Welcome to Schultz & Williams' first
In this Issue:
- Value Is King of the Jungle
- Targeting Is More Important than Ever
- How to Save on Your Next Acquisition Mailing
- Membership is the Heartbeat of Your Institution
This is our attempt at a regular communication designed specifically for
For our first edition, we've concentrated on direct mail membership acquisition campaigns. We're always being asked, "How's the mail doing?" and "What's the latest?" Well, we thought we'd share with you a little of what we've experienced and how our zoo clients responded to what, for many of you, was a really tough year.
Our zoo clients countered the soft economy and a distracted consumer base (war, terrorism, economic uncertainty) with temporary exhibits, new premiums and a focus on value. The result? They had fantastic campaigns. Here are some highlights:
- Philadelphia Zoo doubled its mail volume and mailed 1,000,000 pieces in 2003. The outcome was over 11,000 new members and $500,000 in
net income. - Cincinnati Zoo & Botanical Gardens had its best year — acquiring more than 9,000 new members and $400,000 in net income.
- Cleveland Zoological Society also saw one of its best years. CZS realized a 1.89% response rate and generated $310,000 in net income.
- Both the Toledo Zoo and the Greater Los Angeles Zoo Association achieved more than 40% increases in their campaigns' performance.
- Overall, we mailed 3.2 million pieces for our zoo clients. They attained response rates from 1% to 1.89%. Average gifts ranged from $52 to $84.
- Collectively, our clients acquired nearly 50,000 new members and generated over $1.3 million in net income.
Why the success? Schultz & Williams has conducted many tests and performed in-depth analysis in order to thoroughly understand responsiveness. We want to share our results with you.
One thing hasn't changed in the marketing of zoo memberships — value is still the main reason people join the zoo. In fact, a value-added offer is more important than ever in today's soft economy.
Schultz & Williams is constantly working with our zoo clients to determine the best membership offer. Recent tests have shown that value wins over a "support the zoo" message and that lower-priced membership offers outperform higher-priced offers:
- A 15% discount outperformed a 10% discount offer by 4%, creating an increase of 3% in net income.
- A 10% discount offer outperformed a "13th month free" offer by 44%, allowing for an increase of 77% in net income.
- Every time, the larger discount outperformed a smaller discount, allowing for both an increase in members and net income.
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Targeting Is More Important than Ever
The soft economy forced many to reevaluate their mailing list plans. For example, many of the best lists for zoos have been pulled from the market and others have stopped updating their files. Here are some of the steps we've taken in light of the current climate:
- Continuously tying the campaign in with the marketing platform. Our clients work diligently to give us their current marketing messages and images. We take that and turn it into a unique campaign and package for each zoo.
- Reactivation of lapsed members was critical this year due to a loss of prospect names and a focus on cost reduction. By finding lapsed members who were also on our best prospect lists, we were able to increase deep lapsed file production by 140%. We were also able to eliminate lapsed names that were no longer productive — increasing response and saving money.
- Sophisticated geographic analysis was critical to improving campaign results. S&W performed comprehensive zip code analysis to eliminate poor performing areas, boost mail volume to strong regions and target the offer more effectively.
- We expanded our zoo list consortium to acquire more niche lists relevant to the zoo market.
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These days everyone has to work harder than ever to keep prices low and revenues up. Here's what our clients have done:
- Co-mingle, co-mingle, co-mingle! Our clients combine their print run with others to help lower printing costs.
- Mail to the cleanest list possible. Eliminating bad addresses and duplicates will help save printing and postage costs AND increase your response rate.
- Presort down to the lowest level possible. Regional mailers have a great advantage when looking for postal discounts. Because mail is so concentrated, regional mailers are able to presort down to the local level, which can save roughly 20% of your postage costs.
- Our clients are able to take advantage of the S&W list consortium. By combining their list order with those of other organizations, we are able to order more names and negotiate net name agreements.
- Don't forget that higher gifts mean more income — if you don't lower the response! On average, our zoo clients learned that 30% of their new members join above the basic Family level.
- Our clients took advantage of premiums (T-shirts, backpacks, plush toys), benefits (free events and behind-the-scenes tours) and add-ons (parking, additional guests) to help move members to upper membership levels and increase the average gift.
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Membership is the Heartbeat of Your Institution
Please check our website for a list of zoos whose successful membership initiatives we've worked on recently.
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Visit us online at www.sw-inc.com .
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