Direct Mail - Cost Calculator

Emerald Mail Direct Services
vs. The Cost of Doing It Alone

Results:
The calculator compares all the costs you will incur by writing, producing, managing, and printing a direct mail piece in-house versus the fixed price per piece you will pay through Emerald Mail Direct.

The results may surprise you!

Details:
For details regarding each cost, and to view assumptions relating to each calculated task, click the details button beside each calculator field.

Choose a Direct Mail Piece

Options:
To succeed with direct mail marketing, you need to cusomize a package that will attract and motivate people to attend your event.

Emerald's dining invitation packages come in two varieties - formal invitations and dining letters. Both packages include essential components - a customized invitation, a reply card, event tickets, and a matching envelope.

Each package is tailored to present your seminar in a specific light.

Dining Invitation:
The dining invitation is a formal approach and will generally atract a more affluent audience. The intriguing content and dynamic packaging are best suited for:

• Wealthier prospects
• Older audiences
• Targeted mailings (such as business owners or women only)

Dining Letter:
The dining letter is a less formal approach and is generally suited for:

• Broad audiences
• Younger families and individuals
• Older audiences

How Many Pieces Would You Mail?

Quantity:
To fill the seats at your event, you should touch as many prospects as possible with your mailing. Target a specific audience based on the content of your event, and then mail to a predefined list within a specific geographic radius from your office.

You will need to obtain a mailing list from a professional list service to determine the number of qualified households that exist within your target area. Ultimately, the list will determine the quantity of direct mail pieces you need to order.

Suggestions:

• Sharpen your aim — Consider calling an Emerald Mail Direct Consultant to help you define the type of prospect you want to attract. Once you have defined the target market, your EMD consultant can help you locate qualified households in your geographic area.
• Meet their needs — Emerald can help you choose a seminar that will disturb and motivate your taget audience to seek your help with financial issues. Offerring the appropriate content for your target audience increases your response rate and positions you as an expert who knows how to get results.
• Draw them in — Use a colorful and dynamic package to help build your credibility and intrigue your targeted prospects. Finding an attractive package for the mailing is often the biggest challenge financial professionals will face in their direct mail effort.

How Often Would You Conduct a Mailing?

Frequency:
A financial planner seeking to build a practice may want to schedule an event and conduct a mailing every month. Create an event calendar and schedule your mailings well in advance of the event date. Allow adequate time for customization and coordination.

Carefully choose event days and dates that are proven to attract an audience.

Example:
Tuesdays and Thursdays are highly recommended days to schedule your seminar events. Wednesday and Saturday mornings can also work well depending on the seminar topic and target market. Use great caution with Mondays and Fridays, as weekend activities can make attendance light on these days.

Suggestions:
Emerald offers a turnkey approach to direct mail marketing. Through our Emerald Mail Direct services, you can obtain a targeted list of prospects, and our on-line list maintenance tool lets you edit your list 24 hours a day. Select a mailing period, maintain your contact list on line, and let us do the rest.

What Rate Do You Bill For Your Time?

Hourly Cost:
Your time is valuable, so you should factor in your hourly rate for tasks you decide to accomplish yourself in the direct mail creation process.

Writing, editing and coordinating a mailing can be time consuming. The time you spend translates into lost productivity and decreased time spent managing existing accounts and building new accounts.

Example:
If you plan to write your mailing content personally, you can expect to spend approximately 8 hours researching and generating content for each mailing. If you mail monthly, you can expect to repeat that writing effort 12 times per year. That's 96 hours of writing per year, or 2.4 weeks of full time work! If you bill your time at $100.00 per hour, this effort alone will cost you $9,600.00 per year.

Suggestions:
Emerald Publications employs a full-time staff of talented writers, editors, and graphic designers. Our employees have many years of experience in the financial services industry. Because we can leverage their efforts and produce a templated mailing for thousands of clients each month, the net cost to you is minimal.

The choice is yours. Spend dozens of hours each year generating your own mailing, or spend that time doing what you do best — building your business and managing your existing accounts.

At What Rate Do You Bill Your Office Staff?

Staff Rate:
Once you calculate the many hidden costs of devoting your own billable hours to a direct mail project, you are likely to wonder, "What tasks can I delegate?"

