B2C Closet Company Combines Digital Marketing With Direct Mail Marketing to See Big Results

B2C Closet Company Combines Digital Marketing With Direct Mail Marketing to See Big Results

by | Nov 21, 2023 | Case Studies, Insights

B2C Closet Company Combines Digital Marketing With Direct Mail Marketing to See Big Results

Business Challenge Summary

Clozetivity Southeast PA is a recently launched custom closet franchise company that needed to produce new leads at a lower cost per lead. The client needed help generating more awareness to get in front of prospective buyers using a mix of social media and paid digital advertising. Knowing that content and SEO take time, Clozetivity Southeast PA needed to expand the ways they could target the market to generate awareness and leads more quickly.

Solution

The client turned to &Marketing to supplement their digital approach with a traditional marketing tactic, targeted direct mail, using Every Door Direct Mail (EDDM) by USPS. EDDM strives to make direct mail more efficient and targeted by allowing you to select routes based on specific audience parameters: 

  • Route: City, Rural/Highway, PO Box
  • Residential or Residential AND Business
  • Age
  • Average Size of Household
  • Average Household Income

Not only does this ensure mail pieces are seen by the right people, but at an average price of mailing that is less than a postage stamp. Users are responsible for the printing and delivering of the mail pieces to the post office, but the USPS does provide listings of certified available printers to use for both guidance and physical printing (see here). Mailings currently cost as low as $0.189 per piece (postage). 

After designing two different postcards to A/B test, Clozetivity Southeast PA partnered with PrimoPrint to print 6×9 postcards, select the routes of the audiences they were targeting (residential, high average household income, ages 25-55), and deliver the printed pieces to the USPS for delivery.  

Is direct mail marketing still effective?

Direct mail marketing maintains its effectiveness when strategically implemented, offering tangibility, personalization, and targeted messaging that can create memorable interactions. Although it can be more cost and time-intensive, direct mail stands out in less cluttered physical mailboxes, potentially building trust and capturing attention.

The integration of direct mail with digital strategies, alongside careful tracking and measurement, can enhance its impact. However, its success depends on various factors including the industry, audience, message quality, and design.

Direct Mail Marketing Results

 

After sending about 12,700 highly targeted direct mail pieces for $5,700, Clozetivity Southeast PA received four high-quality leads from Postcard A, two of which led to sales of over $10,000. This led to a Return On Ad Spend (ROAS) of 351%. (What is your ROAS? Check out our Calculator.) Additionally, Clozetivity generated brand awareness among roughly 6,000 potential buyers. Though Click Thru Rate (CTR) was low (0.18%) by industry standards, the conversion rate was extremely strong (17%). This can be attributed to the brand being unknown and the testing of the creative pieces sent. As Clozetivity Southeast PA continues to improve its awareness online through digital advertising and content, the brand will use the lessons and success from this direct mail test to further expand reach.

Results

Spend

$5,700

SQL’s

4

Sales

2

Revenue

$20,000+

ROAS

351%

Conversion Rate

17%

Results

Postcard A

Postcard B

Spend

$2,556.92

$3,098.50

Delivered

6,728

5,995

Clicks

17

6

CTR

0.25%

0.10%

Conversions

4

0

Conversion Rate

24%

0%

Sales

2

0

Revenue

$20,000+

$0

ROAS

782%

0%

What is the average return on direct mail marketing?

The return on investment (ROI) for direct mail marketing can vary widely depending on various factors such as the industry, target audience, quality of the mailing list, design of the mailer, and the offer presented. However, to give a general idea, the average “return” or response rate is anywhere from 0.5-2%. The exact ROI is going to depend on the type of campaign you’re running and what action you ask your recipients will take.

It’s important to note that this is a broad average and actual returns can be significantly higher or lower based on the specifics of the campaign. Well-targeted and well-executed direct mail campaigns have been known to yield ROIs much higher than the average, while poorly executed campaigns could result in a loss. To learn more about direct mail campaigns and decide whether they might be a tactic you should integrate into your marketing strategy, reach out to our team!

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Are you facing challenges of your own in generating leads and meeting your business’s growth goals?

