Direct mail can be an effective way to reach new and existing customers. Adding an aspect of personalisation to your direct mail campaigns can take them to a new level, improving engagement and the overall success of the campaign. If you’re wanting to know how to personalise your direct mail for better engagement you’ve come to the right place. We’ve got everything you need to know when it comes to creating an engaging, personalised direct mail campaign.
In today’s market, consumers are overloaded with generic digital messaging. Personalised direct mail is the crucial strategy that allows brands to cut through this digital noise and form a tangible, meaningful connection with the recipient. This approach transforms a simple promotional piece into a valued communication, dramatically boosting response rates and return on investment.
What is Personalised Direct Mail?
Personalised direct mail is a type of direct mail sent by an organisation to their prospective or current customers and will feature personalised content which is specific to the recipient. Therefore each mailer will be slightly different depending on who the recipient is. Aspects of personalisation can include the recipient's name, their latest purchases, their geographical location or their shopping behaviour. True personalisation goes beyond just using a name; it involves leveraging data-driven insights to ensure the imagery, offers, and messaging are entirely relevant to the individual.
How to Create Personalised Direct Mail?
To create truly personalised direct mail, you will need clean, accurate customer data. Utilising your customer database, website data, as well as past purchase and browsing data, can help you create a highly personalised direct mail campaign with relatable mailers your recipients will engage with. This requires robust data processing and hygiene to ensure maximum deliverability and relevance. Make sure that whenever you are using customer data it is in line with the Data Protection Act 2018 as well as GDPR. An integrated data strategy allows for hyper-personalisation, where the content changes dynamically for every single recipient based on their unique profile.
What Can Personalised Direct Mail be Used For?
Personalised direct mail can be used for all types of campaigns, and objectives and within various types of direct mail such as brochures, leaflets, flyers, letters, catalogues and more. Many types of businesses and organisations use personalised direct mail to reach their target audiences such as charities, local councils, retail brands, estate agents, schools and healthcare services. Beyond these, financial services often use it for highly secure and personalised account statements, while utilities companies can use it to communicate essential, segmented information regarding local service updates or tariff changes. This versatility makes it an indispensable tool for targeted communications.
Why Does Personalised Direct Mail Increase Engagement?
Adding an aspect of personalisation to a piece of direct mail allows for a deeper connection between the recipient and the message being delivered. They will be able to better relate to the content if it is tailored towards them, as well as grabbing their attention if it features their personal details such as their name. Research from the latest JICMAIL Q2 2025 results shows that Direct Mail is interacted with 4.6 times on average, and is a key driver for digital actions like website visits.
Choosing to use addressed mail over unaddressed mail has also been shown to return better engagement, with warm personalised direct mail achieving an impressive 7.9% average response rate.
It is thought that customers feel valued when they receive personalised mail and this can further strengthen the customer relationship which leads to increased loyalty and better brand perception all of which lead to better overall brand engagement. Personalisation signals respect for the recipient's time and interests, creating a positive emotional link that generic advertising cannot replicate. This trust is essential for long-term customer value.
7 Ways to Personalise Your Direct Mail for Better Engagement
1. Segment Your Audience
Segmenting your audience can help you create a more targeted campaign that in effect can be more personalised to the recipient. Using key demographics such as location, age, gender and buying habits can allow you to identify specific segments of customers that you can then send a relevant direct mailer to. Because the mailer will be more targeted toward them, the recipient is more likely to engage as they can relate to the content. This segmentation process forms the foundation of all effective personalisation.
2. Personalised Messaging
Use your customer data to create personalised messages to the recipients. Using their name is a great way to grab their attention and make them feel special, thus leading to better engagement and higher interaction. Beyond the name, this includes using contextual language related to their local area, past events they attended, or services they previously enquired about, making the message feel less like a mass-market communication.
3. Tailored Offers & Promotions
Sending a customised direct mailer with offers or promotions tailored to the recipient and their specific buying habits, demographics or characteristics is a great way to personalise your direct mail and make it relevant to the customer. The more personalised an offer is, the more likely it will be better engagement for the campaign. A highly personalised offer can include unique, single-use codes to make tracking easier and the offer feel more exclusive.
4. Personalised QR Codes
Many organisations use QR codes with their direct mail campaigns as a way to track engagement, direct customers to their online store or site, as well as provide more information. Adding a personalised QR code can be a great way to personalise your direct mail for better engagement as it will lead customers to a customised landing page with tailored content specifically designed for them. This creates a seamless 'mail-to-web' bridge that makes the transition from physical to digital effortless and measurable.
5. Utilise Variable Data Printing (VDP)
A key way to personalise your direct mail for better engagement is to use Variable Data Printing (VDP), a type of technology that allows you to print customised text, images and other elements based on an individual recipient’s data. This allows for a highly personalised mailer, so much so that each one may be completely different! VDP is the technology that makes mass hyper-personalisation possible, allowing you to change entire blocks of content, imagery, and calls-to-action without slowing down the printing process.
6. Utilise Past Purchase Behaviour
You can personalise direct mail for better engagement by including messaging surrounding the customer’s past purchase behaviour. For example, if they recently bought a pair of earrings perhaps you could send them a brochure showcasing the rest of the collection with 10% off their next purchase. Providing your customers with relevant messaging will improve engagement and result in a more successful direct mail campaign. This is particularly effective for re-engagement or loyalty campaigns.
7. Combine with Digital Marketing Efforts
Combining your direct mail campaign with other digital marketing efforts for a 360-degree personalised approach can really help to improve engagement. After sending a piece of direct mail, following up with a personalised email or social media advert can reach the customers at all touch points and bring direct mail into a broader marketing strategy. Studies show that coordinating direct mail with digital campaigns can increase response rates by up to 118%, demonstrating the power of an omni-channel strategy.
What are the Benefits of Personalised Direct Mail?
As well as increased engagement, sending personalised direct mail can have many other benefits.
- Increased Brand Awareness
- Improved Brand Loyalty
- Greater Return on Investment (ROI)
- Improved Response Rates
- Higher Conversion rates
- Strengthened Customer Relationship
- Better Targeting
Personalised Direct Mail with DMS
At DMS, we specialise in sending high-quality, personalised direct mail to drive engagement and help organisations meet their marketing objectives. We help produce, deliver and manage all aspects of your personalised direct mail campaign and can even provide data processing services to ensure high-quality data use and high deliverability rates. We utilise the latest in Variable Data Printing (VDP) technology to ensure every piece of your mailer—from the imagery to the offer code—is perfectly tailored.
Our experienced team is also always on hand to advise you on ways to use personalisation to better engagement and the overall success of your direct mail campaign. Get in touch by clicking here.