If you choose to delegate, consider the steps involved in getting the direct mail piece to your client's doorstep. You'll need an employee with graphic design experience and time to layout the various pieces required for a mailing. You will need to incorporate changes from compliance, manage the mailing list, and then print, sort, bundle and deliver the mailing to your post office.

You may delegate the task of writing / editing the content of the direct mail piece, but remember, the professionalism of your mailing piece sets the tone for your presentation and has a significant impact on the response rate.

Example:
With labor costs for delegated tasks at $10.00 per hour, your staff time alone for a single mailing could cost $300.00. This translates to $3,600.00 per year if you want to mail monthly. These are labor costs alone.

Suggestions:
Delegate the entire process to Emerald. It's as simple as that. The cost savings are substantial, and your office staff can be devoted to more valuable pursuits.

Who Would Write The Content?

Professional vs. You:
The average direct mail piece contains a variety of components. A professional writer would normally charge $1.00 per word. If you choose to write the piece yourself, multiply your hourly rate by 8 hours - which is the average time a writer takes to author content.

Assuming a personal billing rate for you at $100 per hour, here is a comparison of the cost to hire a writer versus writing it yourself:

Suggestions:
Save yourself between $6,000 and $9,600 per year in writing costs. With an Emerald Mail Direct piece you automatically receive:

• Customized dining invite letter or wedding style invitation containing topic-specific text, event details, and your contact information
• Dining invite envelope personalized with your name and address, as well as an optional restaurant logo to help pique prospects' interest
• Personalized reply card with postal permit
• Attendee admission tickets that are customized with the event dates and location

Our experienced consultants speak with financial planners on a daily basis. This national perspective can provide you with advice and techniques that are proven to work in your region.

Who Will Edit and Check Facts?

Professional vs. You:
When you reach out to clients with published content, you put your professional reputation on the line. It is critical that your direct mail piece be checked for accuracy, edited, and if possible, approved by the NASD.

You can assume the editing responsibility for yourself, or contract a professional editor with experience in the financial services field. Whatever you choose, make sure you submit the final product to your home office or broker dealer for approval.

Example:
Assuming a personal billing rate for you at $100 per hour, here is a comparison of the cost to edit the piece yourself versus using a professional editor:

Suggestions:
Let Emerald take the burden of compliance from you.

In addition to the professional writing services you receive as an Emerald Mail Direct subscriber, you also benefit from our editorial process. All content published by Emerald is thoroughly reviewed by an editor and checked for content accuracy. In fact, many broker dealers and home office compliance departments pre-approve Emerald pieces for use by their agents.

Who Will Create The Graphics?

Design:
Unless you choose an Emerald Mail Direct subscription, you have two options:

1. Hire a professional designer
2. Use someone in your office

Delegating an office employee with the task of graphic design may save you the cost of a layout specialist, but the decision will hurt you in the long run. An office employee will probably utilize standard office software to layout the newsletter. This software is limited in graphics capability and professional print options.

Limitations in office software coupled with lack of graphic design skills in an employee could diminish the professional look of your piece and lead to incorrectly prepared digital art. If you need to print in high volume, you could also run into problems at professional print shops.

Example:

Suggestions:
Avoid the "homegrown" look. Choose from one of two professionally designed four-color invitation templates at Emerald. Each template was crafted by a team of designers under the creative direction of Emerald's Marketing and Product Development Group.

Who Will Incorporate Changes From Compliance?

Revisions:
With any communication to the public, it is critically important that you submit all materials to a compliance review and approval authority. Your communication must meet the rigorous standards of the NASD or your internal broker/dealer compliance department. Compliance is simply a necessary step in the process. Also you will no doubt need to incorporate revisions requested by the compliance review.

Again, your options are to invest the time yourself, delegate the task to an employee on your staff, or go back to a professional writer. Either way, there are costs involved. For each editorial cycle, you should budget approximately two hours to revise a direct mail piece.

Considering you will need to resubmit to compliance after each change, you may want to allow at least six weeks for the approval process. You will need to start well in advance of the mailing date to allow for the approval process.

Example:
Assuming an office staff rate of $10.00 per hour and a personal billing rate of $100.00 per hour, here's what the approval process will cost:

Suggestions:
At Emerald, the direct mail process is ongoing and compliance approval is our specialty. Our writers are at work each day preparing topical content and incorporating recommendations from the NASD and other compliance authorities.

