Mail Unleashed Transcript

Rory 
Hello and we're back.
And welcome to another episode of Mail Unleashed. Brought to you again by Marketreach. And today I'm delighted to welcome Kate Wheaton. Who is actually a colleague of mine and Head of Strategy at Ogilvy One. And like me, a kind of lifetime direct marketer. I think it's probably fair to say. Kate welcome on the show. So tell me, you first started I think, in a sort of small telemarketing and direct mail agency back in the day.
And then you variously made your way via I think EHS Brand, of course.
Where you were very closely involved in the launch of the Tesco Clubcard.
Oh, no. Not the launch.

Kate 
I was there when it was piloted. I went on to, work properly on Clubcard much, much later. I think just after the financial crash, actually around 2008. Yeah, I've worked on it for a while, and it was very much about
what the future of Clubcard be. Because obviously, you think, you know, Clubcard was invented as a, you know for a superstore world.

Rory 
Of course.

Kate 
Which was obviously analogue and we were moving into a world which was digital. With multiple formats, including online, small shops, all sorts of things. So it needed to evolve. So I was part of that team was really, really interesting.

Rory 
It's really interesting. Because, I mean, Mark Ritson always talks about the central, a central function or responsibility of a marketer. To do what he calls the magic 180 degree flip. Where you look at a business through the consumer's own eyes. Rather than through the lens of finance operations. In other words, internal metrics. You're actually looking at a business as a consumer sees it. And actually direct marketing. I always thought. I mean, it's interesting that Ogilvy One brought back Ogilvy One after a time. Direct marketing actually does that on steroids, doesn't it? Because you actually look at it through the lens of one consumer at a time over time. Yeah. And I don't think anybody else, if we're being honest. Nobody else quite does that. Advertising tends to look at aggregates and averages.

Kate 
Yeah. Universal truths etc.. Yeah. Whereas I think we're looking, not all the time. I mean I think if I. If I was looking at audiences and trying to develop something and I could find something that genuinely works for all of them. I would certainly use it. You’d be stupid not to. Yeah. But what you usually. What we nearly always find, is there is such significant differences between different groups. You need to you know, talk to them differently. And use, you know, what you know about them to kind of in anger to kind of make it supremely useful and relevant to them I think.

Rory 
Now I think there's always been this mistake in media where people are looking for the single right answer, as I call it. Which is a great way of winning an argument. But it's not a good way of solving a problem. In that. What you should be looking for is the right combination of different media in sequence. Rather than trying to optimise for one or the other. And I think there's a thing kind of which economists would call comparative advantage. In that, there are certain customers where for certain products. Nothing short of mail is going to work. Just as there are certain things you can only buy with a phone call or a conversation.

Kate 
Totally agree. Yeah. We saw this recently and we do some work with Lloyds. And I think on one of their brands. We were talking to people about something fairly serious, investing. Oh it's actually consolidating pensions.

Rory
Yeah.

Kate 
It's a complex issue. It's the sort of thing where you need both the kind of, you need weight, to be quite honest, of a certain amount of real estate. To kind of explain what you're talking about. But also, people still appreciate, I think. The kind of value of having something that they can sit down and read quite slowly.

Rory
At leisure, at the moment of their choosing.

Kate 
Think about and go back to. I don't know if you've tried to find an email once it's in your inbox. It's amongst many thousands of different things. Unless it's right near the top. And I just think, generally, you know. To have something you can show to someone else very quickly, your partner or whatever. Sort of say, should I do this? And I think we really underestimate the I think your whole swathes, both of customers, but also categories where you just appreciate a bit more time and ability to look at things. I think, oddly enough, fashion is another one. There's a reason why, you know, quite posh brands like ME+EM, use.

Rory
Glossy paper.

Kate 
Well it's not even glossy. It’s just of a scale and size. That kind of makes their clothes look really good. It's not that big on a tiny screen. And guess what? You can browse it and look at it and go back to it. And kind of go. Should I spend £250 on a top that seems like quite a lot of money? And eventually convince yourself, it's great idea. But, you know, I think there is something. I saw some stats recently that said that on average, consumers spend something like one hundred and thirty four seconds with a piece of direct mail over a seven day period. Yeah. Now, when you think how much time do you spend with your average Facebook ad. It's like, what, three, five seconds or something if you're lucky.

Rory
And you feel hurried.

Kate
Yes. Yeah.

Rory 
Fundamentally.

Kate
So there is something I think really important in certain categories. And for certain consumers by that sort of thing.

