Royal Mail MarketReach has signed a raft of new industry figures as it steps up its campaign to get more businesses to switch their budgets to direct mail.
The five new advocates are former adman Tim Lindsay, who is now chief executive of D&AD; Tess Macleod Smith, vice-president of publishing and media at Net-a-Porter; Ben Hammersley, the former deputy editor of Wired magazine; Beth Reekles, the youth author and young entrepreneur; and Adam Pike, the co-founder of SuperCarers.com.
The content-based campaign, devised by Publicis Chemistry, features five “thought-leadership” articles on the MarketReach website, under the premise of “New thinking about mail from the best minds in the business”. Each extols the benefits of embracing direct mail, while also highlighting the flaws of adopting a purely digital approach.
Lindsay, who was joint managing director of BBH, president of Lowe Worldwide and chairman of Publicis UK, states: “With a piece of print or mail, you get to touch it, feel it, see a better quality image, smell the paper. All that stuff is evocative, and none of it can be achieved by pixels.”
Meanwhile Hammersley, who admits that a lot of digital marketing is “smoke and mirrors”, says: “As the world becomes increasingly digital, a few smart people will turn towards something that can be considered old-fashioned – direct mail. Even if just 3% of a direct mail prompts a response, that’s a rate of return that dwarfs most digital advertising.”
Royal Mail MarketReach managing director Jonathan Harman said: “Some of the most impactful pieces of marketing these days are the ones that land on our doormat and are kept in the home. In an increasingly digital world, that’s what stands out. It’s where direct mail can really make an impact and form an effective component of an integrated communications strategy.
“We’re already seeing a rise in the popularity of playful, tactile direct mail and I’m looking forward to helping advertisers rise to this challenge.”
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