By Darby Roach
You know the government’s “Do Not Call” list? The one that’s supposed to stop telemarketers from calling? Well, I’d like to see the same thing for junk mail.
Now this might not seem like heresy to most people, but coming from me, it is radical thinking indeed. You see, I work in the very industry responsible for sending out those millions of pieces of mail each year.
Yes, I admit it. I’m a direct mail advertiser.
The idea for a government-enforced “No Junk Mail” list came to me a few months ago when, at a friend’s wedding reception, I found myself seated next to the minister who had performed the ceremony. He was in his mid-sixties, silver-haired and kindly looking. We carried on a few minutes of polite chitchat before the conversation came around to what I do for a living. “I’m in advertising,” I told him.
“Advertising, you say? What kind of advertising?”
“Direct advertising,” I said. “I come up with ideas for ads, I write copy, things like that.”
“Oh,” he replied. He paused a moment, thinking. “So, have I seen any of your ads?”
I smiled. “Probably…if you have a mailbox.”
He was quiet for awhile. I could see the wheels turning, then he gave me a stern, disapproving look. “Ohhh, THAT kind of advertising.” I sensed his demeanor growing cooler. “You’re the guy who sends me all that junk mail.”
Now, this was not the first time I’d gotten such a reaction. I firmly believe that a number of promising friendships have been nipped in the bud after I revealed my profession. There was an uncomfortable silence at the table. I fiddled with my silverware and cleared my throat. “Uh, well, I uh…that is, we don’t do junk mail…you see, we do only very creative ads and mail them to a very narrow target audience…”
He wasn’t having any of it. He interrupted me. “I got this thing in the mail the other day…came in a brown manila envelope…had a return address that made it look like it was from the government or something. I thought I was being audited by the IRS. I just about had a heart attack. Turned out to be an ad for a record club.” He shook his head sadly, clearly disgusted.
I could tell just thinking about it was upsetting him, and I have to agree, those kinds of tricks make me mad, too. That’s why, in all my years in direct advertising, I’ve never used a single one. But I understand why some direct advertisers do. There’s a lot of money to be made selling through the mail.
What’s the old saying? You have to kiss a lot of frogs to find a prince. Well, the same holds true in today’s direct advertising environment: You have to mail to a lot of people to find one who’s interested.
But it shouldn’t be that way.
At my agency, we do everything we can to narrow our lists and make sure we mail only to those who are likely to be interested in what our clients have to offer. We research demographics, ponder psychographics, pore over lists, and develop strategies specifically aimed at sorting out those who probably aren’t good prospects. I don’t want to mail to you if you don’t want me to.
But try telling that to someone who’s just gotten a pile of unwanted junk mail. While it’s not as intrusive as telemarketing, it’s still an irritation, and people have a right to be angry. I just wish they wouldn’t take it out on me.
That’s why I’m all for a government-enforced No Junk Mail list. People everywhere could enter their names into a database to indicate the kinds of ads they do—and don’t—want to get, or they could opt out of direct mail advertising all together.
The benefits to the public are obvious: no more irritating junk mail. People would receive ads only for the kinds of things they are interested in (or, in the case of those who opt out completely, no mail ads at all). Plus, there’d be less paper going into our landfills.
The benefits to direct advertisers would be subtler, but real nonetheless. We could do a better job by targeting our ads to an even more select audience. Because we’d be mailing to fewer people, we could invest more in each ad and give people better offers for responding. The cost of acquiring each customer would go down, and our clients could price their products and services more competitively.
Most telemarketers continue to fight the Do Not Call list because they see it as the death knell for their industry—and they might be right. But I believe a similar approach to direct mail advertising would have the reverse effect. It wouldn’t kill my industry, it would make it healthier. So if Congress enacted a No Junk Mail list, I’d not only support it, I’d sign up for it.
In the end, life would be a lot easier for all of us. Best of all, just maybe the next time I went to a wedding reception, I wouldn’t get the old fisheye when I told my dinner companion what I do for a living.
That, to me, would be the happiest benefit of all.
Darby Roach is the principal of Seattle-based Orbit Direct Creative Marketing.