The Marines’ 2011 recruiting brochure provides a case in point. The trifold brochure promotes the Frederick C. Branch Leadership Scholarship, which is awarded to prospects who meet Marines requirements and agree to attend a selected historically black college or university. (White, Latino and Asian American students are eligible also.)

The brochure presents a variety of photos illustrating the Marines experience, including action-themed photos of military missions. Additional photos of African American aviators and judges suggest the range of vocations recruits can select from the Marines Occupational Specialties program. To incentivize prospects, the brochure includes information about financial assistance, and is complemented with two perforated Business Reply Mail® Cards for recipients to give to friends.

“We understand that not everybody responds to solicitations via the web, so the other way that we intimately reach prospects is through direct mail and collateral materials,” says Peter Brown, UniWorld account director for the Marines Corps. “Direct mail is really the intimate, one-to-one brand relationship mechanism that drives prospects to action.”

Read more about multicultural marketing in our Q&A with a panel of experts.

And then there’s the spending power. The Selig Center projects that African American buying power in the United States will rise from $957 billion in 2010 to $1.2 trillion in 2015. Asian Americans are expected to wield $696.5 billion in buying power by 2015. Meanwhile, the purchasing power of America’s 10.4 million Latino households already exceeds $1 trillion.

So why, in light of these massive strides and shifts in U.S. demographics, do so many American brands and businesses still seem to struggle with getting tailored, appropriate and effective messages about their products and services to such ethnically diverse consumers? What’s right with multicultural marketing these days? What’s wrong? And how does direct marketing get better?

In an effort to foster open discussion about these and other pertinent questions, Deliver convened a panel of distinguished multicultural marketing specialists, the sort of independent minds you consult when you’re ready to get serious about connecting with diverse consumers. Though most panelists agreed that marketing to diverse targets (especially African Americans and Latinos) has steadily improved, they also agreed that U.S. companies still have much progress to make.

As successful multicultural marketers such as McDonald’s and the U.S Marines understand, multicultural marketing is not some advertising backwater, but a veritable ocean of potential opportunities. Yet as our panelists explain in the proceeding roundtable, multicultural marketing is not a smash-and-grab plundering of ethnic wealth. When done right, marketing to diverse consumers is ultimately a supportive investment in the communities that you do business in. For more insights on how to earn the trust, faith and dollars of this combined $2 trillion market, read the Q&A below.

Q: Give us a widescreen view of multicultural marketing. Have things improved from, say, a decade ago?

Miller: I don’t know if it’s gotten better, but it has evolved to include other segments. Back in the day, multicultural marketing, that meant African American. Now it’s expanded to include other groups. Some even refer to “cross-cultural marketing” because marketers are looking at how to connect one message with more than one segment.

Bynum: It has improved in front of the camera, where you see more African American models and more African Americans in commercials. So you see the face. However, you don’t find those African Americans behind the camera, behind the concepts, and that’s where you get a lot of mistakes.

Q: What are the most common mistakes companies make when attempting to market to diverse audiences?

Lopez-Knowles: Mistake number one: Assuming that if I target the Spanish-language-dominant, first-generation Hispanic with Spanish-language television advertising, then I’ve covered the Hispanic market and done my job. Mistake number two: Assuming that I’m reaching the English-language-dominant, second-generation Hispanic with my general-market advertising. You may be reaching them, but are you making an effective connection? Are you touching them? Mistake number three: Neglecting to create unique marketing efforts to target the bilingual/bicultural English-language-dominant Hispanic. This group needs to be reached in a culturally, linguistically and intellectually relevant fashion. Speaking to them in the same manner they speak to each other validates them and drives effective brand connections.

Bynum: I think the biggest mistake is not getting involved. The best companies create and participate in some events, such as sponsorships that make a difference in the community, or they may be a major player in something that the community specifically identifies as part of their culture. The companies that do multicultural marketing well do a form of integrated marketing where they’re not just placing ads, doing billboards or starting a Facebook account.

Miller: I think they’re making many of the same mistakes in that the African American and Latino segments continue to be undervalued and underrepresented. With African Americans, it’s just seeing us as a monolith, and not recognizing that we’re not just different from the mainstream — but also different from each other. I think it might be the same with Latinos. Many marketers are still identifying Latinos as only Mexicans. They don’t understand that Puerto Ricans are different from Cubans, who are different from Mexicans, who are different from Dominicans.

