Reaching an elusive audience with direct marketing

For most businesses, direct marketing only makes up a single part of their overall advertising strategy.

Why Choose Direct Marketing?

It’s important in today’s diverse media environment to cast as wide a net as possible in order to draw the most number of potential customers to your service and product.

However, that doesn’t mean you should be indiscriminate with your marketing approach. Sending the same basic materials out in a half-dozen different ways (door drop leaflets, direct email, social media post, Instagram video, and so on) is unlikely to improve your engagement. You need to figure out who your other advertising strands are failing to reach and tailor your direct marketing strategy to them.

Over 60s

While it may be a cliché that the over-sixties are technically illiterate and wouldn’t be seen dead on social media, it’s certainly true that they are less likely to be influenced by online advertisements. For some, it’s a matter of caution, given all the horror stories they’ve heard about online fraudsters. For others, they use their Facebook pages and Twitter accounts purely as a way to keep in touch with family and friends and choose to ignore the various marketing posts. Many more simply don’t spend as much (or any) time online compared with the younger generations. If your product or service is targeted at pensioners, direct marketing is likely to give you a better return.

18-25 Year Olds

Okay, we know what you’re thinking—people ages 18–25 definitely don’t have a problem engaging with marketing online. While this is certainly true, there is one area of online advertising that has seen this particular demographic almost fall out of sight: Facebook. While 18- to 25-year-olds spend hours at a time on social media, placing ads in their Facebook feeds simply isn’t garnering hits. This isn’t due to a lack of interest on their part, but a lack of authority on yours. When browsing online, customers from this age group are more likely to be swayed by influencers that they trust rather than a static ad campaign. Even if those influencers are part of that campaign, 18- to 25-year-olds will engage more with TikTok, Youtube, and Instagram personalities than they will with a post in their Facebook feed. The good news is that your direct marketing literature is viewed in the same light as an influencer’s post. It is being delivered directly to them, so it carries a certain authoritative weight. Target the content at them, too, and you’re onto a winning strategy.

Females Over 25

Again, we’re not trying to say women aren’t influenced by online advertising, but rather a specific sub-sector of it. In this case, YouTube. Over a third of YouTube visitors are aged between 18 and 24, making them the largest demographic. Of those over 25, more than 65% are men, which is why YouTube ads tend to be male-centric. This gives you a large customer base to target with direct marketing material.

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