Boost Your Prospecting Results
The example in the table shown on page 48 demonstrates how the economics of list suppression work. The first column represents a mailing without optimization. A list with 500,000 names responding at 1.4 percent would be slightly below break-even, generating a loss of $2,000.
The second column shows the effect of optimization; 10 percent (or 50,000) of the names in the file would be suppressed. These names are assumed to perform at 0.7 percent, which is half of the response rate of the average name on the list. The optimization cost of $2,250 is more than offset by the savings from not printing and mailing 50,000 catalogs to this below-average group of names.
- Companies:
- Lett Direct Inc.
Steve Lett graduated from Indiana University in 1970 and immediately began his 50-year career in Direct Marketing; mainly catalogs.
Steve spent the first 25 years of his career in executive level positions at both consumer and business-to-business companies. The next 25 years have been with Lett Direct, Inc., the company Steve founded in early 1995. Lett Direct, Inc., is a catalog and internet consulting firm specializing in circulation planning, plan execution, analysis and digital marketing (Google Premier Partner).
Steve has served on the Ethics Committee of the Direct Marketing Association (DMA) and on a number of company boards, both public and private. He served on the Board of the ACMA.  He has been the subject of two Harvard Business School case studies. He is the author of a book, Strategic Catalog Marketing. Steve is a past Chairman of both the Catalog Council and Business Mail Council of the DMA. He spent a few years teaching Direct Marketing at Indiana University in Bloomington, Indiana.
You can contact Steve at stevelett@lettdirect.com.