Simmons: You can’t talk to all of us the same way. Where we are in life defines our wants and needs. For example, Family A (a mom in her 30s, a dad in his 30s, two kids) and Single Man/Woman A (in his or her 20s) can live in the same neighborhood, but they may not have the same needs or interests. Too often marketers just cast a wide net and go for the sweet spot — young teens and adults with disposable income. Let’s say we took a poll in that same neighborhood and asked everyone, “Who speaks for Black America?” I guarantee you’d get different answers. But if you restructure that question and ask males, ages 18 to 25, “Who is the most influential African American?” you may start to get more consistent answers. You have to define the segment of the multicultural audience you wish to reach and use the elements that connect best with that group.

Q: Do you suspect that some mainstream marketers are not engaging for fear of rousing racial sensitivities?

Miller: Well, yes. Multicultural marketing does require more time, and it’s more challenging. There’s a lot of dynamics, a lot of politics. First of all, if it doesn’t come from senior management, many lower-level marketers don’t care. So if there’s no senior management buy-in, you get this non-chalant attitude toward targeted advertising. But when you do have senior management buy-in, you’re more likely to invest in research, because doing research with these segments gives you a lot of ammunition. If you’re not talking to them, how do you know them? With a lot of these guys, it’s a case of “my next door neighbor is black” or “my kid’s tutor is Indian,” so they feel that they’re in there.

Q: How do companies avoid any appearance of insensitivity or presumptuousness that comes with this shallow understanding?

Cherry: The messaging has to come from a strategic place that’s driven from the insights, not just putting a black or Hispanic family there and writing a headline that says, “Come buy my stuff.” It’s to capture that moment and experience that maybe your average mass marketer has not thought about. For instance, when I do direct mail, it’s about bringing out a message that something happened in your life many years ago — or it could have been yesterday — and I’m bringing it back and sort of sharing with you and everybody else. Those things make people feel comfortable.

Q: What about creative in multi­cultural marketing? We’ve all seen the racially ambiguous model who’s intended to pass for every person of color …

Miller: It’s not wrong to do that, per se. Ideally, that’s how everybody says we should live. But we continue to find that if you’re African American or Latino or Asian — if a brand has an effective campaign with a targeted, all-ethnic cast — ethnically diverse consumers are more likely to pay attention to the ad. In focus groups, they say they don’t — but trust me, they do.

Cherry: It starts with having an idea that is honest — especially with direct mail. A lot of times you’re using stock photography and images that are very staid. You have to stay away from those images. Imagine a photographer came into your house for a family dinner. The photographer would be there almost like a photojournalist, capturing that moment. Multicultural audiences are really attuned to authenticity, and when we see it done wrong, we’ll say that’s clearly not us and throw it away.

Q: Given this, how effective then is direct mail at reaching ethnically diverse consumers?

Bynum: I look to direct mail to get a feel for what your brand is all about. The other mediums are in the air, and I can cut them off at any time. With direct mail, at least they have to look at it.

Lopez-Knowles: I think direct mail is effective in reaching Hispanic consumers as long as it’s hyper-targeted. By that, I mean that merely selecting a Spanish surname from a database and using that as the opportunity to deliver a Spanish-language-only piece of direct mail to a perceived Spanish-language household is a mistake. To work effectively, direct mail marketers need to have a deep understanding of target composition. What language do they prefer? Are they U.S. born? Are they an influencer? What does their multigenerational household look like? Knowledge of these variables and the ability to leverage them to create a tailored marketing piece will drive results. That’s hyper-targeted direct mail.

Simmons: Some of the most promising stats I’ve seen say that only 30.5 percent of African Americans are exposed to direct mail, but more than 75 percent read what they receive. So if three out of four are willing to take the time to read what you have to say, why aren’t more marketers taking advantage of it?

Cherry: Direct mail is beyond the answer. You want the audience to invite you into their homes so you can have a conversation. Direct mail will get you there, Day One.

Q: What are the best ways of integrating mail with other channels to capture diverse consumers?

Lopez-Knowles: One of the most effective ways is to ensure that the total consumer experience is absolutely synchronized. Multichannel planning ensures that each media vehicle used has an objective and works synergistically to build a greater, more relevant consumer experience.

