A DMAB Update

April 2006

 

  1. Last month’s Direct Mail Advisory Board’s Forum was a very good one, with several examples of new and innovative products and services to better cater for Direct Marketers’ needs. The presentations are posted on our website, at http://www.upu.int/direct_mail/en/dmab_forums.shtml (I am sorry the link I gave last month was not the correct one).

 

  1. Brazil Post, for example, made a very good presentation on some of their value-added products and services. One of them, the National Address Directory (DNE®, in Portuguese), is a commercial database containing postal codes and several other address elements from all over the country. At the end of 2005, some 323 companies had already acquired a license to use DNE®, from 89 in 2003. DNE® can be used to build a multitude of tools, with purposes as important as address hygiene to standardisation. The contact information at Brazil Post is Luiz Carlos Hallay Cecilio at cecilio@correios.com.br.

 

  1. The day when a piece of Direct Mail arrives at the household of the addressee is often a critical factor for the success of a campaign. Swiss Post has just introduced an innovative service: OnTime Mail, a solution for delivery of bulk mail (and especially advertising mail) on a fixed day of the week, including Saturday, if the customer so wishes. Information in French, German and Italian can be found at Swiss Post’s website, www.post.ch. The brochure in French is available at http://www.post.ch/fr/pm_broschure_ontime_mail.pdf.

 

  1. Lists are the core of any Direct Mail campaign. Many postal services offer list services, and many of them are quite sophisticated. The Royal Mail, for example, has a number of address products. One of the most recent products is the “Just Built” mailing list, containing all new addresses as they become active. And not only that, it also offers a list of “Not Yet Built” addresses, with postcodes and addresses for properties that are under construction or still at the planning stage! This and other address products are described on http://www.royalmail.com/portal/rm/jump2?catId=400120&mediaId=400084.

 

  1. I often receive requests for information on several different postal and direct mail issues. A wealth of information is already available, most if it free of charge and not requiring a password, from our UPU website (www.upu.int). A few examples are:

§         Postal statistics (http://www.upu.int/statistics/en/index.shtml), collected annually from postal administrations and more recently also from postal regulators. The database can be queried using a number of variables.

§         UPU Standards (http://www.upu.int/standards/en/index.shtml), containing technical standards and EDI message specifications to improve the exchange of postal-related information between Posts, and promote the compatibility of UPU and international postal initiatives.

§         Market analyses (http://www.upu.int/market_analysis/en/index.shtml), with various studies, some of them commissioned by the UPU, which set out the postal market's challenges, trends and strategies.

§         External stakeholders issues (http://www.upu.int/consultative_committee/en/index.shtml), describing the activities of the UPU Consultative Committee, which represents the interests of the wider international postal sector, and provides a framework for effective dialogue between postal industry stakeholders. One of the current themes of the Consultative Committee is “Access to postal markets, products and networks”, and a paper by the International Bureau is posted on the website.

§         Postal codes and related tools and databases (http://www.upu.int/post_code/en/postcodes.html), as well as postal addressing systems in member countries (http://www.upu.int/post_code/en/addressing.shtml).

§         UPU news and press releases (http://www.upu.int/news_centre/en/index.shtml), containing the latest news on activities developed by the UPU and its International Bureau.

§         And last, but not least, the Direct Mail Advisory Board (http://www.upu.int/direct_mail/en/index.shtml), where you can find our Development Plan, membership issues, presentations, past “DMAB Update” issues and much more.

 

  1. The Slovenian Direct Marketing Association is holding its 3rd Central European Direct Marketing Congress, “direkt2006”, from 17 to 19 May at the beautiful city of Portoroz. More information available from www.zdms.org, also in English. The first day of the Congress will be actually organized by PostEurop, the Association of European Public Postal Operators. It will be a day entirely dedicated to presenting and discussing strategies and examples of how postal operators are dealing with customers and their requirements in practice, with several customer cases included in the programme.

 

  1. An old acquaintance of mine, James Thornton publishes an often provocative newsletter (provocative as he calls it, and I could not agree more), fully dedicated to issues related to Direct Mail and Direct marketing. James and I are not always in accordance, but we definitely share some objectives. In his latest newsletter, James advocates that postal administrations should support their local Direct Marketing Associations. The Direct Mail Advisory Board joins its voice to his, and strongly encourages close cooperation between Posts and DMAs.

 

 

 

The Direct Mail Advisory Board (DMAB) is a group of postal and industry organizations, and its mission is to "foster the growth of Direct Mail as a factor of economic and market expansion by increasing market knowledge and by developing the expertise of stakeholders at all levels".

 

 

For more information, please do not hesitate to contact:

 

Raquel Ferrari

Programme Manager, Direct Mail Markets Development

Directorate of Markets

Universal Postal Union

3000 BERN 15

SWITZERLAND

Tel: +41 31 350 3534

Fax: +41 31 351 0266

Email: raquel.ferrari@upu.int