• by October 5, 2011

Print for marketing and communications is expensive, bad for the environment, not interactive, and 98.5% of it on average ends up in the circular file. Do we really need that kind of waste at this point, with the digital alternative staring us in the face?

Analysts forecast 2011 direct mail spend in the $45-50 billion range, but the long-term trend is in the tank. Overall mail volume is dropping through the floor and prices are likely to rise. A full-throttle shift from traditional to digital media is underway in most organizations.

Sure, some analysts will argue that direct mail is still the only viable acquisition tool as other channels like email have been less effective for new customer targeting, but there are too many good opportunities to replace a print experience with a more engaging and satisfying digital experience. What was once mailed can now be personalized, packed up as a now-familiar PDF and instantly hosted on a Web page just for you. If you really wanted to print the PDF, you could -- with no waiting, no postage, no mailman, no wasted fuel or resources.

But consumers aren't looking to swap a poor direct-mail experience for a poor digital experience either. Do some checking. How is the consumer experience improved by swapping digital media for direct mail? Can my own organization support the process changes needed to create and manage a new personalized, relevant, and timely digital communication flow? How can I test and prove my hypothesis?

Thinking through these questions with one of nation's largest healthcare insurance providers created some interesting insights. The program was the annual enrollment for Medicare coverage, and the current process worked something like this:

The print route:

1. People 64.5 years old are pretty tuned into the fact that they need to enroll in Medicare. In fact, according to Pew industry research, 76% of Americans ages 56-64 are online, and researching medical/health options is a key activity, as evidenced by the more than 5 million searches performed last year during the fourth quarter.

2. Those folks find an insurance provider and call a 1-800 number for more information and to request an enrollment kit.

3. Ten days later, the enrollment kit arrives at their door. It's usually a hefty package by all measures (size, weight, cost to print and ship).

4. A lot of the package is generic and might not apply to a person's geography, as benefit options can be quite specific based on provider and consumer location.

5. The kit has basically been sent into a black hole. Unless a call center agent follows up on the initial request or the consumer calls back in with questions, the disposition of that kit and buying state or intention of the consumer will remain unknown -- and more importantly, uninfluenced. Nobody knows what the consumer is up to, let alone how or when to help them.

The digital alternative:

1. That same consumer calls the 800 number to request a kit, but is immediately given an option: "Sure, I'm happy to mail a kit to you, Ms. Smith -- it will take about ten days to get to your house, or if you give me your email address, I can send you a kit online right now."

2. The email address is given without hesitation and a triggered email message appears with a link to a Web page where a customized PDF of the enrollment kit is waiting for Ms. Smith. Ms. Smith gladly opens the email and follows the link to the personalized page that contains the familiar Adobe PDF icon and clicks on it.

3. The brand knows that (a.) the email was delivered, (b.) that the link to the page with the PDF was clicked, (c.) that the link to the PDF was clicked, when, and how many times.

4. As a result of this awareness, the brand has the opportunity to influence the process. All of those activities can inform the communications and outreach programs that follow, and in any channel. For example, an agent can call a customer within 24 hours of the link-click on the PDF to offer help and answer questions.

The benefits to both parties are clear. The consumer received information immediately, many days faster than the normal process. The brand significantly reduced the risk of additional shopping by engaging immediately with the consumer and saved 100% of its print and production costs. The world is a greener place.

But what about those organizational changes? Well, as this example points out, most call center applications and CRM systems support variable scripting, and most managers have become adept at implementing them, making it relatively easy to provide the consumer choice of immediate delivery of requested information. And those trigger-based email messages, hosting of Web pages, and rendering of personalized digital documents can all now be easily managed, synchronized and produced within a single platform, eliminating the technical barriers. That's especially true when the print costs for such programs as these are measured in the tens of millions of dollars, versus a fraction of that for the digital alternative.

So what's holding you back from giving the consumer what they want when they want it, reducing your costs, and being a friend of the environment in the process?