We’d love to learn more about your challenges and how a coordinated marketing approach might help take your organization to the next level.

About &Marketing:

&Marketing provides the robust outsourced marketing department growing companies need without the high overhead costs of big agencies or full-time employees. Our variable model empowers businesses to reach their growth goals through access to the guidance and expertise of senior level strategists and a flexible execution team.

&Marketing Case Study: Using Organic SEO to Increase Brand Awareness in Saas Marketing

&Marketing Case Study: Using Organic SEO to Increase Brand Awareness in Saas Marketing

by | Aug 19, 2022 | Case Studies, SEO

&Marketing Case Study: Using Organic SEO to Increase Brand Awareness in Saas Marketing

Business Challenge Summary

RB Solutions is a B2B point of sale software service, focusing on the pool and spa and chimney and hearth industries. In late 2019, RB began looking to further its overall awareness in the marketplace and generate leads to advance new business initiatives. More specifically, RB wanted to improve their SEO and develop a longer-term content strategy. At the time, RB already had a blog in place, but they believed those posts were not being leveraged effectively or seen by enough target decision-makers to drive leads. They needed to drive more brand awareness and get more eyes on their content and unique industry offering.

Solution

&Marketing’s SaaS Marketing Approach

Based on the challenge of an insufficient SEO and keyword strategy, &Marketing provided a full Business Intelligence Analysis in order to create a detailed roadmap that would lead them to gain more traction and recognition online within their industry. This analysis outlined the following:

  • Competitive keyword strategy for SEO, content, digital advertising, and social media
  • SEO/keyword analysis to identify words and phrases for focus and to:
    • Identify technical SEO opportunities (i.e. page level SEO)
    • Inform SEO opportunities for content (long tail keywords or ‘people also ask’)
  • Digital competitive landscape for key terms (traditional and nontraditional competitors)
  • Opportunities to differentiate within the competitive landscape
  • Monthly reporting and analytics set up with Google Data Studio and Search Console for monthly analysis and tracking (focused on traffic, SEO, and goal completions)

Based on our Business Intelligence Analysis, we created a monthly content distribution strategy, mapping it on one central calendar, to help grow their brand awareness. The calendar featured SEO optimized content, including thought leadership articles, testimonials, an eBook, a microsite, infographics, etc. to be created and distributed through multiple channels.

We enabled them to lean in on thought leadership, positioning themselves as experts in their field through the use of various pieces of content. Each month we provided two blogs and an email in order to help increase consumer engagement and awareness. This allowed them to compete better against online retailers sharing similar keyword search markets, creating an opportunity for RB to take a bigger share of the online share of voice within their industry.

Results

As a result of these actions, RB saw significant increases in their digital presence, awareness, and overall goal completions. We saw the following outcomes:

  • Goal completions increased from 235% in entirety
  • 2019 to 2021 – 235% growth in lead gen
  • 2019 to 2021 – 100% increase in organic traffic
  • 2020 —> 2019 – 25% increase in traffic
  • 2020 —> 2019 – 6% increase in organic traffic
  • 2020 —> 2019 – 204% growth in lead gen
  • 2021 —> 2020 – 27% increase in traffic
  • 2021 —> 2020 – 88% increase in organic traffic
  • 2021 —> 2020 – 10% growth in lead gen

Are you facing challenges of your own in your SaaS marketing?

&Marketing can help improve your organic SEO strategy and increase your brand awareness through a combination of a comprehensive Business Intelligence (BI) Analysis and robust content marketing plan.

BI helps us get smarter about the strategies and tactics we choose, and how we execute them. It also enables us to demonstrate marketing ROI. You can learn more about BI and how it can revolutionize your marketing strategy by downloading our eBook below.

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Are you facing challenges of your own in generating leads and meeting your business’s growth goals?

We’d love to learn more about your challenges and how a coordinated marketing approach might help take your organization to the next level.

About &Marketing:

&Marketing provides the robust outsourced marketing department growing companies need without the high overhead costs of big agencies or full-time employees. Our variable model empowers businesses to reach their growth goals through access to the guidance and expertise of senior level strategists and a flexible execution team.

