The Commercial Economic Advisory Service of Australia (CEASA) has been conducting Media, Marketing and Advertising research for over forty years. They have found that Direct Marketing is growing at a rate of 17% per year and represents over half of all media expenditure. That is a whopping $16 Billion spent on advertising media!

A recent Panorama study showed that almost 6 million adult Australians have indicated that they like to receive special offers through Direct Mail. Also, there is evidence that over 50% of them have bought a product or service from a Direct Mail offer.

As the world gets smaller, it is easy to reach millions of households in which people are interested to get offers but who are unable to locate good offers on purchases they may wish to make. Direct Marketing gives them the chance to look through a variety of exciting offers from which they can choose what they need.

The advertising industry relies on the data from research and information services in order to find the right routes to the Direct Mail Marketing avenues. The internet has confused most consumers with its overloaded websites which move people from link to link every few seconds. Most people who browse the web to find information are usually unable to find what they need. The advantage of Direct Mail is that it allows easy access to each person with the strength and focus of one-on-one discussion.

Direct Mail includes advertising circulars, catalogues, Compact Discs (CDs), Digital Video Disc, mock credit cards with applications, sample merchandise, coupons, flyers, newsletters, etc.

Direct Mail can captivate the receiver's imagination like none other. The two dimensional pictures and advertising on the Internet fails to tantalize the viewer and hold their attention. However, the three dimensional beauty of direct mail package that the user can hold, feel, hear, smell, read, enjoy and save could be a beauty to behold. Many of the receivers keep these packs, especially if they are in postcard format, as bookmarks to enjoy forever.

Direct Mail is perfect for a country like Australia where there is a lot of rural towns and isolated areas from which people find it difficult to travel to the city and shop for what they need.

The most important step of the setup is the Customer database. This database may be created from telephone directories, private associations, one you rent from a trade group, a professional organization or a list broker. Lists of addresses can also be obtained from Direct Marketing businesses that cater to this work. You can delineate the results by age, income, occupation, gender, area, education or other interests. The more targeted the mailing list is to your product or products, the more successful your results.

After a directory is obtained, the next step is the message. The right message at the right time will enable you to get the buy-in. The easiest way to create the message is to use the pre-formatted sales flyers in the Microsoft word processor. There are many applications devoted to the creation of attractive and professionally designed inserts. People love to see flashy picture postcards, newsletters on the neighbourhood, videos of vacation spots and samples of products to try.

Personalization is the way to get to the heart of the consumer. By using their name and sending those offers on the items that they may need, Direct mail can easily persuade them to buy the item. Marketers and list sources usually note the psychographic and demographic profiles of the people who are matched to the product criteria.

Direct Mail is an efficient use of advertising dollars and the highly selective and targeted marketing has been proved to be very successful with more than 50% of the customers buying the product. The main benefits mentioned by these consumers were the value and the convenience of buying from home.