EDDM marketing: The ultimate guide

Are you looking for an engaging and cost-effective way to reach local audiences? Every Door Direct Mail (EDDM) might be the answer. In this guide, we’ll explore what EDDM marketing is, how to implement EDDM in your marketing strategy, how to measure its performance, best practices for optimization, and the benefits it can bring to your business. Let’s dive in and discover the power of EDDM marketing!

What is EDDM marketing?

EDDM is a marketing strategy that allows advertisers to send direct mail to specific neighborhoods. Unlike traditional direct mail marketing, EDDM eliminates the need for expensive mailing lists and postage permits.

EDDM providers like Oppizi partner with the United States Postal Service, allowing businesses to choose specific postal routes and target customers based on demographics, household sizes, and other factors. This targeted approach ensures that your direct mail pieces reach the right people, resulting in higher engagement rates.

EDDM is an attractive option for both small and large businesses whose aim is to reach local communities. By utilizing EDDM, businesses can effectively tap into specific customer demographics without the hassle of compiling mailing lists.

How to implement EDDM with Oppizi Ads

Now that you understand the basics of EDDM marketing, let’s explore how you can implement this powerful strategy in your own marketing efforts.

Set your campaign goal

Before launching your campaign, it’s important to start by defining SMART campaign objectives - whether it's boosting sales, brand awareness, or customer retention. Clear goals will help you better focus your efforts and measure the success of your campaign.

Select target audience and postal routes

Selecting the right audience for your EDDM campaign is easier than ever with the Oppizi Ads EDDM tool. Simply enter the target address to access an intuitive postal route selector with appended demographics for each route. This feature helps streamline your selection process and ensures you target the most relevant audience.

Oppizi plans to introduce a demographic selector to refine this process further. Use the tool to filter postal routes based on demographics, household sizes, and customer types, optimizing your campaign’s impact. Evaluate population density, age range, and income levels to choose the best routes, significantly boosting brand awareness and return on investment.

Create attractive designs for postcards

Designing eye-catching mailers is simple with our intuitive Oppizi Ads tool. Whether creating a new design or uploading an existing template, the platform makes the process seamless.

Follow these tips to enhance your mailers:

• Use bold colors to stand out.
• Choose easy-to-read fonts.
• Incorporate high-quality images aligned with your brand.
• Keep the design clean and uncluttered.
• Test different postcard sizes to find what resonates best.

Partnering with a professional designer can further elevate your mailers, increasing engagement and boosting business results.

Include a discount or coupon code

Adding an enticing offer in your EDDM mailers is a great way to motivate recipients to take action. To create compelling offers:

• Tailor offers to your audience’s needs and preferences.
• Use time-limited deals to create urgency.
• Clearly highlight the benefits of your offer.
• Include coupons, discounts, or freebies for added value.an redeem at your business.

Include testimonials to build trust

Building trust is crucial in any marketing campaign, and EDDM marketing is no exception. By including testimonials and certifications in your mailers, you can establish credibility and encourage recipients to trust your business. Here's how to effectively incorporate testimonials and certifications:

• Feature positive testimonials from satisfied customers.
• Showcase certifications or awards to highlight your expertise.
• Strategically place testimonials throughout your mailers to reinforce your brand’s reliability.

Building trust through testimonials can boost the effectiveness of your EDDM campaign and drive customer response.

Select a tracking option

Enhance your campaign's impact by adding interactive elements like a QR code, which not only engages recipients but also offers a direct link to your online content. You can also incorporate a coupon code into your design, providing a tangible incentive for customers and a valuable tool for tracking the effectiveness of your campaign.

These features, combined with the simplicity of our design tool, empower you to create compelling, trackable, and highly effective direct mail pieces for your EDDM campaigns.

Follow USPS postage guidelines

Adhering to USPS guidelines is essential to ensure your EDDM mailers are delivered without issues. Here’s what to keep in mind:

• Ensure your mail pieces meet USPS size requirements to avoid rejection.
• Use the correct USPS indicia to indicate prepaid postage for accurate delivery.
• Include properly formatted address blocks to guarantee correct delivery.
• Familiarize yourself with all USPS regulations related to EDDM to prevent delays and wasted resources.

By following these guidelines, your mailers will be delivered efficiently and convey your marketing message to the right audience.

Use the required address block and indicia

To ensure the successful delivery of your EDDM mailers, certain inclusions are required by the USPS. Here's what you need to include:

The address block, which should adhere to specific USPS standards, must be included on your mailers. This ensures accurate mail delivery, enabling customers to reach out to your business easily. Although the address block is mandatory, an actual address is not necessary to be included.

The EDDM indicia, also known as the permit imprint, is required on your mailers to mark them as prepaid postage for efficient handling by the USPS. It is the printer's responsibility to include their own indicia with a permit number. Make sure that your indicia meets all USPS requirements, as any deviations could lead to mailer rejection.

By including the required address block and indicia, you can facilitate smooth mail delivery and maximize the reach and impact of your EDDM campaign.

Determining your mail drop-off date

Determining the mail drop-off date is crucial to guarantee that your mailers reach the intended recipients on time. When using Oppizi Ads, you have the option to choose the campaign launch date, bearing in mind that the actual delivery will take place within 3-5 business days from the launch date. It’s important to consider that holidays or weekends could impact the mail delivery schedule.

