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| The secret life of business reply mail
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When it comes to increasing response rates for certain kinds of mailings, providing your customer with a business reply envelope or card is often recommended because it takes one, two or even three barriers out of the equation. But did you know that this seemingly innocent, simple envelope or card is actually moonlighting as a specialized, fine-tuned direct mail instrument? The USPS defines four types of reply mail, but the majority of the mail we see uses either Courtesy Reply Mail (CRM) or Business Reply Mail (BRM) services. Here’s what differentiates the two: If you choose CRM for your reply mail, you’re just providing your customer with a self-addressed envelope, to which they personally affix postage. The post office is not involved; you create the piece and handle it from start to finish. Your customer has to invest in a stamp (or you can provide one). With BRM, the reply mail is created entirely by the post office. You can’t change it at all, but the convenience for your customer is undeniable: the postage permit is pre-printed on the piece and paid by the mailer. It costs more, but how much more? Here’s where it gets a little more complicated. If you expect that you’ll receive fewer than 887 responses in a year, you pay a $175 permit fee, plus postage and a $0.70 per piece handling fee. This means that each returned reply envelope or card will cost you no less than 96 cents. If you expect you’ll receive more than 887 responses in a year, you can pay a $550 annual accounting fee in addition to the $175 permit, plus postage and either $0.08 or $0.05 per piece. As your quantities increase, your handling fees with the Post Office decrease. Your per piece cost is much less in this scenario, but you pay up front for that privilege and hope/plan for huge response in order to make it pay out. Clear as mud, right? It comes down to weighing your options – do you place more importance on saving your budget (therefore making your customer pay postage and do more work to respond to your offer) or increasing response (therefore paying a little more to increase your sales and make your customer’s life easier)? For more detailed information about reply mail, give me a call or visit the USPS Reply Mail website: http://www.usps.com/replymail/welcome.htm |
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