. With Managed Print Services, you can get the maximum number of prints by taking away the excess printers.
• Save Employee Time: An advanced MPS solution like PostGrid essentially automates your bulk printing needs, saving employee work hours.
• Save Energy Cost: As your printing gets optimised, the number of print cycles also gets minimised, leading to more savings on energy costs.

What Can Print Management Services Do For Your Business?

Managed Print Services tools are not just helpful in saving money on your printing expenses. There are several steps involved in an MPS service. Furthermore, some of them can even help you optimise other aspects of your business. Here is the list of things an MPS system can do for your business.

Analyse Your Print Requirements

MPS first analyses all factors concerning your printing requirements. It includes analysing your scanning, copying, and faxing needs as well. Additionally, Managed Print Services consists of a detailed printing audit. In the audit, the MPS assesses each printing device to reveal information such as:

• The documents or photos a device prints
• The identity of the person who uses that device for printing
• The cost of printing for that specific printer

The data listed above helps you get a comprehensive understanding of the printing habits of your organisation. You can even categorise the data based on specific departments in your organisation. The audit also reveals the overworked devices enabling you to consolidate your printers. Apart from this, you can avoid unnecessary printing in your organisation.

Reduce/Eliminate Local Desktop Printers

The need or necessity for local or desktop printers is one of the first things that print management services analyse. It is always better to use dedicated remote printers for your business communications as the local ones are inefficient and expensive.

An individual employee usually uses local or desktop printers, and they are rarely ever networked. Furthermore, such printers always use up a lot of ink toner cartridges, and the smaller cartridges are typically more expensive.

Consolidate Your Print Devices

The Managed Print Services provider also assesses your multifunctional devices and checks them against your business’s print requirements. It finds out the number of excessive devices you have if there are any. 

Hence, you can consolidate your devices to a lower number. For instance, you can take printers from departments where they rarely use them to share one among departments with similar printing needs. 

Place Your Printers 

It might surprise you that printer placement plays a crucial role in your printing operations. The printer(s) should be so that the required number of people can easily access it. Apart from optimising the printing within your organisation, managed print solutions also improve your business’s workflow. As a result, it maximises your workforce and work hours. 

Replace Your Inefficient Devices 

Sometimes, having an inefficient printer can cost you more in the long run than buying a new and efficient one. Hence, MPS providers analyse and find out underperforming devices and replace them with efficient ones. As a result, you save money and time on frequent servicing and maintenance. 

Automatically Refills Your Print Supplies 

Managed Print Services tools enable your business to refill your print supplies automatically. Hence, you can ensure there are no more delays or interruptions in your printing process. Furthermore, you don’t need personnel wasting their time monitoring the stock of print materials and placing new orders. As a result, you can eliminate downtime caused by ink shortage almost entirely. 

Accurate Cost Estimation

By consolidating your cost and suppliers, the Managed Print Services can provide you with a much more accurate prediction of monthly spending. Additionally, businesses can use the MPS contract for ensuring that the provider you pick maintains a steady supply of toners. It ultimately helps you avoid unexpected maintenance and servicing costs.

Print Your Documents/Materials Remotely

MPS providers like PostGrid enable you to set up remote printing capabilities for your business and streamline your direct mail campaigns. You can print everything from marketing postcards to sending regular direct mail communications like bills/invoices. For example, financial institutions can remotely print their direct communication such as adverse action letters and debt collection letters using PostGrid. 

Print Only When And What Is Necessary

The cost-saving principles of Managed Print Services are pretty straightforward. MPS providers enable their customers to have more control over their print operations without any inconveniences. It optimises your printing operation to eliminate needless printing within your organisation. 

You can even set up a default setting for minimising your printing costs. For example, you can opt for black and white printing over colour printing, significantly impacting the prices. Using double-sided printing can help you save a considerable chunk of money on paper costs.

Reduce Your Spending On Printers and Copiers

The most significant expense for printing operations inside an organisation is none other than the printer itself. With Managed Print Services tools, you can significantly minimise equipment costs to your organisation.

