Automate Print & Mail: Variable Data Printing Services

How to Use Variable Data Printing to Improve Marketing Campaigns?

Did you ever open your door and see a flyer on the knob? If yes, how much time did you spend with it before dismissing or throwing it away? We are sure not much! And the reason is that one significant aspect is absent in traditional printing—the ability to keep the reader hooked!

Direct mail marketing strategies are always highly-successful if you implement them rightly. And one crucial element you need to consider is variable data printing.

It is a digital printing method to help you personalise your marketing items to better resonate with your audience.

In this blog, let us discuss variable data printing in more depth and learn how it can benefit your marketing campaigns!

What is Variable Data Printing?

It enables the insertion of variable data into a print run. These variations may apply to individual mail items or specific batches.

You may have already used the mail merge feature to personalise your recipients’ names and addresses. Earlier, personalisation was limited to only adding a few variables, while the visual design was the same for all items.

Luckily, variable data printing services like PostGrid offer more advanced technology to customise your printed materials. You may add as many variables as you want without putting in any effort.

You can grab your audience’s attention using variable colours, images, and texts. It allows you to create unique marketing items that appeal to prospective and existing customers.

Let us consider our earlier example to understand variable data printing better. If the flyer on your doorknob had your name, you would have spent more time with it. Perhaps, you may have saved and shared it with your family and friends. And there would be better chances that you used the coupon to make a purchase.

The same thing happens in a large-scale marketing campaign. Instead of shipping the same marketing postcard or marketing letter to prospects, use variable data printing to send items unique to every individual.

In a study, 90% of marketers stated that personalisation has a measurable positive influence on their promotional efforts. Thus, variable data print solutions help you add value to your campaigns and increase engagement.

There are many benefits of employing variable data printing, like:

Higher returns: The face cost of personalised printing may be expensive but only on a marginal level. It is well worth paying a little extra and guaranteeing your campaign’s success than sending generic mailers and hoping to hear from prospects.
Stand out from the crowd: Using variable data printing, you can send eye-catching mailers that sets you apart from the competition. Whether or not you use personalisation decides if your items would be a part of the ‘save’ or junk mail pile.
Unlimited options: Once you start customising your marketing materials, you get numerous options to experiment with your campaigns, like adding dedicated phone numbers and coupons.

Examples of Variable Data Printing Opportunities

This printing technique opens a new world of marketing opportunities for businesses. They can use variable data printing services for promoting events, making announcements, advertising new products, retaining customers, etc.

Below are some examples you can use for reference:

Printing address labels: Typically, address labels consist of variable data—the delivery addresses of your recipients. Thankfully, variable data printing capabilities can insert a unique address to every mailer for your direct mail marketing campaign. Thus, you don’t need to spend tons of hours preparing labels manually.
QR code printing: QR code marketing is gaining immense popularity because of its responsiveness and high ROI. Using PostGrid’s variable data print solutions, you can print custom QR codes that allow you to track respondents. Similarly, you may add discounts or voucher codes to record your campaign’s performance.
PURLs: Personalised URLs let you track every response to individual customers, and variable data printing helps add them to your mailers. However, as said above, people dislike typing links, so make them short and sweet. For example, www.postgrid.co.uk/anthony-brown/. Using the recipients’ names in your links is the best way to get their attention and persuade them to respond.

Variable Data Printing and Marketing Strategies

Direct mail produces an average response rate of 11.6%. But, you must ensure that you use tailored content to suit the recipient’s needs. You can do much more than adding the person’s first name in the greeting or using a personalised signature to maximise profits and expand your brand publicity.

Here are some ideas on how to incorporate variable data printing into your marketing programs:

You could use customer data regarding the items they viewed on your website. Or you can print related products to induce sales. If the recipient already has the product on their mind, a tailored offer can help you convert them.
Collect data from various sources, like social media, telemarketing, past invoices, CRM, etc., to compile effective variable databases. It enables you to understand customer preferences better and offer them what they need.
Use variable data printing services to send shopping cart abandonment reminders. Sending these personalised reminders may help you convince customers to return to their carts and finish the transaction. Remember to add a link or QR code to redirect them to their online accounts on your website, speeding up the procedure.
Companies can also benefit from variable data printing by adding custom maps to their mailers. These maps help display the nearest store’s address where customers can visit and buy products at a discount.

Employing Variable Data Printing Services for Transactional Tasks

Another advantage of variable data printing is that you can also use it for transactional mailing. Transactional print and mail don’t come under marketing. But, these tasks form an essential part of a company’s operational activities.

Hence, you need it to communicate with customers smoothly and establish trustworthy business relationships.

Transactional mail includes:

Sending onboarding letters to customers
Thanking them for their business
Sending collection letters, invoices, cheques, and bills
Confirming orders or payments
Notifying employees of a policy change
Mailing legal and tax documents, etc.

You require efficient variable data print solutions like PostGrid to prepare such documents without doing anything yourselves.

How Can PostGrid’s Print and Mail Services Help You With Variable Data Printing?

Our print and mail API helps you from start to end in launching a direct marketing campaign. Also, PostGrid offers variable data printing for numerous items, like:

Postcards
Brochures
Newsletters and surveys
Welcome packs
Corporate mail items
Special offers and coupons
Envelopes and labels
Marketing letters
Thank-you cards
Flyers, etc.

Our boutique solutions help you plan personalised campaigns fueled with variable data printing. You can integrate our direct mail API into your CRM and design appealing mailers with our pre-built templates. The integrations help you fetch customer data in no time to auto-fill content for printing on your marketing materials.

PostGrid’s clients primarily use our services for customer acquisition and retention. However, they also employ our automated solutions to build valuable customer-company bonds and increase brand awareness. Here’s one of our client conversations that depict how PostGrid works:

The CEO of a retail company wanted to employ variable data printing to increase the number of RSVPs for an upcoming product launch. He thought of offering a discount for customers who book orders during the event. The company inquired if we could help them mail 5,000 personalised event invitations on short notice.

One of PostGrid’s dedicated account managers reached out to the client and explained the process in detail over a demo. They highlighted how our dedicated -business day SLA is ideal for launching such speedy campaigns effortlessly. Also, our variable data printing services help clients:

Create, print, and mail appealing and eye-catching items
Insert unique content to make readers feel special and push them to respond
Add upfront CTAs and offers to guide them on what to do next
Track individual and total campaign responses
Access analytics and detailed reports to determine results, etc.

The best part is that our variable data print solutions are diverse to fit the requirements of all industries, including healthcare, financial services, insurance, etc. Furthermore, you can avail of our automation services at affordable rates with access to a 24 x 7 customer support team to help you.

Talk to our sales team now to learn how you can take advantage of variable data printing using PostGrid!