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Page 16 March 2001
Color Business Report
Technology Adoption
Study Demonstrates High
One-to-one Response Rates
One-to-one marketing can yield three times the
response rate of a conventional direct mail program,
according to an A-B comparison study conducted by the
IIW Institute of Information Management
(Dortmund, Germany). In the experiment, funded by
NexPress, utility business customers were asked to
enter into a one-year contract for both gas and electric
utilities, prior to the liberalization of the gas market.
In the experiment, two of the four pages of the mailing
piece used photos specific to the customers industry
classification. In addition, the customers name was
mentioned in two places, and the pieces were
personalized with account and rate information. The
personalized piece resulted in 104 contracts returned,
a 15.5% order rate for Stradtwerke Dusseldorf AG, the
utility (see chart). Conventional direct marketing pieces
were mailed to 748 customers, and 40 (5.4%) returned
a signed contract. A link to a 26-page summary report,
Added-value Analysis of Four-color Digital Printing, can
be found in the News Release section of the NexPress
web site (www.nexpress.com). The link is part of a news
release dated February 12, 2001, titled, One-to-One
Marketing Study: Personalized Content Boosts Success
Rate Nearly 300 Percent - Feb. 2001.
The personalized piece generated three times the
telephone inquiry rate, as well. Forty-two recipients (6.3%)
of the personalized piece called the company to ask about
the program, compared to only 18 (2.1%) of those receiving
a conventional marketing piece. The set of phone inquiries
generated an additional 38 orders27 from those who
received the personalized mailing, and 11 from those who
received the conventional mailing. On a percentage basis,
the follow-through order rate on telephone inquiries was
nearly equal for both groups.
In addition to providing compelling evidence of the
effects of variable-data printing, the report supplies a
step-by-step structure for tracking the costs and results
of mailing programs. Further, the report provides a set
of tactical considerations for those interested in using
one-to-one marketing techniques.
CRM: The Price to Pay for Getting Higher
Response Rates
The report recommends that variable-data
marketing efforts be undertaken as a tool within a
customer relationship management program (CRM):
The presence of a CRM infrastructure is thus a
prerequisite and a starting point for further decisions,
e.g., relating to the development of marketing
campaigns and the technologies and service providers
to be used for this purpose. By assuming that companies
should practice CRM anyway, the reports authors are
able separate CRM-related costs from the costs of using
communication tactics such as one-to-one marketing.
decisions relating to communication channels, media
and technology are independent of the basic decision to
practice CRM. This also means that the costs associated
with the basic CRM infrastructure should not be
allocated to individual communication channels.
Under the Observed Implementation Problems
section of the report (page 20), the authors note that
CRM is a marketing concept that pervades the entire
company. The IIW Institute of Information
Management recommends that CRM be
institutionalized and that dialogs with customers
populate database records. The cost consequences of
implementing customer relationship management can
be significant. Even if one can rationalize not attributing
the costs directly to ones marketing budgets, the
company must still bear the cost, somehow.
Assuming that customer relationship management
is instituted and those who are involved in customer
Distribution Notes
Announcement
Date Vendor Comments
February 28, 2001 Danka/Canon Danka to market and distribute Canon CLC 5000 color copier/printers.
February 28, 2001 Danka/WorldCrest WorldCrest, a provider of online procurement for goods and services, to offer
Danka’s line of copiers and printers from Canon, Toshiba, and Heidelberg to its
customers.
February 21, 2001 EFI/Pageflex EFI to license Pageflex’s Mpower and Persona variable data software packages.
March 8, 2001 IBM/Exstream IBM to sell Exstream’s Dialogue personalization software with its digital color
Software printers, including the InfoPrint Color 130 Plus.
February 12, 2001 Xerox/Pageflex Xerox to license and resell Pageflex’s Mpower and Persona variable data software
packages through its sales channels.