Conclusion

Thanks to advanced automation, MPS providers can streamline your organisation’s print requirements with ease. Print management services like PostGrid optimise your business’s bulk mail requirements, saving you money, resources, and time.

The services offered by an MPS provider are not just about saving money but optimising your business communications. Industries such as financial services can optimise direct mail communications and send important documents to their customers.

Furthermore, MPS providers like PostGrid enable you to run advanced direct marketing campaigns and send marketing materials directly to your target audience. The best thing about using Managed Print Services tools like PostGrid is full automation capability.

You can use PostGrid’s print and mail API to completely automate your direct mail marketing and communication efforts. Hence, you can personalise, print, and deliver printed materials to your customers and partners. As a result, you can minimise wastage of time and resources leading to a high ROI.

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The post Managed Print Services appeared first on PostGrid UK.

source https://www.postgrid.co.uk/managed-print-services-guide/

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UK Postage Rates

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UK Postage Rates: All You Need To Know About Royal Mail’s New 2022 Postage Prices

Did you know that Royal Mail is updating its postage prices in April 2022?

Is your business prepared to handle the postage price change that is inevitably coming?

A lot of time and planning goes into executing direct mail campaigns for a business. One of the reasons most companies still use direct mail campaigns is their high ROI or Return On Investment. How big of an effect can the 2022 postage rates have on your direct mail ROI?

To answer this question, you first need to know how much does postage costs in the UK. Hence, here we have created a comprehensive list of the different postal services offered by Royal Mail and their latest postage rates.

This article will help you analyse the 2022 postage charges and prepare your new direct mail campaigns based on the latest data.

So, let us dig in!

Size and Weight Guide For UK Postage Rates

The postage rate for mailers everywhere globally is usually dependent on their size and weight unless it explicitly states otherwise. Hence, if you are trying to understand the UK postage rates, then the best place to start is the size and weight of postal packages.

Depending on the size and weight of the postal mailer, you can broadly classify it into six types, and they are:

• Letters
• Large Letters
• Small Parcels
• Medium Parcels
• Parcelforce Parcels
• Parcelforce Large Parcels

Type Of Mailer	Length	Width	Thickness	Weight Limit
Letters	24cm	16.5cm	0.5cm	100g
Large Letters	35.3cm	25cm	2.5cm	750g
Small Parcels	45cm	35cm	16cm	2kg
Medium Parcels	61cm	46cm	46cm	20kg
Parcelforce Parcels	1.5m	3m length and girth combines		30kg
Parcelforce Large Parcels	2.5m	4m length and girth combined		30kg*

Rolled and Cylinder-Shaped Parcels

You might have also come across rolled or cylinder-shaped parcels. If you did, you are probably wondering how their dimensions are measured. In such cases, the length of the package plus two times the diameter should not be over 104cm. Furthermore, Royal Mail also states that the most significant dimension of a rolled or cylinder-shaped parcel should not exceed 90cm.

Types Of Postal Mail Services And Their UK Postage Rates

We know the different sizes and weights for postal mailers you can send via a service provider like Royal Mail. What is another important aspect that might affect the postage prices in the UK? Apart from the size and weight of the package, the other thing that can affect the postage rate is the speed of delivery.

Royal Mail offers several postal mail services to its customers. Although not all postal mail services are based on the speed of delivery, the majority of the postage prices are dependent on the delivery speed. Some postal mail services have a higher postage rate because they include special services such as proof of delivery.

The types of postal services offered by the Royal Mail can broadly be classified into four distinct categories, and they are:

• UK Guaranteed 
• UK Signed 
• UK Standard
• Parcelforce Worldwide

UK Guaranteed Postal Services

The UK Guaranteed is one of the premium postal services offered by the Royal Mail. As the name implies, the postal service guarantees the delivery of your mailer within a specified time. Even within the UK Guaranteed services, you may see different postage rates UK. 

There are different types of UK Guaranteed services provided by the Royal Mail. The primary UK Guaranteed services you can use for your business communication are listed below.