Droz: Coordination and consistency of the campaign and messaging, for starters. The big priority is to establish an identity, and that’s harder to do with different messages, themes and campaigns that may end up in different media. Keep logos, theme lines and imagery as consistent, or singular, as possible. Plus, ideally, you’ll synergize the efforts from each platform. I’m big on storytelling, so sometimes you have one character in one medium interacting in another platform with additional characters, or storylines.

Simmons: When you work with multiple channels like digital and direct, each piece needs to be able to work independently. But all together, they tell the big story. The DM can be used to direct the audience to mobile and online sites. Mail pieces can also be interactive.

Q: What advice would you give on improving the quality of direct mail targeted at diverse consumers?

Lopez-Knowles: I’d say ensure that multiple lists can be secured, that your list is well-scrubbed, that you have a compelling offer based on your knowledge of the target, and that your creative and messaging are communicated and written in a way that effectively connects with the target and/or multiple members of the target’s household.

Droz: I would put every emphasis and effort on the creative. Make not only your message creative, but more important, make the piece itself stand out from all the others who so often do by-the-numbers advertising. Clutter is clutter, no matter what industry you’re in. You want the person to always say, “Wow!” when they see your piece, or message, or product.

Q: Blacks and Hispanics are often discussed when talking multicultural marketing. But what about Asian Americans? Do marketers underserve them?

Cherry: The reality is that for the most part, marketers focus largely on acculturated Asian Americans and lump them into the general consumer market, as their perception is that they behave very much like the general consumer market. It’s unfortunate that companies don’t take as serious a look on the impact of Asian sub-culture on the mainstream.

Q: What are proper ways to reach out to Asian American consumers?

Cherry: In some instances at UniWorld, we communicate by looking at the Asian American market through racial or ethnic lenses, in which case we look at levels of acculturation versus a more holistic approach that considers not only the racial or ethnic foundation of a group of consumers, but also what other factors unite that group of consumers as informed by overall culture. Hence, appropriately messaged high-end marketing activities, including direct mail, work well with Asian American consumers.

Q: What does the future hold for multicultural marketing?

Droz: Good question. There is the need to not — and pardon the term here — ghetto-ize, or stereotype, the multicultural audience. There is a huge upscale segment out there that likes nice things, and will spend money on them. That transcends race.

Simmons: Marketers are going to have to adapt to where the audience exists. Look at who are the real influencers for the multicultural market. Look at social media and even bloggers who have emerged to become a voice in the multicultural market. There’s a place for direct marketing in all of this. Some smart thinking can make it work.

Lopez-Knowles: I think the future is about more personalized relationships that drive advocacy. It’s about influence and the effect that the greater network has on results. It’s about providing the influencers with the tools to tap in to their networks in order to drive activism. And that’s true across language, generations, cultural backgrounds, media, or what have you.

Picture this: You’re a beauty professional in Florida who receives a photo envelope in the mail with a bunch of snapshots that show why you might want to team up with the iStudio Salons chain and a personalized sticky note urging you to call for information.

That innovative use of direct mail wowed the judges and took home the top spot in the Deliver magazine Marketing Achievement in Innovation and Leadership (M.A.I.L.) Award for 2012. The mailer, created by Barbara Sibley, president of Sibley Smart Copy in Connecticut, generated a response rate of 4.7% among an audience that had ignored two earlier mailings, and generated an ROI of more than 1,000%.

In addition, the judges named two other entries as award winners:

• Dr. Garmont’s Magical Marketing Mailer was a self-promotional piece created by Infinity Direct of Plymouth, Minn., designed as an old-time doctor’s bag complete with “remedies” for common marketing ills.

• They Got What They Wanted, a promotion for John Deere excavating equipment, created by McCullough Creative in Dubuque, Iowa, featured an innovative series of pullout panels that opened to reveal the equipment.

Filling out the top 10 finalists (in alphabetical order) were:

• Community: For Your Consideration Campaign, a direct mail package urging judges to nominate the TV show Community for an Emmy Award. Created by Yes Design Group.

• Focus Active Park Assist, a mailer from Ford featuring a vehicle that “parks itself” in the mailer when opened, demonstrating a new feature of the Focus. Created by Team Detroit.

• Mobile Broadband Activation Program, created for Lenovo, featuring a dimensional mailer shaped like a wallet. Created by Alpha Marketing Inc.

• Personalized Uniform Resource Locator Program from the Diocese of Albany Catholic Schools linking middle school students to Catholic high schools in their area, with innovative use of personalized URLs. Created by Cathedral Corp.

