Are you tracking your mail?

Lots of changes look to be imminent in the future of the USPS… One way to adapt to potential changes in delivery times and days is to get a real sense of how your mail is traveling through the postal system.

The Intelligent Mail barcode, which will permanently replace the traditional POSTNET barcode starting next January, allows you to add tracking to your mail and Action has a very easy to use portal that lets you “watch” your mail get delivered.

Want to learn more? Check out this video or give us a call!

New rates, new rules

Just a quick note to share Action’s updated USPS rate chart, which you can find here and also on the resources page of our website. We wanted this guide to be super useful so we’ve included information on mailpiece design (answering ever-important “where does my address need to go?” question), tabbing – both for current regs and for the upcoming self-mailer changes, and NCOA requirements.

And as always, we have an amazing staff of Mailpiece Quality Control certified sales & account managers who are readily available to talk through any questions on your mail!

Lessons from the Holidays – Part 2

As promised, a few more thoughts from the holidays, which now seem so very long ago…

Back to the Killian household: we have some family living outside of Minnesota that we do not see for the holidays and this means gifts in the mail. Imagine a seven-year-old coming home from school and seeing a Priority Mail box (or just as easily UPS or FedEx) sitting on the table with her name on it. Anticipation, spontaneous grins, excitement. Pure joy!

I love to shop from catalogs and online and one of the key reasons is because I like getting packages in the mail. And really, who doesn’t? Even here at Action, there is a general excitement whenever someone in the office gets a package. There’s that same pre-gift anticipation of the endless potential hidden behind that corrugated packaging, just waiting for you to open it.

So, if a package can elicit that kind of response – pretty much across the board - why are we not sending more packages?

A common theme I seem to keep running across in my daily reading is that consumers today are more discerning and demanding of trust than they used to be. Now, while I could take issue with this conclusion (do you really believe yesterday’s customers were expecting to be cheated or really not paying attention?), technology does make it easier to do research and, probably more importantly, allows unhappy customers a wider reach to express dissatisfaction (and conversely, potential customers easier access to learn of that dissatisfaction).

So, if you are looking for a way to give potential customers peace of mind about your offering, why not send them a sample? Give them the opportunity to interact with you and decide for themselves whether your claims are true (building trust) and potentially express excitement about you and your offering (building loyalty and positive feedback). You, too, can elicit spontaneous smiles when your recipients come home to a package of possibility waiting for them to open.

Lessons from the Holidays – Part 1

I’ve been pondering mail a lot this holiday season, mostly due to visits with relatives who know very peripherally what it is that I do and what exactly a mailhouse is, and I came back to work with a bit more of an inspired view of what some want to dismiss as having long past its heyday.

Take cards for instance – we celebrate Christmas at the Killian household and one of the things I enjoy most about this holiday is receiving cards. Granted, I am of an age where I grew up having a pen pal from Korea I never met and a cousin who lived in Indiana that I exchanged letters back and forth with between our twice-yearly visits, so I have a pretty solid relationship with mail, but I love getting these holiday greetings and cannot imagine them being replaced by electronic media.

I think there are lessons to be learned from those cards that should be applied to mail generally for better effectiveness:

  • Send to everyone who might have interest: I’ve been slow on the uptake with this one as I’ve always justified “only families with kids” do this (which I’ve just recently become), but I’ve been missing out on some key segments (in both the sending and receiving arena) by subscribing to this logic. Put yourself in your potential recipient’s shoes and consider whether they would appreciate you reaching out to them. Most often, they would rather get the message than potentially feel snubbed by being excluded.
  • Make it interesting: A greeting store card is nice, but a photo montage card is even better! I enjoy seeing how my friends families are evolving and appreciate the “peek” into their world. Consider how you can share at that level with your customers and what they would find interesting to know about you or more importantly, how something about you reflects on (or effects) them.
  • Make it personal: Without a doubt, my favorite cards include the “Year in Review” letter. I know they are often fodder for jokes and can certainly be done wrong (though I think it would be interesting for active Facebook or Twitter users to do a “Year In Review” using their status posts/tweets), but a well-written letter leaves you feeling like you’ve just gotten off the phone with your long-lost friend and have re-established that connection. Try to make your communication with your audience establish that connection: well-maintained data and targeted messaging will do a lot to get you there but don’t forget to leave the “real-ness” in your messaging. If the government says corporations are in fact people, then lets make messaging from them more personal.

Mail is still an amazing communication medium – and though we are facing another rate increase this month, it is still quite a value for its potential. As with every other advertising medium, it is evolving and what worked 10 years ago, 5 years ago or even last year, may not be what works today – but that speaks much more to the rate of change due to technology and information. Keep your messages personal, interesting and keep sending – and you will continue to see results!

I have a few more thoughts on holidays + mail that I’ll save for my next post… Happy 2012!

USPS Changes

A couple big changes announced over the past couple days at the USPS worth mentioning:

1) In Home Dates no longer honored

View this letter to read the official notice; the USPS is saying they will no longer use the “In Home By” dates printed on the outside of mail, but will instead only use the following factors for processing mail:

  •  mail entry location
  • critical entry time
  • mail type
  • applicable Service Standard

Before you let this change get you down about mail meeting your delivery window, know that the transportation system and discounts for closer-to-destination delivery have been seriously beefing up over the past decade – so with a little planning regarding delivery (which we’ll take care of for you), you can cut time mail is in transit by drop-shipping mail closer to the addresses that are receiving your message.

Additionally, this might be a great time to try adding mailpiece tracking using the new Intelligent Mail barcode – it’s easy to add, easy to track and gives you the complete picture of when your mail is arriving in-home. Check out this video for a brief introduction on our track-n-trace service!

2) Self-Mailer revised rules are in effect now

The USPS has published a new set of rules regarding self-mailers (letter sized mail that is not bound) that is similar to the recent change in letter-size booklets. The most notable changes are:

  • size: new max size 6 x 10.5 x .25 (was 6.125 x 11.5 x .25)
  • weight: max 3 ounces (was 3.3 ounces)
  • tabbing: no single tabbing allowed, preference for glue closure, no perfed tabs, new tabbing placement specs (updated 12.02.11 reference)
  • final fold: horizontal fold: final fold on bottom (no open bottom)

These changes are effective immediately but will not be required until January 2013. We’ll continue to work with you during this transition phase to ensure your mailpiece design qualifies you for the best possible postage discounts.

The season for giving

Action will be hosting our 6th Annual Holiday Food & Fund Drive from November 28th thru December 2nd, 2011.

Each year, our employees donate over 1,000 pounds of food for Second Harvest Heartland and we are inviting you to join in on the giving! We make it easy to do:

  1. Fill a bag full of food or other household goods (see list of Most Needed Items 2011), then
  2. Contact us to schedule a pick up of your donated items, and then
  3. Feel really good about doing something so simple yet so powerful!

We also have a site set up for those who would prefer to make a tax-deductible donation here.

We encourage you to join in the season for giving after you give thanks with the ones you love.

Happy Thanksgiving!