• Royal Mail Special Delivery Guaranteed by 1 pm
• Royal Mail Special Delivery Guaranteed by 9 am
• Royal Mail Special Delivery Guaranteed by 9 am with Saturday Guarantee
• Royal Mail Special Delivery Guaranteed by 1 pm with Saturday Guarantee

Royal Mail Special Delivery Guaranteed by 9 am or 1 pm 

Royal Mail Special Delivery Guaranteed by 9 am or 1 pm is one of the most widely used postal mail services from Royal Mail. The primary reason why businesses prefer to use the Guaranteed 9 am or 1 pm service is that it enables them to ensure their mailer is delivered at the right time. Royal Mail provides a guaranteed 9 am or 1 pm delivery of your postal mailers. 

Trace And Track Facility

Royal Mail Special Delivery Guaranteed by 9 am, or 1 pm comes equipped with a track and trace facility. It allows the sender to track the mailer’s journey from the moment it leaves your hands to the point of delivery.

Signature On Delivery

Both Guaranteed 9 am, and 1 pm services require the recipient’s signature on delivery. Hence, you will always get proof of delivery when you use UK Guaranteed postal service. Furthermore, you can view the signature online just 10 minutes after the delivery.

Cover For Valuable Items And Late Delivery

Another significant advantage of the UK Guaranteed service is that they offer coverage for your valuable items and late deliveries.  

Compensation And Additional Coverage

The Royal Mail Special Delivery Guaranteed by 1 pm is entitled to a compensation of up to £500. However, the compensation for Guaranteed by 9 am delivery is only £50. Furthermore, you can also access optional coverages for your mailers. 

Royal Mail allows you to access additional cover up to £2,500 and optional consequential loss cover-up to £10,000! Hence it is no wonder that the UK Guaranteed service is preferred for sending items of significant value.

UK Postage Rate For Royal Mail Special Delivery Guaranteed by 1 pm

Weight Up To And Including	Postage Cost
100g	£6.85
500g	£7.65
1kg	£8.95
2kg	£11.15
10kg	£15.45
20kg	£19.45

Note: The above postage charges are applicable only if you want a standard cover of up to £500. If you wish to have additional coverage for your packages, you will need to pay higher postage, as shown in the table below

UK Postage Rate For Royal Mail Special Delivery Guaranteed by 1 pm With Additional Cover
Weight Up To And Including	Postage With £1,000 Cover	Postage With £2,500 Cover
100g	£7.85	£9.85
500g	£8.65	£10.65
1kg	£9.95	£11.95
2kg	£12.15	£14.15
10kg	£16.45	£18.45
20kg	£20.45	£22.45

UK Postage Rate For Royal Mail Special Delivery Guaranteed by 9 am 

Weight Up To And Including	Postage Cost
100g	£22.95
500g	£25.95
1kg	£27.95
2kg	£33.95

UK Postage Rate For Royal Mail Special Delivery Guaranteed by 9 am With Additional Cover
Weight Up To And Including	Postage With £1,000 Cover	Postage With £2,500 Cover
100g	£25.15	£28.65
500g	£28.15	£31.65
1kg	£30.15	£33.65
2kg	£36.15	£39.65

Royal Mail Special Delivery Guaranteed by 9 am or 1 pm with Saturday Guarantee.

Guarantee Saturday delivery is an additional option for the UK Guaranteed postal services. However, the Saturday Guarantee comes at an additional cost. If you opt for Saturday Guarantee, the whole structure of the  UK postage rates change.

Hence it is best to mention the postage rates of guaranteed 9 am and 1 pm with Saturday guarantee separately.

