Mailing Lists
The right mail list makes a big difference in response rates. Who should you mail to? Direct mailing performs best when your prospects are targeted based on...
Customer Profiling
Scientifically find new customers using Castle Press’ Look-Alike Report. This unique consumer report applies 20 basic but strategically important demographic elements...
Purchase a Mailing List
On this site, you can order both Consumer Mailing Lists and Business Mailing Lists based on demographics, geographic location, lifestyle, purchasing behavior, business size, SIC code,sales volume and other categories...
First Class or Standard Mail?
First-class mail is used for postcards, letters, large envelopes, and small packages. First-class mail must weigh 13 ounces or less. Pieces over 13 ounces can be sent as Priority Mail. USPS first-class delivery is given priority over standard mail...
Envelope Sizes
Castle Press stocks a range of standard envelope sizes. It's a good idea to choose an envelope that is about 1/4" larger than both the height and the width of the piece you are mailing. This allows for easy hand insertion but controls possible damage to the enclosure by minimizing excess space...
4 Direct Mail Sales Boosters
The question we should be asking is not so much whether direct mail marketing works (it does) or whether it’s affordable (it is) but: How do I do it?
9 Tips from Matthew Samp on Designing to Boost Direct Mail Response
Make your letters look like letters. Do not set your letter type in Helvetica or Times Roman or other popular type fonts available on your computer...
A Proactive Approach to Direct Mail
More than 50% of households claim they want to receive more or don't mind getting some advertising mail. 84% of respondents open direct mail because they recognize the company who is sending it...
7 Ways to make Direct Mail more Effective
Noted marketing consultant Dean Rieck offers seven pointers on sharpening your direct mail’s selling power...
12 Pointers Toward Successful Direct Mail
Mail to the right lists. Your mailing list is not just a way to reach your market. It is your market...
Pat Friesen’s 10 Low-Cost Ways to Lift Direct Mail Response
Use the word “FREE” on your outer-envelope headline. Check out FTC rules first. Set your headlines in quotation marks. Quotes can boost readership...
10 Ways to Boost Mail Response
Direct mail produces orders or inquiries that can result in orders by motivating sales prospects to make conscious decisions to respond. However...
7 Pointers on Making Direct Mail Succeed
Use photos and illustrations. Graphics boost results only when they help tell a story that engages your sales prospect. Show people enjoying your product…
7 Mistakes that Sabotage Direct Mail Advertising
Refreshingly, copy consultant Susanna K. Hutcheson admits that she has made a ton of mistakes in her long career...
10 Direct Marketing Tips from Lester Wunderman
Lester Wunderman, “the father of direct marketing” and quite possibly the smartest adman ever to prowl Madison Avenue (just ask him), outlined 10 big things about today’s direct marketing during a recent interview...
Marketing Calculators
Postage Calculator, Mailing Sample Size, Campaign ROI...
USPS Postage Rates
Postage Rates Effective January 26, 2020...
USPS Postage Price Calculator
Domestic and international retail prices...
State Postal Abbreviations
NCOA and CASS Certification
NCOA is a database maintained by the U.S. Postal Service of all individuals and companies who completed a Change of Address form in the previous four years...
How to Register to Business Customer Gateway
How to Download Change of Address (COA) Data
How to Download NIXIE/UAA (Undeliverable as Addressed) from Business Customer Gateway
5 Tips for a Down and Dirty Direct Mail Test
Most serious direct mailers do a series of tests to determine the optimal response rate based on the list, offer and creative strategy...
Mailing Tips
Design your piece for mail automation discounts. Include Return Service Requested on the face of the mailer. Ask for a paper dummy (free), and weigh it to confirm it is under one ounce...
5 Tactics that can Boost your Direct Mail Results
The first thing your recipient sees is his name on your envelope. So, Richard Siedlecki advises, type or print the address area or even write it in longhand. And, in your letter, make sure you speak to your reader as an individual...
19 of Dick Benson’s Direct Mail Rules of Thumb
Make your letters look like letters. Do not set your letter type in Helvetica or Times Roman or other popular type fonts available on your computer…
5 Cornerstones of Direct Mail that Sells
Direct mail can generate higher trackable returns on investment than any other advertising medium. Yet, year after year, a few seat-of-the-pants advertising romantics follow their impulses and...
