We moved from a partnership model to a limited corporation a couple of weeks ago.
Within two days of registering on companies house, I received six letters from various banks encouraging me to open a business account with them.
It reminded me of one of the first outreach campaigns we ran when we opened.
We sent 100 handwritten letters to local businesses pitching ourselves and our services.
With over 30 replies, the campaign was a hit. The problem, however, was that it took hours to set up.
Letters are out of fashion. When did you last write a letter to anyone that wasn’t a birthday or Christmas card?
Maybe they shouldn’t be, however.
Gary Halbert
Gary Halbert was a famous copywriter back in the 80s who was exceptionally successful at direct marketing.
One of his tricks was to staple a foreign currency banknote at the top of every letter he sent. He also had a typewriter, of which the keys were his handwriting.
The whole point was to get the other person’s attention – Halbert was a practitioner of the “AIDA” framework (Attention, Interest, Desire, Action).
The strange death of cold email
Why am I talking about any of this?
I think cold email is dying out. Sure, it’s easy to create an automated template and blast out 10,000 offers, hoping one sticks.
However, from people I’ve spoken to in the lead gen industry, they’re having to send more and more emails for their clients’ campaigns compared to just last year.
Even hyper-personalised emails are doing worse because people get so many offers.
Cold-calling might be making a comeback; at least, that’s what the salespeople I’ve spoken to have said.
LinkedIn automation, too. But apparently, that’s past its crest of effectiveness.
Is direct mail back in?
This is all theory - we haven’t run a direct mail campaign in ages. However, a few things do come to mind.
Firstly, your recipient will probably open your letter. It’s unusual enough, especially in 2024.
When was the last time you got a handwritten letter?
Secondly, they know you’ve taken the time to contact them individually. You can’t automate handwriting (at least not yet, anyway).
Thirdly, handwriting a letter encourages forces you to personalise to that person.
What’s the point in handwriting a letter along a template that doesn’t address their particular pain points, company details, etc?
Artificial Intelligence
Artificial intelligence is automating more and more.
Eventually, we’ll never know for sure whether anything we see online is real or fake.
That personalised email? Did AI write it?
Even cold calling might slowly phase out. I’ve already seen telemarketing bots that use generative AI text-to-speech.
So, in the new hyperreality, maybe the things we can see and touch will become even more key.
We don’t use AI to write content, but you might.
Check out our five must-know when creating marketing content with AI.