• Special Ops, a spy-themed package featuring an MP3 player with a message to customers, sent on behalf of CSG International. Created by Hodgson/Meyers Communication.

• Sushi Social Invitation, sent by Curve Dental Inc. to invite prospective customers to a dinner meeting, with a themed box that included a set of chopsticks. Created by Curve Dental.

• Turning Direct Mail Up to 11, a Halloween-themed promotion for an American Marketing Association of Oklahoma event, that featured a dimensional cardboard coffin with plastic vampire teeth and other related items. Created by Robyn Promotions.

On this Sunday last summer, the Omaha Storm Chasers could well have sent a record crowd of 9,023 fans home disappointed in a 2-0 loss. The ballgame wasn’t what they had filled the place to see, though; the ballgame seldom gets the star’s treatment here.

The rocket’s red glare always does.

“Obviously, the biggest night for us, in our storied history, is always that Fourth of July weekend,” says Ben Hemmen, the promotions manager for the Storm Chasers. “That weekend is the highlight of our summer.”

Few people who follow Minor League Baseball™ would disagree.

The Fourth is all teams can hope for: warm weather, kids out of school, holiday time. The peculiar mix serves as a blueprint for packed ballparks and long lines at concession stands, which is why fireworks on Independence Day highlight the promotional calendar for minor league teams.

They send out a lot of material about their promotions. They have to.

While baseball remains the national pastime, the sport often finds itself in a tug-of-war for people’s free time and entertainment dollars. To win, minor league teams can’t count on the quality of the product they put on the diamond. Instead, while the big-league parents provide and pay the ballplayers, the minor league affiliates create the unforgettable moments.

New twists on the ol’ ball game

Minor league teams promise a good time at the ballpark, and they deliver.

Yet like any business today, baseball teams have to promote their product hard. In a world of social media and online connections, teams like the Storm Chasers tweet, text, blog and use Facebook. Direct mail is also a serious player in the marketing media mix.

You can chat away on instant messaging, but nothing connects with people better than a letter, Hemmen says. A letter has a visceral feel that the impersonal world of tweets and texts and e-mails never duplicates.

“E-mails are great,” he says. “But so many times e-mails get lost, or you’ve got the wrong e-mail address. We all get caught up with the idea of instant communication. People can hold a letter; it’s tangible, and it doesn’t get lost that way.”

Hemmen doesn’t want a single promotion of his to get lost on Storm Chasers fans; 1,500 of them are season ticketholders.

He’s hardly alone in that regard. Teams from the East Coast to West mirror what the Storm Chasers (a Triple-A club) do, and weave a range of communications into their promotional strategies.

Tweets, texts, IMs and e-mails fit well into that strategy. They deliver baseball info in an instant. But Hemmen, who augments his digital marketing with monthly newsletter mailings to fans, and other baseball marketers know relying on these social media alone is to slow the flow of information. The mail serves as a valuable communication link between social media and baseball fans.

Fan mail

The Trenton Thunder thinks so, anyway.

For the 2012 season, the Double-A ball club is letting fans know about its “All-You-Can-Eat” nights.

And how? The U.S. mail.

The flyers the Thunder mails tell fans that, for the price of a single ticket, they can pig out on hot dogs, burgers and cheeseburgers, says Bill Cook, director of public relations. “People get a kick out of it,” Cook says. “It’s free — free food at the ballpark. You can’t go wrong there.”

Baseball fans can find more than hot dogs and popcorn on the Thunder’s promotional calendar. To draw them to the 6,440-seat Mercer County Waterfront Stadium, the team uses no-doubt-about-it promotions like “Thirsty Thursdays,” “$1 Dog Night” and “Bobblehead Night,” a promotion that even big-league teams use.

The Thunder tries to put a different spin on the latter. The team has decked out these dolls with the big, plastic wobbling heads in different uniforms, put two players on one figurine and given out miniature versions of the traditional bobblehead.

“I keep waiting for the fad to die,” Cook says. “But people still love bobblehead giveaways.”

Bobbleheads make a cheap, popular promotion, and a good promotion seldom dies; it just remakes itself. Even if one were to die, a minor league front office somewhere would resurrect it from the grave.

There’s not much the Asheville Tourists need to resurrect, says Jon Clemmons, the team’s promotions and merchandise manager. The Tourists use cost-friendly, unique promotions to satisfy their loyal fans and encourage visitors to attend a game at the 4,000-seat historic McCormick Field.