&Marketing Case Study: How to Market a Cleaning Business to Generate Leads

&Marketing Case Study: How to Market a Cleaning Business to Generate Leads

by | May 10, 2022 | Case Studies

&Marketing Case Study: How to Market a Cleaning Business to Generate Leads

Business Challenge Summary

After purchasing a local franchise of a nationwide professional cleaning company, our client was disappointed at the quality and quantity of leads she was getting. When it came to figuring out how to promote a cleaning business, her goals were clear; however, she wasn’t sure how to get there. She enlisted the help of &Marketing to figure out how to stretch her digital advertising budget to successfully market a cleaning business in a way that generated qualified leads that turn into recurring business.

Prior to working with &Marketing, all ads were managed through the national head office. This over generalized approach led to sub optimal corporate-managed landing pages. Additionally, because they were managing at a national level, the ads were extremely broad and not necessarily in line with the needs of the local market. Unfortunately, local optimizations were impossible because the corporate office did not enable franchisees to access their Google Ads account, nor were they willing to segment their approach to be more inline with local markets. This meant our client had no control over the messaging being served to her target audience on behalf of her franchise. This resulted in a frustrated franchisee who knew her ads could be performing better but didn’t know how to work around the limited options.

Solution

&Marketing’s Cleaning Business Marketing Approach

We started by transferring all the franchise’s Google Ads accounts to one our client could access. We then recreated and optimized the ads by building an SEO-optimized landing page with clear CTAs, along with the addition of implementing a call tracking system to make it possible to see which ads were resulting in leads. We then created ROI/ROAS models to track clicks, leads, conversions, and close rates.

We used these metrics to drive recommendations for:

  • Weekly optimization of Google Ads based on local performance
  • SEO optimization for landing pages
  • SEO optimization for franchise landing pages (to be delivered by each franchise to franchise corporate marketing)

&Marketing’s analysis of the existing corporate-managed Google Ads account and historical data revealed significant opportunity to optimize the franchise’s Google Ads and local SEO performance by implementing the following on an ongoing basis:

  • Reducing or re-allocating ineffective Google Ads spend
  • Implementing a call tracking system to eliminate incoming SPAM or wrong-number calls
  • Improving technical SEO
  • Model and optimize Return on Ad Spend (ROAS) to ensure the total spend is leading to inbound leads and incremental revenue by optimizing cost per click, conversion rates, and close rates.

After pouring over the data and figuring out a way to work around the initial limitations, the answer was clear – the best way to market a cleaning business is to run targeted Google Ads with locally-optimized SEO. The results speak for themselves.

Results

As a result of these actions, our client saw significant increases in lead generation quantity and quality and reduced wasted ad spend. Results included:

  • Overall positive Return on Ad Spend (ROAS)
  • 34% increase in form fill-outs
  • 57% increase in conversion rate
  • 28% increase in calls
  • 80% increase in non-branded conversions

Wondering how well your ads are optimized for the best return on spend or concerned you might be missing opportunities for new leads? We’d love to walk through your approach to learn more about your challenges to identify how we may be able to offer concrete recommendations to guide your ad strategy.

Are you facing challenges of your own in your food and beverage marketing?

We’d love to learn more about your challenges and how a coordinated marketing approach might help take your organization to the next level.

Low-Budget Ways to Generate Leads

Are you facing challenges of your own in generating leads and meeting your business’s growth goals?

We’d love to learn more about your challenges and how a coordinated marketing approach might help take your organization to the next level.

About &Marketing:

&Marketing provides the robust outsourced marketing department growing companies need without the high overhead costs of big agencies or full-time employees. Our variable model empowers businesses to reach their growth goals through access to the guidance and expertise of senior level strategists and a flexible execution team.

&Marketing Case Study: Using Organic SEO to Increase Brand Awareness for Cello Cheese

&Marketing Case Study: Using Organic SEO to Increase Brand Awareness for Cello Cheese

by | Apr 25, 2022 | Case Studies, SEO

&Marketing Case Study: Using Organic SEO to Increase Brand Awareness for Cello Cheese

Business Challenge Summary

Cello Cheese is a growing brand of specialty cheese that strives to make the category of specialty and artisanal cheeses exciting and accessible to all. In the summer of 2020, Cello Cheese underwent a brand repositioning with the goals of increasing in-store sales, growing brand awareness, and increasing their distribution via an enhanced digital presence.