UK Postage Rate For Royal Mail Special Delivery Guaranteed by 1 pm with Saturday Guarantee

Weight Up To And Including	Postage Cost
100g	£11.22
500g	£12.18
1kg	£13.74
2kg	£16.38
10kg	£21.54
20kg	£26.34

UK Postage Rate For Royal Mail Special Delivery Guaranteed by 1 pm With Additional Cover
Weight Up To And Including	Postage With £1,000 Cover	Postage With £2,500 Cover
100g	£12.42	£14.82
500g	£13.38	£15.78
1kg	£14.94	£17.34
2kg	£17.58	£19.98
10kg	£22.74	£25.14
20kg	£27.54	£29.94

UK Postage Rate For Royal Mail Special Delivery Guaranteed by 9 am with Saturday Guarantee

Weight Up To And Including	Postage Cost
100g	£25.95
500g	£28.95
1kg	£30.95
2kg	£36.95

 

UK Postage Rate For Royal Mail Special Delivery Guaranteed by 9 am With Saturday Guarantee & Additional Cover
Weight Up To And Including	Postage With £1,000 Cover	Postage With £2,500 Cover
100g	£28.15	£31.65
500g	£31.15	£34.65
1kg	£33.15	£36.65
2kg	£39.15	£42.65

UK Signed Postal Services

UK Signed services are another popular postal service offered by the Royal Mail. As you can guess from the name, it requires a signed proof of delivery from the recipients. You can get UK Signed postal service for your first and second class mail.

Most businesses use either first class or second class mail for their direct mail communication. Hence, the UK Signed services are an excellent way for companies to deliver direct mail to the target audience.

It can be beneficial for industries such as financial services. Financial service providers can use specialised tools like PostGrid to send adverse action notices and require the recipient to sign your letters.

You can learn more about how PostGrid’s direct mail system can help loan companies market their business on our blog “Marketing Ideas for Loan Companies UK”

Online Delivery Confirmation

A definite advantage of UK Signed services is the order delivery confirmation feature. It enables the sender to get a confirmation on the delivery, which can be crucial for many industry verticals and business organisations.

Compensation 

Royal Mail also provides compensation of £50 to its customers using the UK Signed services similar to the ones we saw in UK Guaranteed services. Such compensation can be ideal for businesses that regularly send direct mail communications. 

Eligible For eBay Seller Protection programme

Apart from its other features, the UK Signed services are also eligible for the eBay Seller Protection programme. Hence, it is also a perfect choice for E-Commerce companies for delivering their products and services. 

UK Postage Rate For Royal Mail Signed For 1st Class Mail

Type Of Mailer	Weight Up To And Including	Postage Cost
Letters	100g	£2.35
Large Letters	100g	£2.85
	250g	£3.45
	500g	£4.05
	750g	£4.70
Small Parcels	2kg	£5.55
Medium Parcels	2kg	£8.05
	10kg	£9.05
	20kg	£14.05

UK Postage Rate For Royal Mail Signed For 2nd Class Mail

Type Of Mailer	Weight Up To And Including	Postage Cost
Letters	100g	£2.08
Large Letters	100g	£2.45
	250g	£3.05
	500g	£3.55
	750g	£4.10
Small Parcels	2kg	£4.45
Medium Parcels	2kg	£6.45
	10kg	£8.05
	20kg	£11.55

UK Standard Postal Services

The UK Standard postal service is the number one choice for businesses regarding direct mail marketing. UK Standard postal service includes the regular 1st Class and 2nd Class postal delivery services.

One of the main reasons businesses prefer to use the UK Standard postal service is the low postage costs. Hence, they are ideal for sending bulk marketing mail to the target audience. However, such extensive bulk mailing often requires an advanced automation solution like PostGrid to ensure your campaign’s optimal performance.

Want to know more about how an automated direct mail solution can help your business? Read our blog “Automated Direct Mail”

1st Class Mail

The advantage of using the 1st Class mail service is relatively fast. Royal Mail usually tries to deliver the 1st Class mail on the next working day, even if it is a Saturday. Furthermore, the 1st Class Mail comes with compensation cover up to £20.

UK Postage Rate For Royal Mail 1st Class Mai

Type Of Mailer	Weight Up To And Including	Postage Cost
Letters	100g	95p
Large Letters	100g	£1.45
	250g	£2.05
	500g	£2.65
	750g	£3.30
Small Parcels	2kg	£4.45
Medium Parcels	2kg	£6.95
	10kg	£7.95
	20kg	£12.95

2nd Class Mail

The 2nd Class mail is the most affordable way to send direct mail to your customers. However, it does take a longer time to deliver. Usually, a 2nd Class mail is delivered within two to three working days, but this can vary from time to time. Similar to 1st Class mail, you also get compensation cover up to £20.