The Tourists target each customer group with some sort of promotion depending on the day of the week. Clemmons sends out reminders of the daily promotions — from a “kids eat free” pizza night to a senior appreciation night — prior to each home stand. Electronic media, the local newspaper, Twitter, Facebook and blogs help spread the word.

Switching it up

The marketing mix Clemmons formulates works wonderfully for Asheville, a Single-A team. It might not work in Omaha, Trenton or other places across the minor league landscapes.

Take the Tucson Padres.

One audience the Tucson Padres cater to is the military, says Tim Hagerty, the media relations director for the Triple-A team.

How could they not?

Within a half-tank of gas from Kino Stadium are Davis-Monthan Air Force Base and Fort Huachuca Army Garrison, which means men and women in uniform are everywhere you turn.

Hagerty says the Tucson Padres are mindful of that large audience. So the team has its $1.50 beer nights with fireworks and all the standard minor league fare. But the Tucson Padres turn their home games on Sundays into a salute to the military, a promotion they call “Military Appreciation Day.” For their Sunday games, the Tucson Padres bring in a military guard and they honor soldiers, one of whom throws out the first pitch.

“We’ve gotten a great response from the military,” Hagerty says.

Nightlights and newsletters

The Akron Aeros, the Double-A-affiliate of a major league team in the Midwest, have no built-in audience like the military they can tap, so assistant general manager Ken Fogel has to rely on what he knows will be a hit with fans: fireworks.

“No one I’ve ever talked to can explain it,” says Fogel, whose career has taken him to eight minor league stops. “Maybe the fireworks makers can, but everywhere I’ve been it’s been the same: Fireworks are popular.”

Fogel says the Aeros don’t have to do much to promote fireworks. Not anymore. Their fans know every Friday home game will be “Fireworks Night,’ and for this season, Saturday games will be a “Fireworks Night” too.

Meanwhile, the team uses its mail-marketing dollar to promote its mini-ticket plans. The 20-games package is easier to sell than an entire season package, particularly since the Aeros open their home schedule in the chill of an Ohio April.

To sell their mini-packages, the Aeros, who have a 20,000-person e-mail list, target ZIP Code™ locations and regions that have expendable incomes and children.

Fogel estimates that more than 50% of what the team does to promote its ticket packages is done with mail.

Fogel’s approach in Akron is similar to most minor league franchises — aside from a team here and there like the Storm Chasers, who rely more heavily on their mail program.

Once a month, Ben Hemmen from the Storm Chasers mails a newsletter to fans. Last season, the Storm Chasers had 1,500 groups stream through the turnstiles at Werner Park, and the ball club isn’t about to let its intimate connection with those fans slip.

The team is conscious of not crossing the line, though. It wants the intimacy, but it doesn’t want to go beyond what its fans expect from the pop-culture icon baseball is.

Fans want fireworks; they get fireworks. For nothing is more American at a ballgame on Independence Day than fireworks. Except maybe $1 dogs.

“Our sole purpose is to cater to the fans,” Hemmen says. “We want to be able to offer them an opportunity to enjoy a family-friendly, fun environment, and that’s what our ballpark does.”

Small Business – Glenn Weissman
Vice President, Business Development, Ebony Marketing Research

My daughter-in-law bought a beauty salon. After buying it, she didn’t have much money left for advertising, but she did have enough for an effective, laserfocused direct mail program. The family helped her focus on new movers, since they are very likely candidates to need a new hair stylist. She also targeted new engagements, since weddings and spa parties provide good opportunities for a salon. Her meticulously targeted, ongoing direct mail efforts created a never-ending flow of new customers — and for just a minimal investment. That’s a recipe for success for any small business.

Medium Business – Penelope Welch, CFRE
Director of Philanthropy, Capital Caring

To reach a $1 million direct mail revenue goal for hospice programs, we worked with DirectMail.com to segment our donor database based on giving profiles and to craft personalized messaging. This approach increased our revenue, number of donors and average gift amount, even while saving more than 25 percent on our direct mail costs. A later appeal effort yielded an additional $140,000, with the average gift rising from $27 to $62, thanks to DirectMail.com’s precise targeting, graphics design, envelope teasers and inserts. In a challenging 2010, results exceeded 2008 and 2009 by 27 percent and 29 percent, respectively.

