Mailing Tips

Answering Common Questions About Mail

Mail it First Class or Marketing Mail?

First Class costs more, in many cases about twice as much as Marketing Mail (formerly known as Standard). While First Class mail delivers faster, there are some things you can do with Marketing Mail to rival the delivery time of First Class and still save on postage costs. But be aware that the USPS does not allow certain types of mail to mail First Class - see https://pe.usps.com/StandardMailEligibility/Index for help in determining if a piece is eligible to go at Marketing Mail rates.

What determines the success of a mail campaign?

According to the, studies have shown that a campaign's success is follows the 40/40/20 rule - that is, it depends 40% on the list, 40% on the offer, and 20% on the creative aspect of the mailpiece.

List: - The list must be up to date, with good clean addresses, and de-duped to the appropriate level. Most importantly, it must consist of the right audience. Modeling your perfect customer and applying that model to the data you need will produce a list of those most likely to act on your offer. In other words, why waste money on mailing a promo for a lawn service to people living in apartments?

Offer: - What is your offer? What is your call to action? This part of the equation is where your marketing and advertising skills come most into play. Don't waste the cost of a good list on an offer that won't entice your potential customer to act.

Creative: - What is your offer? What is your call to action? This part of the equation is where your marketing and advertising skills come most into play. Don't waste the cost of a good list on an offer that won't entice your potential customer to act.

What are the different kinds of de-duping available to me?

• Exact - (will only delete exact duplicates of first name/last name/address). This would allow roommates, husband and wife, or co-workers at the same address to receive the same mail piece, though could also allow multiple pieces to a household if there are different spellings of the same name.

• Near Name/Nickname - (will delete duplicates of similar first names but same last name/address). In this case, “James Smith” and “Jim Smith” would be considered a duplicate. This will allow duplicates to same address if full names are different.

• Household - (will delete duplicates if last name and address match). In this case, “Jane Doe” and “John Doe” at the same address would be considered a duplicate.

• Basic - (will delete duplicates if address matches). This would allow only one piece per address, regardless of name

How can mail be tracked?

By utilizing IMB (Intelligent Mail Barcodes), we can track your mail as it travels through the USPS system, giving you a heads up so you can staff your call center at the right time, or just to give you piece of mind that your mail has actually arrived at its intended destination.

What is EDDM?

EDDM stands for Every Door Direct Mail, and it’s a fairly new offering by the USPS for mailing piece to very centralized locality at a very good postage rate. EDDM uses a simplified address (meaning no name or street is in the address, only “occupant” or similar language) and not only saves postage, but saves you the cost of purchasing a mail list. It works best for very localized mailers, like a piece announcing the opening of a new local restaurant. MAR Graphics can take care of all the details of doing an EDDM mailer, but you can get more specific information from the USPS at https://eddm.usps.com/eddm/.

Can you mail on my permit?

Under the Mail Anywhere program, we can mail pieces from our plant in Illinois on any permit, regardless of where it is held. This makes it easy on our customers, taking the pain and worry out of moving funds across the country to cover postage. And when combined with our in house BMEU ability and Seamless Acceptance, we can manage your mail programs efficiently and quickly.