You can feel confident that your communication to the public meets the demanding standards of the NASD and your company's specific compliance approval process.

How Would You Print The Piece?

Printing:
Even a well-designed direct mail piece with professional layout and graphics will not present you in a positive light if you fail to print it professionally. When it comes to the printing process, you should rely on a professional service to make sure your final product is the best it can be.

There are a range of printing options depending on the quality and quantity of newsletters you plan to mail. With each option there are hidden costs and unique requirements.

Example:
Copy Shop (Average cost per piece is between $0.40 and $0.75)

• Increased cost per piece vs. professional print shop
• Turnaround time may be greater than a printshop

Professional printer (Average cost per piece is $0.35)

• Must print large volumes to qualify
• Mistakes and reprints can be very costly

Suggestions:
Emerald Publications maintains an in-house full-color press capability. With a professional print shop, high volume print presses and direct digital printing capabilities, we reduce the overall cost per piece. In addition, we can print high quality direct mail shells in high volume, then add your customized content using digital integration. The result is a professional direct mail piece that is unmatched in quality and tailored to your business, at lower than professional print-shop prices.

Who Would Mail The Piece?

Mailing:
Someone will need to prepare your direct mail piece for the postal service. This involves folding, stuffing, addressing and stamping each envelope. Without equipment to assist in this process, you may need more than one individual to participate in a manual process. Another alternative is to contract with a mailing house to assist in this phase. A mailing house will charge a standard rate per item.

Example:
Manual process in your office (Approximately $0.15 per newsletter)*

• Time consuming
• Loss in productivity to your office

Mailing House (Approximately $0.07 per newsletter)

• Only practical for higher volumes
• May still need to manage your mailing list manually

* Calculated as an average cost based on a $10.00 per hour labor rate and time estimates to fold, stuff and seal envelopes

Suggestions:
Utilize Emerald Mail Direct's mailing services to coordinate your mailing. With on-line list management and fulfillment services, we can save you the extra step of coordinating your newsletter mailing. You control the distribution list through a web-based tool, and we do the rest. Your newsletter can arrive at your client's doorstep on schedule and as frequently as you wish, with very little loss in productivity to your office.

Available Postage

It's just a stamp.

But it's one stamp per piece per mailing. If you want to touch hundreds, even thousands, of clients a month with your mailing, postage can become a significant expense.

For higher volume mailings (exceeding 2500 pieces) "standard presort" is your most cost effective option. This reduces the postage cost per piece but requires some additional coordination with your local post office.

The rate you receive for standard presort also varies based on the capabilities you have to format the mailing in a manner that allows the post office to streamline its delivery. A professional mailing house will have access to sorting equipment that can bundle the mailing for maximum discount through the postal service. If you choose to presort the mail yourself, your rate will likely be somewhat higher.

Example:

Suggestions:
Let Emerald Mail Direct coordinate the mailing. You will still need to pay postage depending on your volume and method of delivery, but you will save yourself the manual process of applying postage and organizing a bulk mail package for your local post office. The cost to utilize our Mail Direct Service is minimal compared to the time and energy you will need to spend coordinating this phase.

List Cost

To succeed with a mailing, you need an accurate and complete mailing list. With existing clients, this information is probably easy to obtain and frequently updated. But with a direct mail piece you are targeting households in a specific geographic area. You are trusting a list service to provide you with accurate and up-to-date contact information that truly fits your target demographic.

A professional list that is scrubbed for accuracy and targeted to a specific demographic will generally cost about 4.5 cents per name. For 2500 names, you can expect to pay $112.50.

List Management

Once you obtain the list, you want the flexibility to add prospective clients and last minute contacts. You also need the ability to export to a mail house or labeling system as close to the mailing as possible.

Does your contact management software accommodate last minute additions and exports? Who in your office can take responsibility for ensuring the flexibility and reliability of a printed mailing list or list export to a mailing house? Someone will need to manage the list on a monthly basis.

Example:
Assuming your billing rate is NaN per hour and your office staff rate is billed at NaN per hour, for list management alone you can expect to pay:

For volumes greater than 2500 pieces, you could expect the management time to at least double and the associated labor time and costs to double as well

Suggestions:
With Emerald Mail Direct services, you manage your list on line. Add prospects and edit contact information as frequently as you like. We'll export and format the list for you and fulfill all your additions.