UK Postage Rate For Royal Mail 2nd Class Mail

Type Of Mailer	Weight Up To And Including	Postage Cost
Letters	100g	68p
Large Letters	100g	£1.05
	250g	£1.65
	500g	£2.15
	750g	£2.70
Small Parcels	2kg	£3.35
Medium Parcels	2kg	£5.35
	10kg	£6.95
	20kg	£10.45

Parcelforce Worldwide Postal Services

The Parcelforce Worldwide postal service from Royal Mail offers to include several sub-services. The primary Parcelforce Worldwide postal services are classified into 7 categories, and they are as follows.

• express48
• express24
• expresssunday
• expressAM
• express10
• express9
• express48 (Large)

UK Postage Rate For Royal Mail express48 Mail

Weight Up To And Including	Postage Cost
5kg	£8.95
10kg	£9.95
20kg	£11.95
30kg	£14.95
Per extra kg	£1.56

UK Postage Rate For Royal Mail express24 Mail

Weight Up To And Including	Postage Cost
5kg	£9.35
10kg	£13.35
20kg	£15.35
30kg	£18.35
Per extra kg	£1.56

UK Postage Rate For Royal Mail expresssunday Mail

Weight Up To and Including	Postage Cost
5kg	£25.80
10kg	£30.24
20kg	£37.02
30kg	£53.70
Per extra kg	£1.56

UK Postage Rate For Royal Mail expressAM Mail

Weight Up To and Including	Postage Cost
5kg	£18.49
10kg	£19.69
20kg	£21.49
30kg	£24.49
Per extra kg	£1.56

UK Postage Rate For Royal Mail express10 Mail

Weight Up To and Including	Postage Cost
5kg	£22.00
10kg	£23.00
20kg	£25.00
30kg	£28.00
Per extra kg	£1.56

UK Postage Rate For Royal Mail express9 Mail

Weight Up To and Including	Postage Cost
5kg	£39.90
10kg	£44.43
20kg	£51.18
30kg	£67.80
Per extra kg	£1.56

UK Postage Rate For Royal Mail express48 (Large) Mail

Weight Up To and Including	Postage Cost
5kg	£31.80
10kg	£36.60
20kg	£44.10
30kg	£61.20
Per extra kg	£1.56

Conclusion

The Royal Mail updates its postage prices every year. Businesses that regularly send direct mail to their customers, prospects, or partners need to update themselves with the latest postage rates. Even a slight ignorance on your part could lead to a significant loss, especially if you send bulk mail.

Besides keeping well-informed about the Royal Mail postage rates, you also need to employ advanced direct mail solutions like PostGrid. A fully automated direct mail software can optimise your direct mail process and minimise your direct mail expenses.

Furthermore, using an automated tool like PostGrid is also the most convenient option for businesses. It lets you personalise, print, and deliver your mailers with just the click of a button. As a result, it saves you valuable time and eliminates the scope for manual error, which ultimately saves you even more money.

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Integrated Direct Mail Campaign

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Integrated Marketing: How To Successfully Combine Online And Offline Marketing Channels

Are you worried about your email campaigns not performing up to the mark?

A typical customer receives tens and hundreds of marketing emails every week. It is easy for your marketing email to get lost in the plethora of marketing emails the customer receives every day. What if we told you that there is a better, more innovative way to ensure the success of your marketing campaigns?

Integrated direct mail campaigns incorporate different marketing or communication channels to enhance the impact of your marketing message. Here, we discuss everything you need to know about integrated direct mail campaigns and how they can benefit your business.

We will also look at how you can integrate your direct mail and email marketing efforts. The article also discusses the scope of multichannel marketing. Additionally, we will explain why using a direct mail automation tool is essential for all multichannel or integrated campaigns.

What is an Integrated Direct Mail Campaign?

An integrated direct mail campaign is a marketing strategy that integrates multiple channels to your direct mail marketing campaign to communicate effectively with the target audience. In other words, you can pitch the same or similar marketing message to your target audience across different channels.

