Save Money £££’s on Your Postage Costs

The largest cost element of any direct mail campaign is the cost of postage. It is frequently 50-60% of your total budget yet it’s the area that often gets the least attention when it comes to cutting costs. 

The temptation is to demand another 5% discount from the printer or list owner when in practice, you should be applying the same technique to reduce your postage – after all a 5% reduction in this area will be worth so much more! 

The de-regularisation of the postal service several years ago has created a confusing picture with UK postal costs. Overseas mailing costs are a jungle too but here are some useful tips: 

• Try and adapt your mailing so that it is no larger than a C5 envelope (ie A4 folded once) weighing under 100gms.
• Mailsort 3 through the Royal Mail usually oers the best discounts so build in a 7 day delivery into your planning to reduce your costs. The minimum quantity for a letter is 4,000 and a larger letter (ie A4) 1,000. There is a useful postage calculator for Royal Mail postage on: www.mailsorttechnical.com
• For 2nd Class deliveries, both for smaller volumes and for quantities that qualify for Mailsort, alternative carriers such as Citylink, TNT and SecuredMail oer signicant cost savings.
• Mailings that can be machine read at the sorting stage will also qualify for additional discounts, as will mailings concentrated into fewer post code areas. 
• The weight of overseas mail is crucial as postal costs increase by each gramme. Using an overseas postal consolidator will usually save substantial sums but this will depend on the destination countries – savings do vary

Leisure Lists is the leading marketing database company specialising in the supply of B2B marketing data for email, telemarketing, or postal records for decision makers in the UK Leisure Industry. www.leisurelists.co.uk