DMA Releases 'Direct Marketing Facts and Figures in the Financial Services Industry'

March 17, 2008 — American financial services institutions are increasingly harnessing the power of direct marketing. According to the Direct Marketing Association (DMA), the $13.4 billion that US banks and credit institutions spent last year on direct marketing advertising generated $178.8 billion in sales. In 2012, these sales are forecast to hit $286.2 billion.

Those are just some of the findings from DMA’s new “Direct Marketing Facts and Figures in the Financial Services Industry.” The report was released today during the 32nd Annual DMA Financial Services Conference, which runs through tomorrow at Harbor Beach Marriott Resort & Spa in Fort Lauderdale, FL. The conference provides leading direct marketing strategies for professionals in the insurance, banking, and other financial services industries.

With eight chapters, 127 pages, and more than 160 charts, this easy-to-follow DMA research helps financial services marketing professionals benchmark their performance in a variety of ways. The chapters — Financial Services Overview, Direct Mail, Insert Media, Commercial Email, Internet Marketing, Print Media, Broadcast Media, and Telephone Marketing — illustrate advertising expenditures, direct marketing-driven sales, and direct marketing-driven employment. Those chapter breakdowns further divide into examinations of market and intent of offer.

“Financial services institutions represent a very significant component of America’s economic infrastructure,” said Anna Chernis, DMA’s senior research manager and the report’s author. “In turn, those institutions are relying more and more on multichannel direct marketing to sell services and products to current and prospective customers. DMA wanted to delve more deeply into this trend. What resulted is this new ‘must-have’ report for any financial service professional interested or involved in multichannel direct marketing.”

“In fact, DMA found that the Financial, Banks and Credit Institutions sector in 2007 was the number one American industry spending on direct marketing, and it ranked second in sales,” Chernis said. “In addition, the Financial, Security and Commodity Brokers, Holding Companies sector was the tenth largest spender and sixth in direct marketing-driven sales.”

Key findings of the report include:

· Banks and credit card institutions had the best ROI in this sector in 2007, at $13.37 per dollar spent.

· Financial services direct marketers mainly use non-catalog direct mail (41.8 percent) as their primary direct marketing channel.

· Financial services companies’ advertising expenditures for commercial email is expected to have the largest growth among all media types between 2007 and 2012 with a compound annual growth of 22.5 percent.

· Internet direct marketing advertising spending in this sector is projected to grow at the second highest rate, at 17.8 percent each year from 2007 to 2012.

· Telephone marketing advertising expenditures for the overall financial services sector are expected to reach $7.4 billion in 2008 and $8.4 billion in 2012.

· Broadcast advertising sales are expected to climb 4.8 percent each year from 2007 to 2012.

· Insert media sales in the financial services arena will exceed $1.1 billion in 2008, with banks and credit institutions comprising half of sales.

· Financial services companies are projecting to spend less on print advertising than they currently do. Banks and credit institutions’ ad spending is expected to decrease 0.5 percent by 2012.

Members and non-members can purchase a copy of “Direct Marketing Facts and Figures in the Financial Services Industry” through DMA’s online bookstore by clicking here. The report is $135 for members and $240 for non-members.

About DMA Financial Services Conference

The 32nd Annual DMA Financial Services Conference will take place March 16–18, 2008, at Harbor Beach Marriott Resort & Spa, Fort Lauderdale, FL. The conference will provide leading direct marketing strategies for professionals in the insurance, banking and other financial services industries. For more information or to register, visit www.dmafscannual.org.

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