It enables you to plan your marketing message deep into the audience’s mind and generate better results for your marketing campaigns. There are several advantages of combining or integrating different communication channels for your marketing campaign.

As we know, direct mail marketing is one of the most effective marketing channels that offers an excellent open and response rate. Including direct mail in other marketing campaigns makes it stand out from the over-familiar digital marketing campaigns.

5 Reasons For Employing Integrated Direct Mail

The primary reason for integrating direct mail campaigns into your digital marketing is simple. It has become increasingly challenging to capture the customer or prospect’s attention via digital channels. Direct mail marketing enables marketers and business owners to reach their high-priority customers and prospects effectively.

But, that is only part of the story. Many marketers and business owners have realised the potential for direct mail marketing in today’s environment. However, only a few have realised the potential of fully integrating direct mail into their digital marketing efforts.

Here are 5 of the most significant advantages of integrated direct marketing that other marketers don’t want you to know about.

#1 The Halo Effect

With integrated marketing communication,  you can effectively integrate the marketing message across all marketing channels you use. Say that you use direct mail, email, digital ads, and social media as marketing channels.

Using an integrated marketing approach, you can time your marketing message to reach the audience simultaneously via different channels. Such an action creates the “Halo” effect, making the whole combination more remarkable than the sum of individual parts.

It essentially means that your marketing message creates a more significant impact on the audience than a regular marketing campaign. Furthermore, direct mail plays a substantial part in making your marketing message memorable. It is possibly the most impactful marketing channel for conveying the message.

#2 Increases Direct Mail ‘Cut-Through’

As we have already mentioned, direct mail’s cut-through rate is significantly higher than any digital marketing channel. More people are eager to open a direct mail and check out its content than a digital channel such as Email.

As a result, it helps you promote awareness or boost brand recognition of online organisations. Hence, you can drive more traffic to your website or social media pages. So, it effectively increases your website’s SEO ranking on the digital marketing side.

In other words, you can use direct mail communications to improve the visibility and traffic of your online assets.

#3 Move Valuable Responders Online

Integrated marketing strategy connects online and offline marketing channels and allows the user to move from one medium to another. Although direct mail offers several advantages to its customers, ‘ cost to touch’ is not one of them.

Direct mail campaigns are often more expensive than online marketing channels because of their requirements. Furthermore, snail mail is not a convenient communication channel as it can take days to talk to someone via mail.

You can use direct mail to lead the customers and prospects to a desired online channel, including your website and social media page. Hence, direct mail acts as a gate-opener to facilitate low-cost and convenient conversation between you and your customers.

#4 Personalised Direct Mail Messages That Align With The Online Experience

With online marketing capabilities, you can easily segment the audience data. Marketers and business owners can use this segmented data for creating personalised direct mail messages that align perfectly with the online experience.

What does it mean for your marketing integrated direct mail campaign?

It means that you can create more impactful marketing messages. More importantly, it means that the marketing message that you wish to convey continues to reach the audience beyond the direct mail. The same message and offer are reflected on the online channels.

However, such details are dependent on the marketer or business owner who executes the integrated marketing campaign. If you can get it right, it will enable you to minimise the possibility of buying drop-outs.

#5 Hyper-Personalised Direct Mail

You can go a step further in integrated marketing by employing hyper-personalised direct mail. As the name suggests, hyper-personalised direct mail involves creating a one-on-one and consistent customer journey.

Also, hyper-personalisation needs to apply to offline and online channels in integrated marketing communication. It can sometimes be tricky, especially if you don’t have post data on the customer.

It is an approach that works best for your past customers or retargeting campaigns. You can base your marketing campaign on the previous buying behaviour and pitch an offer that’s relevant to them. You can even use a PURL in the mailer to pique the customer’s curiosity and make them take action.

Integrating Direct Mail And Email Campaigns

One of the most convenient ways of implementing an integrated direct marketing campaign is to integrate your direct mail and email campaigns. The majority of the marketers are well familiar with both marketing channels, making combining the two relatively easy.

