The past few years have been filled with prophetic warnings that can be condensed into a single decree: Print is dead. If print is dead, then magazine subscriptions will suffer, everyone – and everything we do – will move online and customers will be unreachable with paper, there will be no need for a mailboxes or mail delivery service.
Even with all this woe, and even with more activity happening online and on the go, print retains its power. Here’s why:
- People have to make a conscious decision to throw print pieces away. This pertains especially to direct mail. If a brochure or a postcard or a letter ends up in your mailbox, it needs to pass through your hands at least once and a decision must be made on whether to throw it away or keep it. In other words, some thought is involved. People can absentmindedly delete emails, because the physical aspect isn’t there.
- People retain information better if they see it in print. A study by the University of Houston found that print readers recall more than online readers. One group was asked to read a print edition of the New York Times while the other was asked to read it online. At the end of 20 minutes, participants were tested. The results were this: Print readers remembered an average of 4.24 stories while online readers recalled an average of 3.35 stories. The study’s participants were college students, a generation you would expect to see higher preference and ability with digital because of long-time exposure and use.
- Print pieces cut through all the distraction of a digital world. A print piece doesn’t demand an instant response or any response at all, and it doesn’t clog your inbox or your spam filter multiple times a week. With so much activity happening on digital, sometimes it’s nice to connect with your customers more directly by taking the time and resources it takes to put together a print piece, whether it’s a magazine, a brochure, a booklet, or a one-page safety sheet.
- Print is perceived as more trustworthy. Think about it, every important document in your life is on a piece of paper: your birth certificate, your social security card, you marriage license, the deed to your house, your passport. The list goes on. In the marketing world, printed communications still carry a lot of weight. An International Communications Research survey found that 73% of consumers actually prefer mail over other advertising methods, and the UK Direct Marketing Association found that 56% of customers find print marketing to be the most trustworthy type of marketing.
- Print triggers response. This covers all types of response. Print pieces usually include several options to respond, so that the customer can choose, including integrating digital and social media options – driving traffic to those channels as well. Brian Morris of the Digital Marketing Ramblings provides several statistics that support this: Since 2004, direct mail marketing response rates have increased by 14%. Email response rates have fallen by 57% in that same period. Here’s another one: 39% of customers try a business for the first time because of direct mail advertising.
All of this is not to say that e-mail or anything digital is not important; to the contrary. Our world is dedicated to digital now and we have developed digital habits. It’s a fact that some people respond better to digital efforts. But the most successful companies have a multi-component, multi-media strategy with efforts and strategies that complement one another, in order to maximize reach, communicate with customers, and build relationships.
Make sure yours is one of them.
