Barb Pellow, director of Weymouth, Massachusetts-based InfoTrends—a leading market research and strategic consulting firm for the digital imaging and document solutions industry—believes leveraging all available customer touchpoints to drive relevant customer interaction is the future of marketing. In the following article, she explained how transPromo documents featuring a promotional message positioned alongside essential transactional information, present a perfect opportunity for achieving both operational and marketing objectives.
Enhanced transactional documents lead to effectively managed cash flow, while reducing postage costs and expenses associated with call centers. Tremendous marketing vehicles, TransPromo documents are also directed toward individuals who have opted into a relationship with your company. These documents can build loyalty and trust, cross-sell, educate, reinforce a brand, and retain and activate clients for the ultimate customer touchpoint.
InfoTrends recently completed its multi-client study entitled Trans Meets Promo… Is It More than Market Hype?. InfoTrends surveyed more than 1,000 consumers, 600 direct marketers and 230 print service providers. Based on feedback, InfoTrends projects the North American market for TransPromo applications printed in full digital color represented 1.7 billion impressions in 2007. By 2012, the number of impressions is expected to reach 22.8 billion. A critical data point in the research was how much time individuals spend reviewing statements and other transactional documents. More than 20 percent of respondents spend more than five minutes reviewing these documents, with all respondents spending an average of two to three minutes reviewing each monthly statement received by mail.
TransPromo users say the level of complexity typically increases with the size and scope of an organization, and while the results are clearly worth it, the campaigns need to be effectively managed. Jon Reske, Vice President of Marketing for UMassFive College Federal Credit Union, noted the key marketing challenge is getting the right message to the right individual. “People in today’s market expect you to know them. We can’t send a promotion for a home equity line of credit to someone who lives in an apartment. UMassFive needs to find the member’s hot button and target appropriately,” he explained.
The decision for the migration to a transpromotional approach started with a redesign of the existing UMassFive statement in 2003. “It was a greenbar statement that was confusing and unfriendly,” observed Reske. The redesign opened up the opportunity for targeted and readable messages segmented by client type. Of equal importance, the readability generated a decline in the inbound calls to the call center.
UMassFive uses its Membership Customer Information File (MCIF) to trigger messaging. Depending on the specific business objective, the MCIF is segmented for different types of clients. “We also buy demographic data to append to customer records. I can acquire additional information about home ownership, cars, number of children and credit scores. We then identify the selection criteria—group ‘A’ will get one message, while groups ‘B’ and ‘C’ get different messaging.”
UMassFive lays out a marketing calendar with the statement messages defined by month. They are linked to seasonality and the specific needs of the credit union. In one instance, the credit union needed to raise additional cash. “We ran a promotion for CDs or CDs that were maturing on the statement. This brought in several million dollars in incremental deposits. By using the statement as a marketing vehicle, we got quick cash at zero cost,” said Reske. “With climbing fuel costs, we are providing 12-month energy loans at 3.9 percent. This is a timely issue that our customers are currently focused on.”
The statement redesign was linked to significant bottom-line benefits for UMassFive. The credit union saves $18,000 annually through the elimination of checks. Reske noted that there has been a double-digit increase in the number of members who use the bank as their primary financial institution. “Getting the right message to the right member is key,” Reske concluded. “I want to leverage each and every communication opportunity with a member. The added cost of effectively adding a message to a statement is zero.”
By Barb Pellow
For more information, visit www.infotrends-rgi.com or e-mail barb_pellow@infotrends.com.
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- Weymouth, Massachusetts