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The Data Experience: Part 3 – Automated List Selection

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In the 10+ years I have been in the list business, working for clients of all shapes and sizes, products and services ranging from pizza pies to enterprise level software solutions, the same question always comes up during the initial conversation:

“How do I find the right list?”

As for the answer, it’s always the same:

“Look at your current customers, find out what they look like and find more that look just like them.”

In part three of a multi-part series written exclusively for “MP News” readers, Modern Postcard’s List Sales & Data Solutions Manager, Dan Anglin, will take you through the Modern Analytics Program. The program puts powerful predictive modeling tools at work to analyze your current customer list, describe what they look like, and develop mailing lists that are designed to look just like your best customers.

Modern Analytics
Taking the Guess Work Out of Renting a List

Successfully marketing to prospects can be a daunting task. Unlike your current customers who might respond to mailers with nothing more than a basic offer – your prospects need to be informed, wooed, coaxed and reminded.

The traditional 40/40/20 rule of direct marketing still applies in today’s marketplace. Accordingly, 40% of the campaign relies on the right list, another 40% is attributed to the offer and the final 20% focuses on the creative. If you miss the boat on the first step and mail to the wrong mailboxes, unfortunately you’re setting yourself up for failure.

The Modern Analytics Program was designed to take the guesswork out of consumer demographic and geographic selection by using powerful analytic tools to predict who your next customers should be. In a nutshell, here’s what the program does:

  • Analyze your existing customer list to find common demographic and geographic attributes
  • Provide you with a snapshot that will show you precisely what your best customers look like
  • Build a Prospect Model using predominant characteristics within your current customer list
  • Suppress your customer database, so you’re ONLY evaluating new opportunities
  • Generate “Pure Prospect” counts of consumers who are most likely to do business with you

Modern Postcard’s Analytics Program examines thousands of patterns, which produces a highly targeted list that enables you to mail the right offer to the right prospect. By taking the guesswork out of the list rental process, where you buy data based on who you might perceive (or want) your target audience to be, guess what happens? Higher response rates, increased order averages and a compelling ROI.

At this point, you’re probably waiting for the other shoe to drop – for us to reveal a big fat price tag. Well, here it goes. Modern’s Analytics Program provides the profiles and models for FREE. You simply pay for the names. Single Use test pricing is set at 8 cents a record with a 5,000 name minimum order. That’s only $400 for a custom-modeled list.

So what’s the standard price for analytics? Typically, it’s in the $2,500 range, just to run a Profile Report or build a Model, with prices often being much higher. You then have to go and pay list rental fees on top of that, which typically fall in the 15-25 cents per name range.

Why is Modern Postcard so inexpensive? Unlike typical and costly Analytic Bureaus that need a swarm of statisticians to write, develop and run algorithms based on your customer data set – our agency has written the logic and plugged it into a fully automated program. Not only does this drive down costs, but it also shortens our turnaround time, from 4-6 weeks to just 3-5 business days.

Things to keep in mind before exploring this solution further:

  • Currently, this program is designed for Consumer Marketing Only.
  • You must have a customer list to analyze in order for this to work.
  • Your list must include address, city, state and zip code information at a minimum – first and last name data is definitely recommended for a stronger analysis.
  • Your list must be in electronic format. Sorry, we can’t work with data via fax or on index cards!
  • You should have at least 500 or more records in order for the results to be statistically viable.

If you’re in a situation where you have tens, if not hundreds of thousands of customer records to work with, it would be a matter of selecting and providing data for what you would call your “best” clients.

Please also note that Modern takes data security VERY seriously. Every day, we process hundreds of jobs involving client customer lists – with some of them being Fortune 500 type companies. Your customer data will NEVER be resold or shared with any additional party that is not involved with your marketing project. We can even provide and sign a List Security Agreement in order to protect your most valuable asset in writing – your customer list.

Are you ready to take your direct marketing to the next level, find new prospects and start reaching new heights? Here are three easy ways to get started:

Call: 800.959.8365
Email: listservices@modernpostcard.com
Visit: Modern Analytics Program

Read Past Articles:
The Data Experience, Part 1: List Companies Defined
The Data Experience, Part 2: List Types Defined

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*As a blatant plug, Modern’s List & Data Solutions Team has full service List Brokerage capabilities. Providing you access to nearly any commercially available mailing list on the planet, our relationships with every major data provider gives you a consolidated resource for your direct mail initiatives. If you are looking to grow your business with direct mail, our dedicated team has over 80 YEARS of combined direct mail advertising experience. Modern Postcard also offers list rental on a stand-alone basis, so if you just need data and nothing else, we have products and solutions available to support your requests.

Give us the opportunity to leverage our experience on behalf of your next acquisition campaign, and I assure you that you won’t be disappointed!

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