Introduction:

Although the United States Postal Service (USPS) has been carrying mail for more than 200 years, the digital era has presented new opportunities and problems. USPS has responded by introducing Informed Delivery, a service that offers clients digital previews of their physical mail. Since its debut in 2017, informed delivery has grown in popularity. We will discuss informed delivery in this post, including what it is, how it functions, and how you can use it to maximize the return on your direct mail investment.

Those who use USPS’s free Informed Delivery service can view the daily mail that will be delivered to their mailbox. Each morning, customers get an email notification that contains a grayscale picture of the outside of every letter-size mailpiece.

Customers can easily examine their mail and manage their deliveries by seeing these photographs on a computer or mobile device. Informed Delivery additionally gives users access to some package tracking data and notifications for specific delivery in addition to the photographs.

1. Benefits of Informed Delivery for Direct Mail Campaigns:

Direct mail initiatives can benefit from informed delivery in a number of ways. Informed Delivery raises the possibility that customers will notice and interact with the mailpiece by offering a digital preview of it. Higher response rates and enhanced brand exposure may result from this increased involvement.

Informed Delivery not only raises engagement and brand awareness, but it may also give you useful information about how your customers behave. You can determine which mailpieces are engaging with your readers and which ones are not by monitoring open and click-through rates.

You may use this information to fine-tune your messaging and targeting to increase the success of your direct mail efforts.

Also, Informed Delivery can assist you in lowering the expense of returned mail. Customers can be sure they are available to receive mail by informing them when it arrives, which lowers the possibility of missed delivery or returned items.

2. Getting Started With Informed Delivery for your Direct Mail Campaigns:

It’s simple to get started using Informed Delivery for your direct mail marketing . To begin, you must register on the USPS Informed Delivery website. The process of establishing your identity and connecting your account to your physical mailing address can then be started.

You can start using Informed Delivery to preview and track your mailpieces after your account has been created and authenticated.

The USPS Business Customer Gateway must be used to develop a digital campaign in order to sign up for Informed Delivery for your mailpieces. Giving details about your mailpiece, such as its size, weight, and sending date, will be required.

To be shown in the Informed Delivery preview, your mailpiece must also be uploaded as a digital image. Once your campaign is set up, USPS will email you a confirmation, and you can use the Informed Delivery dashboard to follow the development of your mailpiece.

It’s vital to remember that Informed Delivery is not affected everywhere, so before establishing a campaign, make sure to confirm availability there. It’s also advised to give your mail items enough lead time to be processed by the Postal system before they are scheduled to be delivered.

3. Utilizing Informed Delivery Interactive Campaigns to Enhance Engagement:

The potential of Informed Delivery to facilitate interactive campaigns is one of its most potent characteristics. By offering your clients material beyond the actual mailpiece, you can leverage these campaigns to customize and engage their experiences.

You could, for instance, provide links that clients may use to access landing pages, movies, or surveys right from the Informed Delivery preview.

You must design and distribute your material in conjunction with a third-party source who has been given USPS approval in order to build an interactive campaign. This can entail producing unique surveys that are integrated with your informed Delivery campaign, landing page designs, or video content. You can give clients a more dynamic and immersive experience that increases engagement and response rates by utilizing this content.

Considering your target demographic is crucial when creating an interactive campaign. You should create content for them that is both engaging and related to your overall marketing objectives.

4. Measuring the Success of Informed Delivery Campaigns:

To maximize ROI and improve the efficacy of Informed Delivery efforts, success metrics must be tracked. Using USPS tracking data, which offers insightful information on how recipients are interacting with your mailpieces, is one of the main ways to monitor success. This information may include open and click-through rates, shipping progress, and even client comments.

You can monitor additional indicators, such as website traffic and conversion rates, in addition to USPS tracking information of your informed delivery initiatives. You may pinpoint areas for improvement and hone your targeting and message to produce better outcomes by studying this data and comparing it to your baseline numbers.

For your Informed Delivery initiatives, it’s crucial  to establish clear objectives and standards, and to monitor campaign effectiveness over time in relation to these benchmarks.

Campaigns for Informed Delivery necessitate a thorough and data-driven strategy. You may get a better picture of how your campaigns are doing and take actions to enhance them for optimum impact by utilizing USPS tracking data and other metrics.

5. Best practices for Informed Delivery Campaigns:

There are a number of best practices that can help guarantee success when creating and carrying out Informed Delivery campaigns. It’s crucial to first define your target group accurately and then cater your messaging and content to their unique demands and preferences.

This can entail gathering market data, segmenting your audience, and creating tailored marketing using customer information.

Using interactive content and personalized experiences to engage clients and increase response rates is another crucial best practice. Your Informed Delivery previews can be made more dynamic and immersive for customers, enticing them to take action, by incorporating links to landing pages, videos, and other material.

Conclusion:

Informed Delivery by USPS is a strong tool that businesses may use to increase the efficiency of their direct mail initiatives. Customer’s engagement, brand recognition, and response rates can all be raised via Informed Delivery by offering them digital previews of mailpieces. Businesses may give clients individualized, immersive experiences through interactive campaigns that increase engagement even more.

Businesses may anticipate seeing ever more sophisticated features and capabilities as this technology develops, enabling deeper degrees of customization and engagement. Businesses can increase the effectiveness of their direct mail initiatives and achieve greater outcomes by keeping abreast of these advancements and utilizing best practices for Informed Delivery campaigns. Any company wishing to improve their marketing strategy should take advantage of Informed Delivery’s ability to combine traditional and modern marketing channels.