Printing, bundling and delivery of EDDM mail pieces

With Oppizi Ads you don't need to deal with the hassle of searching for the right printers or logistics related to bundling and delivery of mail pieces to USPS. With connections to printers throughout the United States, Oppizi takes care of selecting printers that follow USPS print and postal guidelines.

This ensures that your advertisement is printed, bundled and delivered to indicated USPS Destination Delivery Unit (DDU) or Business Mail Entry Unit (BMUE), so you can focus on your core operations while Oppizi handles your advertising needs.

Oppizi takes care of the following:

• Produce physical materials that adhere to EDDM specifications, including format, tracking elements, address, and all USPS required elements.
• Bundle and package mailpieces according to USPS requirements for EDDM, ensuring proper packaging and bundling in groups of 100s or as per USPS requirements.
• Deliver the advertising material to the specified USPS Destination Delivery Unit (DDU) or Business Mail Entry Unit (BMUE).

Working with multiple printers, Oppizi offers competitive EDDM pricing and turnaround times for its clients and this is already included in the total cost of the campaign.

Launch your campaign

Once the mail piece drop-off date is confirmed, your campaign is ready to launch. Mailers typically reach homes within 3-5 business days.

Measuring EDDM marketing performance

Oppizi makes it easy to track your campaign performance by providing real-time insights that allow you to monitor and optimize your campaign.

Our user-friendly dashboard is particularly useful for fine-tuning future campaigns and maximizing the return on your Direct Mail investment.

Tracking your EDDM campaign

Monitoring the effectiveness of your EDDM campaign is crucial for achieving your marketing goals. By tracking results, you can identify areas for improvement and make necessary adjustments during the campaign. Monitoring campaign progress allows you to optimize the effectiveness of your direct mail campaign.

Oppizi offers seamless integrations with Shopify and Swell. With these integrations, you can easily track and improve your marketing efforts to enhance your business's overall performance. Its user-friendly interface makes it easy for businesses of all sizes to benefit from its powerful features and drive growth in their e-commerce operations.

With Oppizi, you can track 14 key performance indicators (KPIs) such as total postcards delivered, scans, promo code usage, conversions, and revenue. This data can be analyzed to identify trends and insights that can help improve the effectiveness of your marketing efforts. By using Oppizi's advanced analytics capabilities, you can stay ahead of the competition and achieve better ROI on your marketing spend.

KPIs for your EDDM campaign

KPIs, such as response rate, conversions, and ROI, offer actionable insights for optimizing your direct mail campaign. Oppizi dashboard provides comprehensive data on these KPIs that enable you to track and analyze your EDDM campaigns' performance accurately.

Some of of these KPIs include:

• Total mail pieces sent
• Unique scans
• Unique scan rate
• Hard cost
• Cost per unique scan
• Average time to scan
• Total revenue
• ROI
• Conversion rate

You can use this information to identify areas where you need to make changes or improvements in your strategy. For instance, if response rates are low, you may need to review your targeting criteria or adjust the offer to make it more appealing to recipients. Identifying and analyzing these indicators can help in making strategic adjustments and improvements to your EDDM marketing strategy.

EDDM marketing best practices

• Incorporating eye-catching visuals in the mailers can effectively attract recipients' attention.
• Targeting specific carrier routes ensures reaching the desired demographics, optimizing the direct mail campaign.
• Maintaining consistent branding across mailers contributes to better brand recognition.
• Clear calls-to-action included in the mailers can significantly drive recipient response, making it a valuable addition to EDDM best practices.

How can you make the most of your EDDM campaign?

To maximize your EDDM campaign, start by defining your target audience and creating a mailing list based on demographics. Design an eye-catching postcard that resonates with your audience. Choose the right size and quantity of postcards to fit your budget and goals. Track campaign success using metrics like response rate, leads generated, and ROI.

Benefits of EDDM marketing

Here are some of the key benefits of EDDM marketing explained:

1. Targeted advertising: Reach specific neighborhoods or zip codes without needing a mailing list.
2. No mailing list required: Send unaddressed bulk mail directly to every door without purchasing customer data.
3. Easy setup: Quick campaign setup without complex planning or route selection.
4. Cost-effective: Affordable for small businesses, with postcards costing cents per piece.
5. Customer acquisition & retention: Attract new customers and strengthen local community connections.

Is EDDM worth it?

When evaluating whether Every Door Direct Mail (EDDM) is the right choice for your marketing strategy, it’s essential to consider your business goals and the audience you aim to reach. EDDM can be a highly effective and affordable way to connect with a large local audience, especially if you want to blanket a specific geographic area with your message.

However, while EDDM shines in reaching broad, location-based audiences, it may not be the ideal choice for businesses looking to target a specific niche or demographic that doesn’t align with the broad reach EDDM provides. In such cases, more tailored marketing strategies might yield better results.

Final thoughts

EDDM marketing can be a highly effective strategy for businesses looking to reach a targeted local audience without the need for a mailing list. By following the steps outlined in this guide, you can create and implement a successful EDDM campaign that drives customer acquisition and retention.

From setting campaign goals to designing eye-catching mailers and measuring performance, every aspect of your EDDM strategy should be carefully considered and optimized for maximum impact. With its cost-effective nature and ability to provide targeted advertising opportunities, EDDM marketing is definitely worth exploring for businesses of all sizes.

Looking to increase brand visibility? Launch an Oppizi campaign in minutes and connect with your audience offline!