Here’s the last installment in our Direct Mail Direct-ion series!
Believe it or not, even something as simple as including a P.S. can drastically increase the response rate from a direct mailing. For starters, a P.S. is another way to solidify that personal connection with a donor that can only come from a paper letter. Think of a piece of direct mail as giving a speech to a room full of people. The most basic personalization of the letter, such as addressing the donor by their name, is the equivalent of making specific eye contact with them during the course of the speech. But the P.S. takes things one step further, like a written hand on the shoulder of a donor keeping them from leaving the room once the speech is over, with a, “Oh, one more thing. Just for you.”
A P.S. is a “secret” at the end of the letter, a literal “P.S.sst” whispered to the letter’s recipient, giving the illusion of privileged knowledge shared between friends. The best kinds of P.S.s are the ones that encourage the donor to delve back into the content again by referencing some bit of information specific to that mailing. This way, the best case scenario is that the donor reads the entire mailing twice, obviously encouraging their likeliness to send a contribution. And if there were any donors who opened the envelope to merely skim its contents, the allure of a one sentence P.S. might draw them to read that one line of copy, see a reference to the body above it, and feel obligated read the entire message.
Let us know how these direct mailing tips work out for you!
P.S. Do you agree with our thoughts above about how successful a P.S. can be?
