With email opening rates in freefall Stannp.com is turning digital marketing for theatres on its head with direct mail campaigns that can cost less than the price of a postage stamp and achieve impressive response rates.
According to Royal Mail statistics, more than 20 million adults take action as a result of the direct mail they receive, while research specialists at FastMAP report that nine out of 10 people open their direct mail.
UK theatres from Buxton to Torquay and Worthing are finding Stannp’s service is not only effective for building and maintaining relationships with their audiences, but also makes tight marketing budgets stretch further.
Stannp achieves this with its self-service digital direct mail platform. Theatres can upload both artwork and customer address data to Stannp.com, and test and schedule campaigns to their precise requirements.
As well as its ease of use, Stannp delivers significant cost savings. For example, printing, fulfilment and mailing of 1,000 letters costing 52.5p an item using a franking machine can be handled by Stannp for just 40p – a real saving of 24%.
| 1,000 Letters | Franked | Stannp.com |
| Postage | 0.38 | 0.40 |
| 0.065 | ||
| Envelope | 0.04 | |
| Enclosing | 0.04 | |
| Total | 0.525 | 0.40 |
| Saving | 0.125 | 24% |
Stannp achieves this performance by printing and despatching mail from its Devon base, using hybrid mail delivery to pre-sort items for delivery direct to recipients’ local Royal Mail sorting office, cutting out the traditional regional sorting office stage. This results in not only cheaper but faster delivery.
Jake Randall, Marketing Officer at Buxton Opera House, praised Stannp’s “excellent service” as “really simple and straightforward and at an excellent price. Highly recommended.”
Kim Risdon, Sales and Marketing Manager at the Princess Theatre, Torquay, described Stannp’s “efficient mailing service” as “all under one roof, printing, sending and all with a short turn around”.
Stannp handles campaigns from a single postcard to more than 20,000 items and provides a web API for theatres to automate their campaigns. They can also upload data by CSV or Excel file to make the process even quicker.
But can printed direct mail really outperform email? Darren Stepsky from Stannp says:
“With email you’re competing for attention in a very different way than if your mail is actually opened and then looked at.
Direct mail can put your presence on the kitchen table, selling your theatre shows in the home, without you standing on the front doorstep. The chances are the person opening your direct mail will do so when they get home and they have the time to do so. This is the perfect opportunity for you to appeal to them, to talk directly to them and capture their train of thought.”
With hacks of personal data making daily headlines, direct mail can also establish and maintain trust with theatregoers as they are not being asked to click a link or to surrender personal information to find out more.
Stannp is happy for theatres to try out its service for themselves by giving them £1 to send samples for free at stannp.com or calling it on 01271 344 507 for more details.