Large Business –Scott Coggin
Vice President, Marketing Data Services, dDirect

Georgia Tech asked us to develop a direct mail program for recruiting high school football players by effectively communicating the university’s unique sports history as well as its top-ranked academic programs. We created and produced weekly, personalized mailings full of information and colorful photography about the coaches and players, the team and the school to a targeted list of 1,000 high school players and their coaches. Along with winning a national direct marketing award, we take great pride in helping the Yellow Jackets build a winning team!

The company produces the iTextDirectory.com, a 16- to 24-page directory that promotes local businesses along with text numbers for coupons, offers and promotions. Recipients can use the directory to find an attorney, dentist, day care, car dealership or virtually any other service.

The directories offer an exclusive to advertisers (one attorney per issue, or one auto sales firm) and have a shelf life of about three months, which allows customers to use the book as a reference not just once or twice, but continually for several months, says Debbie Drury, president of Market Doctors Direct.

To get the directory into the hands of consumers, though, the company takes a very targeted approach, relying on Every Door Direct Mail^® from the U.S. Postal Service.^®

“We’ve had five times the response rate with Every Door Direct Mail, compared to e-mailed coupons,” Drury says. “And sometimes the rate has been higher than 7 percent, with the combination of adding in the mobile text coupon feature. People are busy and get so many e-mails that they can’t answer them all in one day. Today consumers want fast, instant, immediate answers and results.”

Every Door Direct Mail allows businesses of all sizes to target customers in specific geographic areas by ZIP Code,™ neighborhood or delivery route without the time or expense required to compile a list of the names and addresses of everyone in that area.

Under Every Door Direct Mail, all mailings can be distributed by Postal carriers as supplements along with that day’s mail to every door that businesses want to reach. The Every Door Direct Mail tool also lets advertisers see how many businesses and homes are within a certain area or radius of a specific location (see “Reach Every Door … Easily” below for details).

Market Doctors Direct uses ZIP Code locations to identify the specific markets it wants to target, then uses the Every Door Direct Mail online tool to pull together the paperwork for the mailing.

While regional companies like Market Doctors have been steady users of the service, large national companies also are finding Every Door Direct Mail can be an important asset to their marketing efforts. Many chains are using the service to test advertising campaigns in specific areas before deciding whether to take them nationally, or even worldwide.

One multinational fast-food restaurant chain has utilized Every Door Direct Mail to fuel its marketing success and continue its growth. The chain, which operates 320 restaurants in 10 countries, including 50 in the United States, has been so pleased with the program that it has made it part of its company-wide marketing efforts.

The company was looking for a delivery channel that could provide reliability. It wanted to make sure its promotional materials were reaching its customers and it wanted to know who was getting the mailers. All of that was accomplished by using Every Door Direct Mail. That was an assurance it didn’t find through other distribution channels, such as e-mail.

Typical of its marketing efforts was a recent mailing of 8,000 postcards offering special discounts on meals. The results were considered excellent with a 4% to 5% response rate, compared to the normal 1% for such efforts.

The initial mailing was in the Washington, D.C., area, but its success easily convinced the company executives to expand such campaigns throughout the chain. Officials knew the offer — a significant discount — would appeal to most consumers if the postcards reached the intended audience.

Thanks to Every Door Direct Mail, that was not a problem.

Reach Every Door … Easily

Using Every Door Direct Mail allows advertisers to reach key target markets, without having to compile – or maintain – names and addresses. Here’s a quick look at how it works:

1. The Every Door Direct Mail website houses the online tools needed for the process. You can choose to create the mailing and drop it at the Post Office™ or, if you’re already the holder of a mailing permit, to drop it at a Business Mail Entry Unit.

2. The website will capture your information, then present you with a tool that allows you to define the area you want to reach by city, by ZIP Code, by county or by using a location, such as the address of your store or business.

3. You can decide whether you want to reach city addresses, rural addresses or PO Boxes, and whether you want residential only, or business addresses too. You can even view the addresses selected in a map format that allows you to carefully designate the area you want to reach, right down to selecting specific carrier routes.

4. Click the submit button and the tool does the rest, furnishing you with a count of how many addresses are in the defined area and the cost to mail to them. The tool will even print out the correct forms for you to take with you to the Post Office when you drop off the piece you want to mail.

5. Need to know more? Visit usps.com/everydoordirectmail for more information.

Want more? Check out the case study.