By combining direct mail and email campaigns, you can effectively optimise your marketing efforts and get better results than independently using either of the channels. It means getting a higher response rate and meeting your marketing goals more effectively.

Direct Mail vs Email

Both direct mail and email are two very different marketing channels. Both have their own set of benefits and challenges. You can achieve success for your marketing campaigns using either of the marketing channels. However, both channels do not have the same features as a marketing channel.

Email Marketing

On the one hand, an email campaign is relatively easy to set up, and they provide some great insights such as open rates and the number of clicks. But, on the other hand, the marketing noise level of email marketing has already reached its peak.

In other words, the customer’s inbox is blowing up with unopened marketing emails from EVERYONE. As a result, the open rate of email marketing campaigns has generally come down. Hence, it is no longer viable to use Email as your sole marketing channel. The risk of losing consumers to competitors is high.

Direct Mail Marketing

Direct mail marketing is not as mainstream as Email marketing. Not many marketers or business owners have stopped using it. Furthermore, people generally like receiving direct mail and opening its content. As a result, direct mail always tends to have a higher open and response rate than Email.

According to Fundera, “the direct mail open rates can reach up to 90%“. However, the challenge with implementing direct mail campaigns is much more significant than email marketing. Companies used to have to manually print and write/print letters and then deliver them to the target audience.

Today, advanced direct mail solutions like PostGrid are available that let you automate the entire direct mail process. Direct mail still needs more time to execute Email campaigns as it involves printing and delivering the mailer via postal service.

How to Integrate Direct Mail and Email Marketing Channels?

Integrating direct mail and email marketing channels is one of the basic forms of integrated direct marketing. Because of its simple integration, it is an easy way to understand the concept of integrated marketing. Therefore, learning how to integrate direct mail and email marketing channels will help you use the strategy in more complex situations.

The new and advanced direct mail automation tools enable you to integrate the direct mail system with CRM and other marketing tools. Thanks to direct mail automation tools like PostGrid, marketers can easily create personalised and targeted direct mail campaigns.

It enables you to send direct mail to the target audience on every significant part of the customer journey. For example, you can send a direct mail for pitching a new offer or product your company is launching. Later you could send a thank you note to customers that brought what you were selling.

Here are some ways to integrate direct mail and email marketing channels for your business.

Target Your Non-Responders

Sometimes, you create a near-perfect or perhaps even perfect Email marketing campaign for your business. You have an exciting new offer, an innovative new Email message, and just about everything you need. Yet, the campaign will still have some non-responders.

There are several possibilities why the audience didn’t respond to your message. They may have lost your Email in the marketing emails cluster they receive every day. You may also have caught the customer at the wrong time, and they did not feel like responding then.

In this case, an integrated direct mail campaign can do wonders for your business. Create a list of non-responders to your email campaigns. Then, create a highly-personalised direct mail piece for the target audience and send them the mailer. Such campaigns yield excellent results for business and connect with the audience that you would have otherwise lost.

Create Efficient Follow Up Campaigns

Acquiring new customers via Email marketing is not easy, and it gets more and more difficult as time passes by. Furthermore, the constraints of GDPR or General Data Protection Regulation makes it even more difficult to target new customers via Email.

Nonetheless, acquisition marketing can benefit businesses, especially start-up companies. It is also ideal for momentarily boosting your revenue. You can bypass the challenges of GDPR to some extent by integrating direct mail communications.

Direct mail ads are not as tightly wound as Email marketing regarding GDPR. It means that you can use direct mail for the initial outreach mail and then direct the reader to a landing page. Once they reach your landing page, you can categorise the relevant audience and follow up with Email campaigns.

Use Direct Mail as Basket/Cart Reminder

As a customer, we are all well-familiar with basket or cart reminders. Every time we add a product on an eCommerce site and do not complete the checkout process, we get reminder emails about it. However, these basket reminder emails often go ignored or worse. They go to the spam folder.

Such a situation could lead eCommerce businesses to a substantial loss of revenue. Integrated direct mail can offer a solution to this problem. Direct mail automation solutions like PostGrid enable Ecommerce companies to automatically send basket or cart reminder letters via post.

