Your mailing list is the core of your business and being consistent across multiple channels helps you promote an accurate image. Ensuring that you have a successful direct mail campaign begins with the data you want to use. we’re going to touch on a couple of topics for how to collect and validate your data for your next direct mail campaign.
Where does your data/mailing addresses come from?
Do you know where your data is coming from for your next mail campaign? Consider your sources. If you’re looking for lead generation and you buy a list, it may not be of quality. In a Deloitte report about user’s data, “more than two-thirds of survey respondents stated that the third-party data about them was only 0 to 50 percent correct as a whole.” That’s incredible. Purchasing data has its risks, but other sources of data can come from registered entities, like a government agency. Some data sources do purchase registrant information for businesses, but there’s a possibility that the registered location, may not be the main billing address of the person you’re trying to contact.
How to validate your mailing addresses:
Methods to Validate your information via the USPS
The USPS has a tool that allows you to look up and verify a zip code to make sure your information is accurate. Additionally, they have a other products here that are a little more technical
Google Maps
This is a longer and rougher method, but you can use Google Maps to authenticate your data to make sure that there is a physical location for your mailer. It’s not a method to say that Frank works at 123 Main St., but that there is a 123 Main St.
Big Mail Address Verification
The Big Mail Project offers address verification to ensure that there is a physical address at the location of your mailer’s destination. It’s a simple method of uploading your addresses via CSV or XLS in the UI and letting it run. There is a small fee per address, but it could help you save, if you’re looking to automate and/or send recurring mailers. If you believe you have a good list of addresses then there may not be a need to verify your addresses.
So, what’s the big deal?
If you send an email blast to 10,000 email addresses and 1,000 of them are incorrect or bounce, then it’s just a percentage. It’ll hurt your domain authority, but overall it’s easier to brush off and you’re spending less per mailer to send than you would with a direct mail piece. When you send 10,000 mailers and 1,000 of them come back, well that’s 1,000 letters or postcards that you’ve paid to be printed, merged and stamped to go out and come right back to you. It’s a more costly experience.
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