Rory
By the way. We were also talking in an earlier episode. Which is quite interesting about the level of trust that direct mail inspires. And we think in an age in which everything is intangible. Having something concrete which someone has produced and sent through the post. I mean, very interesting. When I started. I was trained both in the advertising agency, and the direct marketing agency. The advertising agency always spoke about AIDA. Which is Attention, Interest, Desire, Action. And Drayton Bird always told us with less respect for opera. But I think nonetheless, importantly. It was AIDCA. And it was Attention, Interest, Desire, Conviction.

Kate
Oh, that's a good one. Yeah, yeah.

Rory
Which is quite interesting. And I think there's something there which I think is really important. Which is that. Essentially a whole mixture of things, from the very cost of the medium itself. To the fact that it's tangible. To the fact that you can’t easily fake it. If you like. In the way you can digital communications. Fundamentally gives a level of trust to people interacting. And actually. And of course, I suppose it gives a kind of physical existence to an organisation.

Kate
Yeah. I think that's particularly interesting, isn't it? For sort of, you know, new brands coming through because it is. I think, two things. It's no surprise you end up. Many new sort of start-ups. E-commerce type brands end up going on telly in the end. Because it's sort of the medium that is, you know, traditionally, incredibly trusted. Whereas I'd still say do some direct mail. It's a lot cheaper. You will reach your audience equally effectively. And people will kind of. It's always treated with respect, isn't it? I think it's, people have that sense of important things still come through the post. I was thinking back to. Some of the work we did years and years ago on the first sort of change for life project. And I think one of the nice things about that, that was, I think, just on the cusp of going into digital. But we did use direct mail. Because we wanted to give people something they could keep. You know, we wanted to bridge that gap between something happening on your television. And something that, you know, food is consumed in the home.
Parents make decisions about what their kids are going to eat in the home. So having that in-home presence was incredibly important. So I think we just did. I think it was a wall chart that they could do the snack swaps. Put stars on, or something like that. I mean. It's the sort of idea you say it now and it seems really obvious. But it served a really clear purpose. And I think that whole campaign was incredibly successful. It then has been running for years now. It's been going for, gosh, it must be nearly a decade, two decades?

Rory
They also had some really good brand partnerships didn’t they?

Kate
You guys did the one with Disney didn’t you? I think was very successful. And, I think you know. This is where your direct mail just is, is irreplaceable. Really. Nothing else makes it as easy for you to just unwrap something and put it on your wall. I think going forwards, I would say the challenge for the future of direct mail is really about showing what it can do differently to any other media.

Rory
What it could do that nothing else can do.

Kate
I'd say that's the challenge for all channels. You have to earn your place in the media plan by doing something that, you know. No other medium can do as effectively.

Rory
I also think it's important to the future of how marketing speaks to the rest of the organisation. Because I think what's happened over the last ten to fifteen years. We've had such an efficiency and cost cutting mentality. That marketers basically have gone to the rest of the organisation with this very tedious promise, which is, yeah, we can kind of do the same, but for less.

Kate
Yeah.

Rory
Okay. And actually marketers need to get back to going to the rest of the organisation and saying, actually, magic is possible. You know. We can do the same but for less. But we need to reserve 20% to 30% of our money to prove that occasionally you can discover utterly freakish things. As you know, we've all done maybe once a year you discover something which is just priceless as a discovery. That, you know, a whole group of people who never thought were in your target audience are in that target audience if you address them in this way. I think this happened to HelloFresh, by the way. Digital business. Albeit a food business. And they basically experimented with direct mail and just found results that were absolutely transformational. And we've forgotten to make that promise. Which is instead of just saying, you know, marketing yes I know terrible cost isn't it. Let us help you reduce it.

Kate
And it needs to be about growth.

Rory
We absolutely need to get back to that growth story. Which is, look, miracles can happen. And the reason David Ogilvy was such a huge enthusiast for direct mail. After all, was that on several occasions. He'd seen just extra ordinary things happen.

Kate
And I think know we forget because we're too. We need to put direct mail on the table along with any other channel that is most appropriate in the circumstances. And be very aware and adept in terms of what it can deliver.

Rory
Well Kate. It's been a huge pleasure as ever. Thank you very much indeed.
All that remains for me to say. Is this has been Mail Unleashed. If you'd like to know more. Very simple, albeit digital, call to action, which is to go to marketreach.co.uk Where you'll find a whole repository of information. Along with other films in this series. So all that remains for me to say is. Thank you very much for watching and see you next time. And finally, thank you again, Kate.

Kate 
Pleasure.