Cello Cheese had a clear vision of what they wanted for a new and improved website, but they needed food and beverage digital marketing experts to develop and implement an integrated digital marketing strategy that included an upgraded website, focus on SEO, better content, and consistent email marketing.

Solution

&Marketing’s Food & Beverage Marketing Approach

Based on these challenges, &Marketing proposed a two-phase approach to accomplish these objectives:

1) Move all content to a modern WordPress site, with a chatbot functionally and a front end builder to allow future content updates to be made internally by Cello employees. This also included updating the messaging and layout by applying our Storytelling & Branding framework to provide a strong foundation, improve navigation and consumer experience, raise engagement levels, and improve SEO.

2) Create new content targeting Cello Cheese’s target audiences via a
monthly content distribution strategy (accompanied by a content calendar) to grow an active
online community based on data, audience, and market research.

After successfully migrating Cello Cheese’s website from SquareSpace to WordPress, we started phase two with a full Business Intelligence analysis. This work included:

  • Recommendations for adding keywords to web page titles, descriptions, URLs, and on-page content to improve SEO.
  • Identifying highly searched non-branded keywords to incorporate in new content.
  • Identifying opportunities to differentiate Cello Cheese within the highly competitive digital landscape.
  • Setting up monthly reporting with Google Data Studio and Search Console for monthly analysis and results tracking.

Based on our Business Intelligence analysis, we created a monthly content distribution strategy, mapping it onto one central calendar. The calendar featured SEO optimized content recommendations as well as content topics to highlight Cello’s expertise and position them as category thought leaders. This included creating SEO-optimized blogs and sharing them with their target consumers via email to increase consumer engagement and awareness, which served to also make Cello Cheese more competitive against online retailers sharing similar target keywords.

Results

As a result of these actions, Cello Cheese saw significant increases in their digital presence, awareness, and overall goal completions. Results included:

  • 215% increase in organic traffic
  • 214% increase in goal conversion rates
  • 98% increase in goal completions
  • 262% increase in where to buy goal conversion rate
  • 128% increase in where to buy goal completions
  • 48% goal conversion rate for email marketing
  • 14% increase in pages per session
  • 69% increase in average session duration

We built on this foundational work with ongoing support that included quarterly content calendar updates, drafting and publishing recurring content that touched all levels of the sales funnel, writing and designing a downloaded eBook, sending a monthly consumer email newsletter, providing content to update social media channels, and a sharing a monthly analytics report with insights and recommendations on how to improve and achieve their goals on a rolling basis.

Are you facing challenges of your own in your food and beverage marketing?

Want to learn how &Marketing can help you with your organic SEO strategy and overall website enhancements?? Contact us today to chat or download our simple go-live website checklist to support your DIY efforts.

Download Website Checklist

Are you facing challenges of your own in your food and beverage marketing?

Want to learn how &Marketing can help you with your organic SEO strategy and overall website enhancements?? Contact us today to chat about your DIY efforts.

About &Marketing:

&Marketing provides the robust outsourced marketing department growing companies need without the high overhead costs of big agencies or full-time employees. Our variable model empowers businesses to reach their growth goals through access to the guidance and expertise of senior level strategists and a flexible execution team.

&Marketing Case Study: Healthcare Digital Marketing Strategy Simplified

&Marketing Case Study: Healthcare Digital Marketing Strategy Simplified

by | Apr 14, 2021 | Case Studies

&Marketing Case Study: Healthcare Digital Marketing Strategy Simplified

Business Challenge Summary

A cutting-edge healthcare technology company (BUDDI.AI), whose target audience includes C-level healthcare executives, was poised for major growth in 2021. However, they were playing in a fragmented competitive landscape that would require them to creatively “break through the noise” in order to build and maintain brand awareness, drive lead generation, and achieve tangible results. To become a true thought leader and partner of choice in the industry, they needed to enhance their digital presence.

