Direct mail effectiveness soars

By |2023-03-23T10:05:54+00:00March 23rd, 2023|

Direct Mail experienced something of a renaissance during the Covid years – lockdown prompted a wide scale love affair with the letterbox. People enjoyed receiving mail, it provided a welcome break from the mundanity of being at home ALL THE TIME! This week, as we mark three years since the first lockdown back in 2020, it seems fitting that the latest figures from JICMAIL reveal that mail’s engagement is still on the rise. Mail open and retention rates both soared by four percent year on year. Over Christmas (Q4 2022) open rates hit 77 per cent and retention grew to 66 percent demonstrating the importance of mail within the marketing mix. At a time of year when consumers are more [...]

Data hygiene is all academic, isn’t it?

By |2022-11-14T11:09:16+00:00November 8th, 2022|

How alumni teams at higher education institutions can enhance relationships with past students and increase lifetime value Digital transformation scores a B+ According to a study by McKinsey, almost 80 percent of organisations reported that during the pandemic they initiated a process of digital and data transformation. Undeniably, COVID 19 fast tracked many organisations’ transformation intentions. For instance, the higher education sector - not one famed for its agility - had been toying with the concept of Responsive Blended Learning, a hybrid of traditional classroom based delivery and online learning for years, but it took lockdown for this to actually become a reality. Most institutions went from face-to-face teaching to digital delivery in a matter of days. And with exam [...]

As the cost-of-living crisis bites, mail stays in the home for longer

By |2022-09-09T08:03:04+00:00September 9th, 2022|

The latest stats from JICMail, the joint industry currency for ad mail, show that there has been a significant increase in the amount of households retaining their mail. More households are choosing to file their mail away for later use or take it out of the home. The new data which covers the period from April to June 2022, shows that close to half of mail (44 percent) is still live in the home after 28 days, which is a significant increase on Q2 2021. It is thought that this is because households are placing more importance on mail content in economically challenging times. The research finds that overall, 94 percent of mail is engaged with, i.e., it has at [...]

Why Data Suppression is Key to Compliance with GDPR

By |2018-11-06T10:40:07+00:00May 25th, 2017|

DataIQ recently teamed up with Cygnus Embedded Suppression contributor, The Ark to produce a Whitepaper discussing data suppression and GDPR. The Whitepaper puts forth the message that deceased suppression will effectively become a legal requirement come May 2018 when GDPR comes into force. While both the legislation itself and the guidelines from ICO don’t go quite so far as naming deceased suppression as a legal obligation to achieve compliance, DataIQ make the argument that failing to undertake deceased suppression increases the likelihood of a technical breach. Falling foul of the ICO for a technical breach can cost organisations as much as 2% of group turnover (find out more about GDPR here). So how do Suppression files help organisations achieve compliance [...]

Lean DM – Focus on Goneaway and Deceased Suppression

By |2017-01-11T22:10:53+00:00August 10th, 2016|

Around 1.5 million people move house each year and over 500,000 people unfortunately pass away. This level of constant change can lead to data decaying at rates of over 30% per year for some organisations. The Office of National Statistics estimate up to 110 items of mail can be sent to the deceased in the 12 months after their death. Sending mail to people who have died or moved house is more than just a waste of printing and postage costs. When a business chooses to send mail without removing these recipients the only message being communicated is ‘the brand does not care about its customers’. Relatives of the deceased or new occupants are of course highly likely to see [...]

Proposals for a Fundraising Preference Service

By |2017-01-12T14:09:25+00:00April 8th, 2016|

Response to discussion paper by Martin Rides, Managing Director, The Software Bureau Please find below our response to the Fundraising Preference Service discussion paper and questions raised within. We believe it is crucial that software providers, such as ourselves, are engaged early on in the design and development process to ensure that the FPS is fit for purpose and works effectively for consumers and fundraisers alike. It is for this reason that organisations such as Royal Mail consult with us and our peers when implementing initiatives such as Mailmark. Worst case scenario for FPS is to introduce a solution that fails to stop unwanted solicitations or stymies legitimate fundraising opportunities for charities that desperately need the donations.   Scope It [...]

Is ‘preference’ a Dirty word?

By |2017-01-12T14:39:25+00:00November 10th, 2015|

For years there have been rumblings about various industry-wide consumer preference services giving  consumers the chance to select (or deselect) channels, sectors and even specific brands they want to hear from. Such movements always provoke mass debate. Justin Basini’s Allow and REaD Group’s Itsmypost.com were two such initiatives that are no longer in existence. Is this because they didn’t work? Or perhaps because opposition from marketers was too strong to ignore? Why have these initiatives failed to gain traction? The question today is were these frontrunners onto something but just a little before their time? One argument against them was that the industry as a collective didn’t approve of any individual company profiting from their perceived misery, which is how many viewed [...]

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