As we know, the chances of the customer opening the direct mail are significantly higher than any other marketing channel. Hence, if the customer is genuinely interested in the product, they will likely complete the purchase. Furthermore, sending direct mail as a basket reminder will also help your company stand out and establish itself as a brand.

You might also find our blog “Triggered Direct Mail Marketing” helpful if you are interested in trigger-based automatic direct mail marketing.

Event Marketing

Conducting events are a great way to attract new customers and engage with the existing ones. Numerous companies attend networking events and trade shows every year. Such trade shows are highly beneficial to the event organiser. They can collect relevant information on the attendees and create priceless and appropriate mailing lists.

The success of such an event is very much dependent on how significant a reach you have in delivering the event invites. With integrated direct mail campaigns, you can use direct mail and email communication channels to maximise the invite reach. Furthermore, a printed event invite looks more professional and excites the event to some extent.

Similarly, companies taking part in the event can use direct mail to customers or prospects that visit their booth. You can even collect the company’s details, such as company name, email address etc. so that you can follow up with them. Hence, using an integrated marketing approach can be a driving factor for event ROI.

You can also consider sending postcards as event invites. Read our blog “Automated Postcard Mailing” on using postcards for marketing campaigns.

Multichannel Marketing Approach

In many ways, integrated direct marketing resembles a multichannel marketing approach. However, a multichannel marketing campaign is usually more complicated than integrated marketing. We merely integrate the new channel or channels to an existing marketing campaign in integrated marketing.

In multichannel marketing campaigns, the whole marketing strategy incorporates several marketing channels. Furthermore, the marketing strategy itself is more complex for multichannel marketing campaigns.

Tips For Multichannel or Integrated Marketing Campaigns

Here are a few tips that can help optimise your multichannel or integrated marketing campaign.

Maintain Consistency

Make sure that your messaging is consistent throughout the marketing campaign regardless of how many channels you use. It is one of the most crucial tips a company needs to use multiple channels for marketing campaigns.

Additionally, you should also try to be more consistent in your branding. Give special attention to finer details such as maintaining a consistent tagline, colour scheme, and even the font you use. In other words, a prospect who has already received the marketing message should immediately recognise your brand from the follow-up.

Stagger Your Communication Points

We never send three consecutive Emails in one go for Email marketing as it runs the risk of looking like spam. The same goes for your advertising mail. You must not send consecutive mail to the customers without adequate intervals in between. 

Marketers must learn to stagger their communication points in integrated marketing campaigns. It is the only way the user has enough time to take in all the presented data. For example, if you are targeting new customers, the best place to start would be to introduce your brand.

You may then follow up with your products/services and explain how their life can be better with what you have to sell. So, you need to gradually rope in your customers with regular follow-ups instead of presenting with a lot of complex data.

Use Landing Pages Intelligently

Landing pages are an integral part of almost every digital marketing campaign. However, many may not realise that landing pages are incredibly beneficial to direct marketing. You can lead the customer to a landing page via a QR code printed on your mailer.

It will take the audience to the appropriate page on your website. The strategy has forever been used in Email marketing. It is now a popular choice for direct mail marketing. There are several advantages to connecting a landing page to your integrated direct mail campaign. 

You can use it to increase traffic to your website and make your marketing campaign more visually appealing to the target audience. Furthermore, you can use your website analytic tools to access detailed insights about your marketing campaign and customer behaviour.

Conclusion

Implementing an integrated marketing campaign is not easy. A lot of planning and hard work is necessary to incorporate multiple communication channels for a single integrated marketing campaign. And in many ways, an integrated marketing campaign is similar to multichannel marketing campaigns.

Multichannel marketing campaigns can be even more complex as they usually include more communication channels. However, using advanced marketing tools like PostGrid can significantly make your life easy.

PostGrid’s automated direct mail tool enables you to execute advanced integrated direct mail with minimal errors. You can even integrate PostGrid’s systems into your CRM and personalise your letter. It saves you valuable time and even helps to streamline your direct mail communications.

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The post Integrated Direct Mail Campaign appeared first on PostGrid UK.

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