Like many growing businesses, this client had neither the time nor the resources to hire an internal team to drive the level of marketing strategy and execution needed in order to achieve success. They also struggled with bringing an unknown concept to market and helping potential customers understand the value that it brings to their companies.

The &Marketing team worked with BUDDI AI to quickly understand our technology platform and develop messaging based on data and Business Intelligence. During this time of rapid growth for our company, they found a way to harness the power of our own data and leverage it to get in front of the right audiences and decision-makers. This directly impacted our ability to more than double our lead generation goals in less than three months.

Ram Swaminathan

Co-Founder & Chief Architect, BUDDI AI

&Marketing’s Approach

Internal Discovery & Immersion

Due to the complexity and newness of the company and its product, a foundational “reset” was first needed, to create consistency and alignment within the company itself and ensure their positioning and messaging was delivered in a way that would resonate with their target audience. This discovery phase consisted of:

  • A comprehensive review of backgrounding documents from the client
  • Several internal stakeholder interviews and exercises
  • Supplemental secondary customer research
  • A high-level audit of competitor websites and messaging

&Marketing used this as fuel to build the following foundational outputs:

  • Audience segmentation, customer research, and identification of pain points
  • Brand voice and tonality/personality for each audience segment
  • Value proposition and key message document, using our Storytelling & Branding framework
  • The customer journey
  • Alignment on success goals and KPIs (metrics)

 Business Intelligence

To identify digital marketing opportunities and create the building blocks for a comprehensive strategy and execution plan, &Marketing needed to first understand A) the target audience’s behavior online and B) the competitive digital landscape. To do this, we ran a Business Intelligence and Analytics project for this client to review and assess the digital online landscape:

  • Keyword Striking Distance Analysis: Identifying top keyword opportunities based on current rankings
  • Enhanced Competitive Analysis: Identifying competitor strengths and opportunities in which Buddi could steal their online market share
  • Nontraditional Competitor Analysis: understanding where our target audience is going to consume information about our product/service that are NOT competitors.
  • “People Also Ask” Research: Related online searches that may provide less expensive opportunities to rank or advertise for that reach our audience at each stage of the sales funnel

This research served as the building blocks for a future comprehensive strategy and execution plan that would include content, digital advertising, website enhancements, and SEO optimization.

Execution & Reporting

Discovery and Immersion combined with Business Intelligence data allowed &Marketing to create sophisticated, yet engaging content, automated email campaigns and highly targeted paid advertising on Google and LinkedIn helped to drive website traffic, lead generation efforts, and overall brand awareness.

Results

In four and half months, we helped BUDDI.AI generate 253 qualified leads at cost per lead of $121 – more than double their goal and all within their budget!

Additionally, we helped increase website traffic 434% compared to the previous period, furthering BUDDI.AI’s presence amongst the marketplace.

We continued to support this client as their business expanded with new products and audiences.A comprehensive marketing strategy was developed that included digital marketing, social media exposure, website and SEO enhancements, content creation, sales enablement, email automation, and a lead generation plan that expanded their brand awareness and accelerated their sales efforts.

Are you facing challenges of your own in generating leads and meeting your business’s growth goals?

We’d love to learn more about your challenges and how a coordinated marketing approach might help take your organization to the next level.

About &Marketing:

&Marketing provides the robust outsourced marketing department growing companies need without the high overhead costs of big agencies or full-time employees. Our variable model empowers businesses to reach their growth goals through access to the guidance and expertise of senior level strategists and a flexible execution team.

Case Study: Marketing for a Drug & Alcohol Addiction Recovery Facility through the Pandemic

Case Study: Marketing for a Drug & Alcohol Addiction Recovery Facility through the Pandemic

by | Apr 14, 2021 | Case Studies, SEO

Case Study: Marketing for a Drug & Alcohol Addiction Recovery Facility through the Pandemic

Business Challenge Summary

Our client is an addiction recovery center dedicated to improving the delivery of vital services which include drug and alcohol rehabilitation and treatment. Before engaging &Marketing (pre-pandemic), the center wanted to enhance its online presence and messaging to more closely connect with its audience and simplify the process of seeking help as much as possible. Driving more consistent leads would also reduce fluctuations in staff workload to provide a better overall patient experience.

