DMA Releases 5th Annual 'Response Rate Trends Report'

October 13, 2007 — For nearly 30 years, direct marketers have been asking the Direct Marketing Association (DMA), “What’s the typical response rate for a direct marketing campaign in my profession and product category, and what channels will yield the best response?” Five years ago, DMA put all the answers in one book. Today, DMA’s 2007 Response Rate Trends Report is bigger and better than ever.

The report includes:

· Four years of data — with more refined calculations, and more precise results — to help multichannel direct marketers benchmark their campaigns.

· Details four direct marketing objectives that are isolated and reported on separately: direct order, lead generation, traffic building, and fundraising.

· Breaks out direct marketing channels and types of lists used (house file vs. prospect), as well as the industry being advertised.

“We’re especially proud of this report, because it directly and immediately answers members’ top marketing campaign questions,” said Anna Chernis, DMA’s senior research manager. “This new report provides a dependable and robust response rate benchmark for a wide range of industries and campaign types. In fact, in its relatively short life span, this DMA report has become a ‘must-purchase’ reference resource for many marketing companies.”

“For the 2007 report, we opted to provide revenue/sales and promotion cost on the somewhat more widely used per thousand (/M) rather than per contact basis,” Chernis continued. “Also for the first time, this report shows promotion costs as a percent of revenue/sales — a useful performance benchmark.”

Among the findings of this year's report:

· Direct Order and Fundraising: Direct marketers with a primary goal of soliciting direct-order sales or motivating customers to make a contribution achieved the highest response rates: Catalog (2.24 percent), and direct mail (2.15 percent).

· Lead Generation: Email (4.09 percent) produced the highest absolute response rates for those whose primary objective was to generate leads.

· Traffic Building: Direct mail (5.35 percent) is the premier medium used for traffic building.

DMA’s 2007 Response Rate Trends Report includes data for more than 1,600 campaigns received since 2004. Six media channels are explored, which may have been used solo or in combination, to achieve specific campaign objectives: direct mail (flat), catalog, email, inserts, outbound telephone, and newspaper/magazine.

In addition, the study provides information for 19 major professional categories, consistent with the North American Industry Classification System (NAICS), as well as a selection of 30 specific products and services.

DMA’s 2007 Response Rate Trends Report — priced at $245 for DMA members and $445 for non-members — can now be ordered through DMA’s Bookstore at www.the-dma.org/bookstore.

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