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The Winterberry Group have just released a white paper titled 'Vertical Market Trends in Direct Mail 2008'. The report highlights that direct mail spending grew by 5 percent in 2007 and continues to outpace that of both "above-the-line" advertising and virtually all other non-interactive marketing media. But that growth slowed dramatically in 2007 from the previous year, when marketers increased their year-over-year investment in direct mail by over 7 percent.
The report concludes: "With [the postage rate] increase now a distant memory — and with the threat of future such hikes mitigated by postal reform legislation that sets an effective cap on new postage increases — the focus for 2008 will shift to advancing the role of direct mail as a component of the multichannel marketing mix. Expect marketers to continue turning to new applications (including analytical modeling, event triggering, multi-channel coordination and advanced postal optimization initiatives) in order to reinforce their presence in the mailbox and complement other on- and offline marketing approaches."
The white paper further outlines three macro trends and five vertical market trends which should play significant roles in shaping the direction of direct mail use in 2008. The macro trends include heightened political and societal pressure to "go green", potential legislative threats, including "do-not-mail," and logistics and raw material costs which will continue to impact DM budget allocation.
The white paper is available for complimentary download from the Winterberry Group's Web site.
Posted on Monday, 4 February 2008 at 1:34 PM | TrackBack: http://www.veedeepee.com/cgi-bin/mt-tb.cgi/84