Whether you're a small business owner looking to dip your toe into direct mail marketing or a seasoned veteran of targeted mailers, you can't go wrong with PostcardMania. It has more than a decade of experience in the industry, offers a wide range of customization options, and has speedy production and shipping times. The company's all-in-one direct mail solution beats out the competition with its tracking system that lets you learn how customers react to your marketing campaigns.
PostcardMania Pricing
Costs for direct mail marketing campaigns depend on many factors. As such, the final price tag that you're quoted will differ from one campaign to another, and from the pricing we received in our testing.
To find out how much a potential campaign would cost with PostcardMania, we used the basic set of criteria that we used in all of our testing: The hypothetical campaign requires 5,000 full-color 6 x 8.5 postcards, to be designed by the company, and an accompanying mailing list of 5,000 households.
After discussing this campaign with a sales representative, we learned that the total cost of products and services without sales tax would be $1,357. The costs broke down as follows:
- 5,000 postcards: $633 at approximately 13 cents per piece
- Design services: $199
- Addressing 5,000 postcards: $275
- Resident/occupant mailing list for 5,000 homes (three uses within 90 days): $250
The sales rep we spoke to recommended running the campaign with two different run times to maximize our efficacy. Under that plan, we would need to double the number of cards printed. If we went with that option, the postcard printing price and the addressing service would have doubled to $1,265 and $550, respectively. The final total without sales tax was quoted at $2,374.
It's important to note that postage costs are invoiced and paid separately. Once the mailers are ready to be shipped, the cost is calculated based on current United States Postal Service rates.
We ran another estimate that included PostcardMania's Everywhere Small Business feature. For a 5,000-piece campaign, the cost was $800, while a 10,000 campaign was double at $1,600. But there are additional monthly fees for this service after the initial three-month period, so that's something to keep in mind.
Features
The features associated with PostcardMania's direct mail service are what really differentiate it from other companies. According to the company's website, its direct mailing solution takes a "Swiss Army knife" approach to this particular brand of marketing.
If you design a direct mail marketing campaign with PostcardMania, here are some of the features you will have at your disposal.
Direct Mail 2.0: Featuring four distinct steps that integrate the power of the internet with the company's direct mailing efforts, PostcardMania's Direct Mail 2.0 aims to bolster customer engagement using the following marketing techniques:
- Like other direct mail solutions, the company will send out postcards to your targeted mailing list. If this is successful, those homes will turn into potential new customers just through the mailed pieces.
- Using a proprietary "cutting-edge barcode technology system," PostcardMania tracks the entire mailing process, allowing you to see exactly when your postcards reach your targeted households.
- When someone visits your business's website through the link provided with the direct mail campaign, it triggers an "automatic follow-up system." Powered by Google, text and visual ads matching the postcards will follow your visitors around as they surf the web.
- Each campaign comes with a unique phone number that forwards to your business's normal phone line. Each call to the special phone number is tracked and each conversation recorded so you can monitor how your employees handle potential clients.
Like other add-ons, Direct Mail 2.0 comes with an additional cost. The company says this is "pennies per piece," but the price varies depending on the complexity of the campaign.
Everywhere Small Business: If the tracking and advertising options of Direct Mail 2.0 aren't enough for your needs, PostcardMania's Everywhere Small Business option gets your business in front of Facebook and Instagram users as well. This feature works like Direct Mail 2.0, except it also displays targeted ads using your direct mail campaign's assets on the social media platforms. It has a stronger phone call tracking system that displays a caller's full name, address, gender and age.
Everywhere Small Business has an additional cost. According to the estimate we received, the feature costs an extra 16 cents per piece, resulting in an $800 charge for 5,000 postcards. How much this feature costs to add to your mailing may differ, depending on the specifics of your postcard marketing campaign.
Quick turnaround: The time it takes for a campaign to be printed and shipped largely depends on the company and how many pieces need to be produced. According to PostcardMania, its average turnaround is somewhere between three and four weeks. Broken down even further, that time includes three to five business days for the first proof, six days to print and approximately one week to get everything shipped out.
Flexible design options: Like other direct mailing companies, PostcardMania gives you a choice between uploading your own postcard designs or hiring its in-house team to create something new for you. This process can take up to two days, though more complex graphic design options can take three or four days. What makes this feature impressive is that it allows you to make an unlimited number of revisions before anything goes to print, giving you ample opportunity to perfect your message.
Other mailer types available: While this review focuses on PostcardMania's postcard options, which include standard 4.25 x 6 cards and larger 6 x 11 postcards, the company can also print folders, door hangers, business cards and other items.
Additional Considerations
During our research, we had an exemplary customer service experience. Our process demands that we pose as a potential customer and call a vendor's customer service hotline with questions. The customer service representative at PostcardMania not only showed interest in our supposed company, but also asked follow-up questions to get a quote together for us quickly. They sent that quote directly to us by email.
Their answers to our questions were easy to understand and well-intentioned. They also told us about additional marketing services that they thought would be useful to us, such as the company's Everywhere Small Business plan.
In case you need customer service and don't want to speak with someone over the phone, PostcardMania has live chat and a FAQs section on its website.
Limitations
While PostcardMania is a strong option for postcard-based direct mailing campaigns, there are some caveats to keep in mind. When setting up an order, you will be expected to pay the entire bill upfront before any work is done.
If you're looking for specific information on PostcardMania's website, you may find it a little difficult to locate. While flashy colors and videos work for most places on the web, PostcardMania's site is cluttered, and we had to hunt around for some of the information we needed, as it was either buried in menus or just hard to find.
Any mailing lists you get through PostcardMania are 90-day rentals that you can use a maximum of three times. Other companies will sell you a mailing list, allowing you to use it as you please. This isn't too much of a drawback, however, as mailing lists can become outdated.
We also must note that, while its turnaround time is good, we found other companies with slightly faster processes. However, when others are faster, it's by one week at most, and even then, turnaround times vary greatly based on each campaign's specifications.
