Every magazine’s sales tool: the “blow-in” card.
The beauty of direct mail is that you can test to find out what works.
So that is why Victoria’s Secret and Golf Magazine enjoy your attention today.
“Pretty” is nice, but in direct mail it’s the offer that counts.
Opening the December issue of Golf Magazine, 4 different blow-in cards fluttered onto the kitchen table.
Why 4? Because there are a number of triggers to test on the reader.
This card focuses on the discount off regular price.
The FREE gift is the sales incentive here.
Buy one, get one free for a friend, plus a FREE gift.
As it turns out three of the cards have identical offers, but each with a different deal. Or look. One will feature the discount off the cover price. Two will bathe the reader in yellow ink, but one of those is really pushing the FREE gift–a really cool Golf Distance Finder, with “BEST DEAL!” screaming to check the top box. The fourth card is a gift sub card, making a two-for-one deal, plus a very classy Free Gear Bag.
Each card is key-coded to track which works best. Kudos to the subscription manager who recognizes that one deal does not suit all people.
Based on response, you can bet they will tweak the next set of cards, but odds are, they won’t reduce the count: four.
Now turn to Victoria’s Secret, where we get two mailers within the same week, each taking pre-eminent positioning at the kitchen table during lunch.
The mission of these cards is to drive traffic. At least one will snag the reader.
May I note that the “staff” over at Victoria’s don’t probably enjoy lunch?
Fortunately, they do get full, heated-room privileges, which accounts for their restive, but somewhat hungered composure.
The two mailings are spectacular for their origami and construction. Best of all, each mailer contains 4 different mini-cards with specific deals.
Each card’s mission is to entice the shopper to get to the store.
If the Free panty doesn’t do it, the Free Tote Bag will.
The advantage of personal direct mail– the ability to track and analyze.
The production on these pieces is clever. One is a 10-page booklet, with 4 mini-cards attached to one page. The back of each card has a live bar code on it. Meaning they can track response to the mailing, the offer, and yup, to the shopper too. Yikes!
Four cards in a 10-page mailing: unstoppable!
The cards themselves are 24 mil, meaning for you lay folks, thick enough to jimmy a hotel lock.
But they are small, demanding less space in your wallet or purse.
I recall as a small youngster having a wad of direct mail coupons which I pretended were dollar bills….kept them in my plastic wallet. I liked flashing “money” when shopping with my mother. I don’t think she would have gone for the Victoria’s cards so much.
Testing through direct mail offers the luxury of control: distribution, offer, targeting and tracking. When done well, marketers can get the most for their dollar spent. That means they learn to send you things you like, and don’t send you things that turn you off.
Sharing testing strategies across different media, like mail and magazines is also productive, and enhances perspective.
“Gee Dad, it looks better over here!”
So I wonder, could we test the FREE Golf Distance Finder with Victoria’s Secret?
Thanks for reading this far! I hope your mail box provides as much enjoyment as does mine!
Phil Brown 
Hey Phil, enjoyed your overview on a strategy that emulates focus group mechanics. You get to look at multiple offers and creative etc. at the same time and come out with the “best”. My experience with focus group direction has not always been reliable. DM uses single variable test cells to determine the best offer and creative. If we could figure out how to execute the strategy in a DM environment without having to mail multiple individual tests we could save a lot of money. The multi variable test strategy had some legs some years ago but did not get wide spread utilization…I think because it may not have proven valid over a period of time, not sure about that though. Regards, Allan.
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I think the technique here is the basic testing between four offers, as in the VS mailing, and two offers with 4 formats for Golf. Focus groups are great for surfacing potential offers, but they don’t make any quantitative case for using one version over another. But I gotta tell ya, I think the VS focus groups could be entertaining.
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