16 Direct Mail Watchwords
The late Chicago agency head Bob Stone wrote that in more than 30 years in marketing, these 16 direct-mail principles held true more than 90% of the time…
Dean Rieck’s 7 Direct Mail Pitfalls
Trying to sell to everyone on your list - Big mistake. You take the edge off your message when you try to speak to everybody, and that depresses response…
Matthew Samp’s 8 Ways to Generate More Leads from Direct Mail
Leave your reader thirsting to know more. You cannot say too much in a mailing aimed at selling a product or service. That’s why long copy works best when you want to trigger an order...
7 Tested Ways to Follow up a Successful Mailing
To get the most bang out of your advertising buck, consultant Dan Kennedy advises, use one or more of these ways to follow up a profitable mailing…
4 Bases Every Direct Mailer Needs to Cover
Many direct marketers shoot themselves in the foot by neglecting four factors that determine the health of a promotion program…
5 Ways to Louse up your Direct Mail
Dean Rieck, a nationally respected direct marketing consultant, writing in DM News, pinpointed five common ways mail advertisers shoot themselves in the foot...
7 Ways to Rev Up Mail Response
Lois K. Geller, of New York’s Mason & Geller Direct Marketing agency, suggests these ways to spark your customer acquisition out of the doldrums...
15 Ways to Fine-tune your Offer
Your offer is right up there with your list selection when it comes to direct-mail impact. But what factors make for productive offers?
Mail Package Development
The basic direct mail package consists of the outer mailing envelope, a main offer (typically a letter), a call to action response card and a return envelope...
Standard Sizes
Letterhead, envelopes, business cards, labels, presentation folders, brochures, booklets, postcards...
Mail Delivery Times - First Class and Standard
Of average printed project that mails, postage is 9% of the total investment. What is the process? Address an envelope put on a stamp and drop the envelope into a mail box. Within 3 days that letter will be delivered anywhere within the United States ...
Tab Requirements for Self-Mailers
The US Postal Service instituted new rules for Folded Self-Mailers (FSM) that took effect on January 05, 2013. Use the examples below to make sure that your mail piece complies...
11 Direct Mail Pointers from Ed Burnett
A mailing to your customers probably will out-pull a promotion to cold prospects by as much as 10 to 1. Yet many advertisers combine the two audiences under a single code. Such a mailing’s combined response may be 1.1%—which conceals valuable-to-know facts...
23 Detailed Direct Marketing Observations by Nat G. Bodian
The acceptance rate on trial offers is about 85%. Recipients of a direct mail package usually go to the letter first, then to the folder, and then to the reply device...
Jim Rosenfield’s 11-Point Direct Mail Success Checklist
Pointers on how to save printing dollars without hurting the eye-appeal and response rates of your mailing packages...
6-Point Checklist for Effective Direct Mail
A direct mailing is more engineering than art. It is a set of cues that signal the reader to take an action...
9 Tips on Sales-Boosting Direct Mail
Marketing consultant John Abate writes to share nine pointers, gleaned from his years of success in direct mail...
Ten ways to boost your direct mail response
Some of these pointers on successful direct mail may sound elementary, but don’t skip any of them. Marketing maven Barry Feig writes that not obeying them is a common, costly pitfall...
Denny Hatch’s Checklist for Successful Direct Mail
Hinge your copy on one or more of these key emotional drives: Fear, Guilt, Flattery, Exclusivity, Greed, Anger, Salvation…
6 Ways to Increase Responses to Your Direct Mailings
Once you have developed a compelling offer and determined which lists to use, you can lift response to your mailing package—as much as 100%...
Denny Hatch’s 5 Pointers for Direct Mail Success
You can greatly benefit from an ongoing direct-marketing campaign that is based on some simple, but powerful strategies…
9 Tips on Prompting Sales Prospects to Act Right Now
Almost every potential customer who puts your mailing aside until “later” is a dead loss to you. “Later” usually means “never...
7 Earmarks of Highest-Response Offers
Legendary marketer Clayton Makepeace writes to reveal seven elements he and his clients credit with sparking millions of dollars in direct-mail sales…
Tips on Creating Non-Profit Appeal Packages
Don’t talk about masses. Even if you are appealing for funds that will benefit millions of people, talk about the needs of a single person...