Direct marketing software can make communicating with your current and prospective customers much easier. You can develop direct marketing initiatives in a variety of ways, direct marketing software can help you not only decide which is best for your goals, but also design the collateral.

Direct marketing software options include direct email software, database management marketing software and even telemarketing software solutions. These software solutions can help with everything from verifying addresses and saving postage on direct mail marketing to enhancing your customer database with more in-depth information about each customer to help you serve them better. When using direct marketing software, consider the following options:

1. Use direct mail marketing software for traditional forms of advertising.

2. Use direct email marketing software to reach more customers, faster and easier.

3. Use telemarketing software to reach customers directly over the phone.

Action Steps
The best contacts and resources to help you get it done

Try traditional direct mail software solutions to reach customers

Direct mail marketing is often a good way to market to your existing customers and potentially grow your current business. You can use direct mail marketing software to help you with sending out promotional materials to your entire customer base or to send out individualized mailers specific to each customer's past purchasing trends.

I recommend: NetSuite offers marketing automation software that helps you with direct mail and direct email marketing campaigns. Check out VerticalResponse for direct mail tools that help you create postcard mailers. There’s also a free trial of the product and you can watch a demo before starting your own direct postcard campaign.

Try direct email marketing software to reach customers electronically

With the Internet, you can now reach customers electronically to save on postage, printing and time spent on your marketing campaign. More people are turning to email as it's often a faster way to get responses to upcoming promotions and you can use more graphically rich marketing to really impress both current and potential new customers.

I recommend: Email Express Direct provides everything you need to produce email marketing campaigns from start to finish including building and managing your email lists, sending out your graphics-rich email marketing messages and tracking the results of each campaign. Try iContact for a web-based email marketing software solution that allows you to track every aspect of your email marketing campaign.

Purchase telemarketing software that allows you to reach a large number of people quickly

Telemarketing is one of the oldest ways to find prospective customers. Using software specifically geared towards telemarketing will make it much easier to manage a great deal of calls and potentially reach the most people.

I recommend: Acarda Sales Technologies offers CallAssist, a telemarketing call center phone dialer that helps your company’s telemarketers make a large number of calls quickly. It also offers KnowledgeMax Script Manager, which is a telemarketing script software solution that makes managing responses to frequently asked questions more efficient. When looking for direct marketing software providers, you can also check out the list of telemarketing software vendors at The Software Network to compare different products.

Tips & Tactics

Helpful advice for making the most of this Guide

• •  You can use database marketing software as a direct marketing technique to utilize a database of current and/or potential customers for promotions of products or services geared towards the individual. Database marketing solutions might also offer various types of list management techniques to help you keep addresses and other identifying information safely stored in one convenient location.

The Internet notwithstanding, direct mail remains one of the most effective tools for growing your business, and you'll find no shortage of software and services to help you design, generate and deliver a direct marketing campaign.

These tools can help in many ways, such as ensuring that your mailing qualifies for US Postal Service bulk discounts. Still, it's not so much the mailing that matters — it's the list. Tools for building and maintaining the right mailing list for your growing business are the key to making direct mail pay off. You need a list that's:

1. Targeted: A targeted list keeps you from wasting postage and printing to reach poor prospects.
2. Clean: A clean list has up-to-date names, addresses and other customer/prospect data, and is free of duplicates and dead ends.
3. Compliant: A compliant list obeys USPS rules to qualify for bulk rates, and observes laws in some states requiring you to filter out names and addresses of those who do not want to be contacted.

Action Steps
The best contacts and resources to help you get it done

Keep it Simple

If your needs are modest and you already have exactly the customer list you want, generating the mailing can be a snap.

I recommend: You can always use Microsoft Word's built-in Mail Merge facility, but Word won't help you design and address your piece according to postal regulations for such things as required "white space" for labels and bar codes. SuperMerge is an inexpensive Word add-in that generates a mail merge using addresses from Outlook contact folders. Most desktop direct-mail programs can import list data from virtually any application you may be using. For Mac, there's Mail Factory and for Windows there's Easy Mail Plus. If you manage your customers in ACT! an add-in called RemarkableMail generates direct mail from ACT! records.

Build your in-house list

For more extensive direct-marketing campaigns, start by developing a detailed database of your current customers.

I recommend: If you don't already have a customer list database, you can build one by gathering files containing customer data, such as sales records, and submit them to a data enhancement service (sometimes called "data mining") that will convert them into a usable, manageable mailing list. For an online service, try Melissa Data Products and Services. Desktop/network software such as ManageMore Lists & Labels or Mail Manager 2010 and MAILERS+4 all import customer info on demand and map it into fields for list management and printing.

Expand your list with third-party data

You can buy a bigger list from a list broker, or better yet, use a list enhancement service to add detail to your own.

I recommend: Online data enhancers such as Direct List Technology and Melissa Data Products and Services take your list and apply analysis and comparison technologies to add useful information. There are thousands of list brokers, so picking the right one could take some digging. Check GreatLists.com or BuyerZone.com's service that matches your needs to a directory of list brokers.

Keep it clean

Any mailing list software, list broker or list enhancement company can supply list 'hygiene' services such as eliminating duplicate entries. Cleanup should be an ongoing and frequent task to ensure that you're not wasting paper and postage.

I recommend: Upload your list to the Smart Clean service, which filters the list to make it compliant with state, federal and industry DNC lists such as the Direct Marketing Association's Mail Preference Service list, or try ListCleanup.com.