The center’s website was already optimized well for SEO but was outdated in terms of user experience and engagement. In addition to updating the site, the client wanted the capability to monitor their automated Google Ads and use that data to make incremental improvements. They also wanted to create and execute a clear plan of action to retain close connections with past graduates, so they began searching for a partner that could help them reach these goals.

Additionally, the pandemic accelerated the already growing mental health crisis in the United States. Those populations at highest risk for addiction grew as rates of stress, alcoholism, and drug abuse soared. According to the American Medical Association, in December 2020 more than 40 U.S. states saw increases in opioid-related mortality along with ongoing concerns for those with substance use disorders. A reporting system called ODMAP shows that the early months of the pandemic brought an 18% increase nationwide in overdoses compared with those same months in 2019. It’s also likely that the total impact of the pandemic has on this industry will not be known for decades to come.

Major life events are often triggering for those coping with substance use issues. Through our discovery work with the center, we learned that these events often drive one of two parties to take action: either the person facing addiction or a loved one seeking help on their behalf. Each group has unique needs, so it was important to create campaigns that are helpful to each.

Because of the high urgency of need paired with growing search volume, it’s also important to top the first page of Google search results to reach audiences that need assistance. With only ten spaces available on the first page, this can be challenging. We took a 3-prong approach, including:

  • Search Engine Optimization
  • Google Ads
  • Google My Business / Google Maps (especially helpful to this industry because most searches are focused on a localized area)

&Marketing’s Approach

&Marketing guided the client toward improving their results in five steps:

  1. We conducted a Business Intelligence analysis of their current SEO, digital advertising, social media, and content marketing practices.
  2. We implemented the strategy and tools required to continuously improve Google Ads paid search campaigns, offering a more dependable way to reach the client’s audience.
  3. Using that data, the team generated comprehensive messaging and value propositions to provide a strong foundation for building marketing assets. We helped the center update its website with improved visuals and messaging, applying our Storytelling & Branding framework and letting the data guide further optimizations.
  4. We also recognized the opportunity to improve local SEO and organic reach by improving the client’s Google My Business reputation. The center had positive but infrequent reviews, so the team ran campaigns to encourage alumni to add new Google reviews and made review requests part of the graduation process.
  5. To build on relationships with potential patients and alumni, we developed a content calendar and email marketing campaign with two blogs and one email per month. Email content focuses on driving traffic to the blogs, highlighting employees to offer their expert insights into the recovery process, and driving awareness for upcoming events or newsworthy items.

Results

  1. Putting a strong foundation in place for building marketing assets, the process is less daunting and more repeatable and reliable.
  2. With Google Ads monitoring and optimization in place, the client now has guideposts to help them set and reach progressively higher goals.
  3. The freshly updated website puts a working tool in their hands that allows them to become a better resource for their audience.
  4. Improved engagement with alumni through content and a clear call to action to leave reviews has created a better Google My Business reputation and increased their organic reach, which is the primary source of their traffic. The positive reception to review requests was a pleasant surprise that the center didn’t expect.
  5. The client has benefited from an overall incoming traffic increase of 96%.

By the numbers:

%

Inbound Phone Inquiries: Now reaching more of the right audience with a 363% increase in inbound phone calls. Up from 19 in 2019 to 88 in 2020

%

Organic Search Traffic: This is their biggest driver of traffic and has increased from 48% of their overall traffic in 2019 to 55% in 2020

%

Local SEO: Positive calls generated from Google My Business have increased 153%. Up from 76 in 2019 to 192 in 2020.

%

Website Traffic: Average time on page increased by 15%. Bounce rate decreased by 12%. Pages per session increased by 18%.

%

Email Marketing: Open rate ~23%. Click-through rate ~1.5%.

Are you facing challenges of your own in generating leads and meeting your business’ growth goals?

We’d love to learn more about your challenges and how a coordinated marketing approach might help take your organization to the next level.

About &Marketing:

&Marketing provides the robust outsourced marketing department growing companies need without the high overhead costs of big agencies or full-time employees. Our variable model empowers businesses to reach their growth goals through access to the guidance and expertise of senior level strategists and a flexible execution team.