The January 2010 issue of our ‘Sample of the Month’ direct mail case study features our client American Craft Council and their test of new outer envelope creative for their #10 control package.

American Craft Council worked with ProCirc, their circulation management partner, to execute this test with Ballantine handling the printing and mailing portion of the project. Sage Communications handled the copy & design.

Both #10 packages (control and test) contained the same exact 5 components: 2-page letter with perfed reply card, 2-panel brochure, buckslip and BRE. The offer for both was a 1-year subscription to American Craft magazine for $20.

   CLICK HERE for pictures of the #10 control and test.

Test Summary

American Craft Council’s control package was a #10 package with a plain, double-window outer envelope. One window carried the address block and the other window showed a personalized membership card.

In January of 2009, they tested this against a #10 package with the same exact components, but a completely different outer.

The OE had the address block imaged on the back and only one window on the front. This one window showed the personalized membership card and blended in with the creative. View pictures here.

Test Strategy

The strategy with the test was to add more impact to the outer envelope’s design and, more specifically, to make the OE creative work together with the window placement for greater effect. The design was created so it looks like two hands are giving the membership card to the recipient.

Test Results

The small initial test panel included in the January 2009 campaign had a 64% increase over the control verification panel! American Craft Council rolled out to the new package in their next campaign six months later. With the much larger rollout quantity, it still captured an impressive 36% increase in net response over the previous control. The “two hands” package is now the current control and Ballantine just mailed a 3rd campaign one week ago.

Questions & Comments

If you have any questions or comments, please leave your message below. You can also email Ryan Cote by clicking here.

Welcome back. Have you subscribed to our blog's email updates yet? Remember - you also get the free whitepaper pictured left on cutting direct mail costs.

Quick creative tip…

If you’ve designed a brochure that includes copy changes reversing out of a four-color background (a headline, for example), consider changing that background to a PMS fifth color. By doing this, each version change will only affect one plate instead of all four plates. This will more than offset the increase in cost of changing to a five-color brochure.

For 50 more tips, download our direct marketing white paper.

It is important to give typography as much consideration in solving a design problem as color, imagery and composition. Experience and sensitivity to type design will make the difference between a piece that merely “reads” to one that “communicates”.

Keep a file of brochures, magazine articles, ads, etc that you find appealing. What strikes you about each? Can you identify the typefaces used? Notice the difference between the headlines and body copy.

And the typefaces should be complimentary. This can often be achieved through a mix of serif and sans serif fonts. Attention should also be given to line breaks in headlines and body copy. How does the copy read?

Here are 3 more tips:

1. Avoid more than one hyphen in a row, widows and large gaps in the end of lines.
2. Adjust letter spacing in headlines as many fonts have poorly designated kerning pairs.
3. Letter spacing should look consistent whether the copy is set tightly or spaced out for a wide look.