Consider CASS

Most list software and services promise to generate and print addresses in ways that comply with the best bulk rates. One way to achieve that is by being certified by the USPS's Coding Accuracy Support System (CASS). Any CASS-certified software adds Zip+4 codes, barcodes, and anything else required to get CASS rates on your mailing.

I recommend: The USPS publishes a list of all CASS-compliant vendors.

Tips & Tactics

Helpful advice for making the most of this Guide

• •  List prices are usually tied to the number of records, so avoid buying more list than you need. If you're looking for 100 new customers, don't buy a list with a million records.
• •  Consider expanding your list by trading with other companies targeting similar customers but not carrying similar products. Don't trade or sell your list to anyone unless you can ensure that it can't make its way to a competitor.
• •  Along with CASS, keep an eye out for DPV (Delivery Point Validation), a related standard that helps ensure that addresses are correct and verifiable down to apartment/suite number.

Direct mail software is a big part of an online business's success. Direct email software helps simplify the direct marketing application task of reaching many prospects and customers at once and in a cost-effective, fast way. Direct marketing tools like this have a great effect on target markets and usually end up padding profit margins.

Luckily, direct mail marketing programs are easy to come by. However, business owners who aren't accustomed to using direct marketing software applications may require assistance when trying to learn the direct marketing software systems ropes. Unfamiliarity with programs shouldn't be a reason to pass up using them, though. Consider this:

1. Direct marketing programs increase profits because of their ease-of-use and functionality.

2. Using direct marketing applications can cut down on advertising and marketing expenses.

3. Direct marketing software providers even provide the solutions for learning how to operate the software.

Action Steps
The best contacts and resources to help you get it done

Check provider websites for direct email marketing software tutorials

Good software providers know that they will need to provide new prospects and customers with reference information so that they can successfully operate their applications. They offer actual step-by-step tutorials that customers can use to learn the program.

I recommend: Softouch Technologies offers an interesting array of tutorials for prospects and customers so that they can familiarize themselves with their products. Software Marketing Associates makes tutorials come alive by offering training on-site, in classrooms and over the Internet.

Look for direct marketing software training courses offered by providers

Providers can directly offer training courses, workshops or online classrooms to help customers learn how to work their software. Take advantage of these training primers to make the most out of the software.

I recommend: Freelance Technologies recognizes the importance of offering certified training programs for direct mail software. Likewise, BCC Software provides classroom training and workshops for standard and advanced users so that anyone can maximize the effectiveness of their software.

Find direct mail marketing software training elsewhere

At times, clients have to be resourceful when finding education and training materials. Though some companies may not have detailed websites dedicated to educational offerings, many third-party websites do. It's just a matter of finding them.

I recommend: For example, Virtual Systems offers training on their website, but it's almost mentioned in passing and clients have to contact the company for more information. You can do that, if you want to. But if you can't find any material on software provider websites, try looking on educational websites like the SAS Institute's, and find a course dedicated to your software or learning objectives.

Tips & Tactics

Helpful advice for making the most of this Guide

• •  Don't be afraid to look elsewhere to find tips on how to use database marketing software. Blogs and video websites can often contain user manuals made by other customers. Many times, this user-to-user advice is more accessible than provider-provided manuals because it's presented in simple language.

Direct marketing software comes in various forms with any number of features to maximize the impact of a business's marketing efforts. The right software can directly impact the success of a marketing campaign, which can result in a much greater profit margin. Direct marketing software solutions do not have to require a huge investment in order to get the features that your business needs. When shopping around for the best solution for your business, keep the following direct marketing software key terms in mind so that you can choose the software that offers everything you need.

Action Steps
The best contacts and resources to help you get it done

Direct marketing

Direct marketing is a type of marketing that attempts to send a marketing message directly to consumers with the goal of inspiring recipients into action as a result of the marketing message.

I recommend: Learn more about what exactly direct marketing is from the Direct Marketing Educational Foundation.

Direct mail software

Direct mail software is a type of computer program that allows a business to easily manage direct marketing through mail by managing mailing lists and responses, sending automatic mailers and even personalize them.

I recommend: Get a better idea of how some direct mail software solutions can work through a free trial of Mailers+4 by Melissa DATA.

Direct email software

Direct email software is a kind of software solution that manages email marketing campaigns by managing contact lists, email tracking and sending automatic emails to notify existing customers of news and updates or sending unsolicited email, known as spam.

I recommend: Read all about using software to run successful email marketing campaigns at DirectMailMarketingSoftware.net.

Telemarketing software

Telemarketing software is a computer program that automatically dials multiple phone numbers, delivers an electronic message to calls answered and monitors the response of calls.

I recommend: Find a ton of information on the most widely-used telemarketing software solutions and download trials from Telemarketing-Software.com.

Database marketing software

Database marketing software is a computer program that allows businesses to streamline marketing efforts and make them much more successful by managing customer contact information and analyzing data about customers to find the best marketing tactics for them.

I recommend: Biz-Tech Customer Database Software has in-depth information on how database marketing software can help a business's marketing campaigns.

List management

List management is a feature that should be included in all kinds of direct marketing software solutions that not only manages contact information, but segments the lists to find the best marketing solutions.

I recommend: Visit Benchmark Email to learn more about the possibilities that list management can offer a business.