However, if you can replace that insert with a targeted colour message on the prime document, you can be sure that the consumer will look at that message for between 1-3 minutes. Due to the increased attention to your message, response rates can increase by anything up to 800%. This is why `true transpromo` mailings are so exciting to customers.

A statement is a statement, right?

WRONG. Using a combination of bold design, colour print and variable data, you can turn your statement (or any transactional document) into valuable marketing tools that allow you to both retain and inform customers. By using, or allowing others to use, the white space on your transactional documents it is now possible to generate valuable extra revenue. This action will bring excellent results with customer acceptance.

Already 20% of the UK’s top 100 loyalty schemes are now printing transpromo adverts in the white space of their statement mailings, a report has found.

The recent study from GI Solutions Group’s direct mail division, GI Direct, found that the music and entertainment, mobile phone and electronics industries had employed the strongest transpromo initiatives. The least advanced schemes were found in the credit card issuers and travel agency sectors. Patrick Headley, sales and marketing director at GI Direct, said: "As pressure is mounting on marketers to achieve improved return on marketing investment in 2009, harnessing transpromo for cross sales, or to subsidise scheme costs through third party advertising revenue, is turning into a commercial imperative."

The recession has created a timely opportunity for companies to capitalise on transpromotional advertising and design opportunities within billing and statement documents, DST Output has said.

In a recent survey commissioned by the company, nearly two-thirds of respondents said they reviewed their bills more closely to check their accuracy and to look to opportunities to cut them. The most reviewed bills were found to be those from credit card, energy and mobile phone companies. The survey also highlighted that more consumers were delaying payments until final demands, or are more readily switching suppliers. (A customer retention strategy beyond the traditional ‘enhancing of brand’ via mass market media, or product discounting is needed to resolve this growing concern).

DST Output chief executive Tim Delahay said: "More than half the respondents questioned stated that they are looking to change service suppliers – now is the time that businesses must use every communications channel open to them effectively to keep customers loyal.  "Work with our clients has shown that businesses who invest in clever design and targeted messaging on bills and statements can reduce debtor days and improve relationships with customers."

Most of us already receive some type of TransPromo mail pieces, such as flyers or vouchers that accompany a department store credit card bill. However, TransPromo is effective beyond lowering the cost of delivering advertisements. For one, it gets a better response.  Bills get opened and reviewed. You have a captive audience. By placing messages directly on your customers’ bills, you can take advantage of prime real estate to call attention to time-sensitive offers, to cross-sell or upsell certain services, such as bundled telephone and Internet service, or offer tips on maximising cell phone usage.

The main secret to an effective TransPromo strategy is to use all the customer information in your address database and other customer-related files to create business communications that are truly relevant to the recipient. Today’s software makes it possible to parse customer data and link it back to core systems that combine transactional information with marketing messages that reflect the recipient’s individual tastes and interests. You then can leverage the information you have on a customer to get much closer to their needs. And printing this information directly onto the billing statement instead of having to design and produce a separate ad results in lower paper and printing costs.

Are inserts on the way out?

Often yes, simply because it’s cheaper. But giving up traditional inserts does not mean you have to give up on creativity; transactional documents don’t have to be plain-vanilla, functional statements anymore. Affordable digital print technologies make it possible to combine the regular monthly statement and marketing communications with full colour used to print attention-grabbing graphics or photographs, which have been shown to have a greater impact and generated higher response rates than a typical one-size-fits-all promotional direct mail piece.

TransPromo documents don’t even have to be printed. Electronic presentment of a bill can be integrated with multichannel marketing communications. Although experience to date shows slow adoption rates for electronic billing, eliminating even 10 percent of printing and mailing costs by switching to electronic billing can translate into significant cost savings. Electronic TransPromo documents can be designed to match the printed items so customers feel comfortable migrating to electronic media and don’t have to navigate through unfamiliar formatting. And, of course, electronic bill presentment is another way to add revenue with easy-to-access offers for online buyers and to sidestep the postal rate increases. (read more here)

Success Requires Merging More Than Just Data

Leveraging what we know about the customer converts cost-based transactional communications into revenue-producing vehicles. Marketing people immediately see the advantages. However, statistics show that 64 percent of companies lack a formal strategy for using their customer data. This lack of strategy puts a burden on the IT department implementing TransPromo documents, because additional programming time is required to mine data when the IT staff already is responsible for other mission-critical concerns. Often, with no budget for such requests and a focus to meet the tight turnaround times to get bills out the door and revenue back into the company, the idea of creating TransPromo documents could be seen as an interference with production goals.

But in the end, every department’s goals within an enterprise are really the same. Marketing wants to promote its messages to gain more revenue. IT wants to move things along more quickly to gain more revenue. And the finance department wants to do all of it in the most economical way to protect revenue. Does TransPromo have the magic necessary to accomplish these requirements and is it worth the effort? The answer is yes. When every department understands the benefits of TransPromo — increased response and conversion rates, decreased overall costs and improved customer loyalty — it is something everyone can get excited about.

Getting Creative With TransPromo

While TransPromo offers an innovative way to get your regular billings to do double service, fully automated volume mailing still offers the lowest postage price per item. In order to keep those discounts, billers must follow all NZ. Post requirements, and these, too, have been changing over the last couple of years. As the rates go up, it’s more important than ever to understand and comply with postal regulations. Failing to do so can mean paying higher rates for noncompliant pieces, or losing the discount for the whole mailing.

The cost of postage has been rising steadily. While no one likes to see a rate increase, billers that are moved to review their print/mail production processes and capabilities and to seek ways to improve their costs and efficiencies will be better for it..

A TransPromo strategy can help companies find creative ways to reach customers while reducing costs. It is more than adding a single-line — and often overlooked — announcement at the bottom of the bill. Color, graphics and highly personalized messaging based on customer demographics can result in connecting more meaningfully with your customer base and generating more sales.

It simply makes economical sense to add that newsletter or insert in with the bill because you can send these materials together for less money than it would cost to send them separately. And adding your messaging directly to the bill with TransPromo is an even more effective vehicle for building a customer relationship, generating customer loyalty and awareness, and getting maximum results from your mailing dollars — all in one package.