Another common mistake for many direct mailers is not knowing what the Long Term Value of a new customer is, and what is an acceptable cost to acquire these new customers.

Some people new to direct marketing use direct mail one time and say it didn’t work for them because the amount of initial sales from new customers didn’t pay for the mailing. Yet if they figured in how much a new customer would spend over the next year or years, they may find out that the effort was hugely successful.

If you are looking for direct mail marketing statistics to plan a successful marketing campaign, two studies are available from the National Mail Order Association, NMOA. They are, the DMA Statistical Fact Book, http://www.nmoa.org/catalog/dma/dma_stats.htm and Inside Direct Mail http://www.nmoa.org/catalog/insidedirectmail.htm