While many are decrying the potential advent of postal services only four days a week, Brands should be examining its impact and be the first to make the most of it.
We at Marketsmith know that a great marketer knows all things must change. This is one of those times we think it will be a good shot in the arm to a channel that is seriously limping along.
Why do we say that only four days of mail delivery a week is a positive? Let’s face it – mail is boring (unless it’s one of our clients doing a breakthrough piece like we have seen from Solstice, Tumi or La Perla). And having this experience for six days a week can seem particularly tiresome. But if two days are cut out, the pattern shifts. And we think consumers will be so excited to get their mail they will pay more attention. We think they will fall in love with their walk to their mailbox and wonder what will be there. As the old adage says, Absence makes the heart grow fonder.
The rising postal rates have been the equivalent of an unexpected tax on direct marketing operations. The cost of communicating with customers by mail has been escalating at almost geometric rates. It has been the cause of many company failures.
The change will come. Lobbyists for the unions will recognize that even with the monopoly of the USPS, there is an upward limit to what businesses can pay. The Postal Service will be forced to do the economics and realize that mail four days a week is the only way to go.
It will be a whole new channel to a degree. At the most basic level, it should help lower, or at least stabilize costs. From a value added perspective, we see curtailing mail delivery as adding some excitement back into the direct to consumer mail business.
Start now to think about how to interact with your customers once the change happens. It will be important to make sure the direct mail pieces are engaging and that they tie to the other communications received, to reinforce the connection to and interest in the Brand.
By October 1, 2010, we may be down to five days.
The Post Office no longer provides a service that needs six day delivery. If cutting delivery by a third improves overall sustainability, we say – Go Postal! And we are already creating strategies that take advantage of the new system.
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