Editorial Articles

Despite the onset of autumn, green shoots are very much in evidence in the marketing industry according to the latest report by ourselves and the Marketing Society - Royal Mail Index July-December 2010

Encouragingly, a third of the UK’s top marketing directors we polled predicted that they expect their marketing budgets to grow over the next six months, with less than 13 per cent believing they would be cut. The remainder, 54 per cent, stated their budgets will remain the same.

When compared with the same research we carried out last year these figures compare very favourably. In 2009 only about a quarter (26 per cent) expected an increase in their budgets, while 25 per cent anticipated a drop over the latter half of 2009.

What is particularly interesting from the research is that acquisition is marketing directors’ number one priority, with 43 per cent of those surveyed saying this would be the main focus – a significant rise on the 28 per cent who said this was the case last year. Meanwhile, nineteen per cent said they were focusing on retaining customers – a figure that remains the same for both years. The third biggest priority, for 15 per cent of respondents, was brand building.

These tactical objectives would suggest marketers want tangible results from their spend, which plays well to the strengths of media channels such as direct mail. And with a trend towards on and offline marketing channels that can deliver highly personalised, targeted communications that drive customer acquisition it’s perhaps not surprising that direct mail, social media and advocacy marketing are proving popular.

Indeed, marketing directors indicate they plan to use a wide variety of marketing channels to contact consumers over the next six months. In terms of the channels which will be important for their business (directors could select up to three) SEO/natural search leads the way on 45 per cent, closely followed by social media on 42 per cent. Other digital channels saw email on 28 per cent and paid search 13 per cent.

Outside of the digital sphere 37 per cent of marketing directors said advocacy/word of mouth was most important for their business, 33 per cent press, 27 per cent direct mail and 23 per cent TV.

It’s great to see marketers are recognising that in the vast majority of cases multichannel campaigns are much better at maximising ROI when compared to single-media campaigns.

With multichannel it’s possible to effectively use the strength of the different media routes to deliver strong campaigns that meet your prescribed objectives. While email or mobile may be an effective way to communicate a short, concise message, when there is more detailed information to be conveyed, a medium such as direct mail is more appropriate. In fact, our own figures in a report collated from nearly 200 UK campaigns across the globe reveals digital campaigns see a 62 per cent increase in return on investment when combined with direct mail.

So whilst the research reveals that digital remains in vogue, it’s also interesting to see the strong popularity of a wide variety of on and offline media that can deliver highly personalised campaigns that maximise ROI as marketers strive to achieve their tactical objectives of customer acquisition and retention.

Mark Thomson
Media Director, Royal Mail