Direct marketing is a form of advertising.

Direct marketing involves promoting your product or service directly to buyers. You can deliver your message of purchase through traditional methods like email marketing, direct mailing and telemarketing as well as newer ones such as social media and text messages.

The marketing message you send will reach groups of people who will likely buy your product. You may want to target consumers that have purchased from you in the past or expressed an interest.

Direct marketing is different from Inbound Marketing , which creates content that customers discover themselves.

Direct marketing is still a very effective and traditional method. Direct mail includes physical marketing material such as flyers, catalogues, newsletters, sales letters, coupons and postcards.

Email marketing is an effective digital marketing tool that’s been used for years. It is a highly effective method, but it’s also very competitive. Success often depends on the ability to create a compelling message.

A newer form of direct marketing is Short Message Service (SMS). Marketing can deliver promotional short messages by text, while Multimedia Messaging Service (MMS marketing) can send longer messages that include images, videos, and links.

You can target your ads on Facebook, YouTube and Instagram to existing customers as well as your followers.

Another direct marketing method is to sell products or services by contacting past or potential clients. In outbound telemarketing, company representatives or call centers contact customers.

Direct marketing methods can also include in-person sales because they deliver a message to the consumer directly through door-todoor selling, events promotions and face-toface interaction.

Mass marketing is similar to direct advertising in that it uses messaging to encourage customers to purchase, but instead of a specific group of people to receive the message, the mass marketer delivers the message to everyone. Mass marketing is commonly done through TV ads, radio advertisements, print ads and billboards.

Although you may be able to influence the audience of your advertising message in mass marketing campaigns by choosing certain publications, time slots and ad placements, it is not delivered directly to the individual, like in direct marketing.

Direct marketing has many advantages.

• Targeted marketing: You can use data that you have collected about your customers or potential clients — such as demographics and purchasing habits — in order to target only those consumers most likely to purchase your product.

• You can use personalized messages: Since you know the details of your audience, it is possible to personalize promotional content by including first names, location and past purchases.

• You can easily track your results: Since you are sending your message to a particular group, you will be able to monitor the responses for each campaign to see which method is the most effective.

• Direct marketing campaigns are more effective than inbound marketing or mass marketing because they allow your company to interact directly with customers.

• Affordable: You can include email, text message and social media advertising campaigns in your marketing strategy at relatively low costs, particularly since you are able to control how many messages go out.

• Automatisable: Marketing software allows businesses to automate the majority of processes required to run email, SMS, direct mail, and social media campaigns. This saves time for your company and helps you to better track results.

Direct marketing has many disadvantages.

• It can be considered as intrusive. Unsolicited direct marketing can also be seen as intrusive. This can result in unsubscribes and a negative perception of the brand.

• High-level competition: Today’s consumers are bombarded with emails, text messages, and digital advertisements.

• Response rates can be variable: Since you are reaching out to consumers instead of expecting them to come to your store with an intention to buy, some recipients will not even read the message. A good email response rate is 10%, while a direct mail or door-to-door marketing campaign has a rate of 2%. Digital ads have a lower than 1%.

• Legal requirements are included: The customer has the right to stop receiving marketing messages from you if they don’t like it. This is why there should be a clearly marked unsubscribe link on emails.

These tips will help you get the best out of your direct-marketing efforts.

The marketing budget you have will determine the types of campaigns and methods that are used. A small business may choose to concentrate on emailing existing clients if it has a low marketing budget. A business with more money might include direct mail to customers and social media advertising in their strategy.

You can send them messages by dividing your list of contacts into groups that share similar characteristics or demographics. Your database may include additional fields that allow you to separate leads from existing customers. Segmentation tools in customer relationship management software can help you with this.

You can differentiate yourself from your competitors by customizing a message based on the information you know about them. This will also increase open rates. Use of the consumer’s actual name in an email or text message instead of generic greetings can improve engagement.

Due to the low response rate associated with direct-marketing, you can achieve better results by using other marketing methods. Text, images and call to actions that are similar can make it easier for customers to remember you and your products.