Know Your Mailing Audience

Mailing Audience Demographics to Consider

When defining your direct mail audience, consider criteria such as:

• Age range
• Income level
• Homes with children (or children of a specific age range)
• Address type (single-family or multi-family)
• Gender
• Homeowner vs. renter

You can also use information from your own customer data or purchase a mailing list to reach new potential customers.

Capitalize on other information at your disposal:

• Draw from your own customer data
• Purchase a list through your Smartpress sales representative to reach new potential customers

Verify Your Mailing Audience List

Before sending your direct mail campaign, your mailing list can be processed to help identify duplicate records and determine how you want mailings handled within the same household.

Once you have narrowed down who you want to mail to and sent us a list to process, we can:

• Check for duplicate records to ensure every person gets only one
• Remove duplicates per household to ensure each household gets only one or each person in the household gets one

The appropriate list processing option depends on whether you want to mail to individual people or to households.

Target by Location or Addressee

Direct mail audiences can be targeted by geographic location or by specific addressees, depending on the goals of your campaign.

1. A company that services pools might target locations because they want to reach only nearby homes that have pools. The mail piece can use “OR CURRENT RESIDENT” when the goal is to reach the current occupant at an address rather than a specific individual.
2. If you are trying to reach specific people, we can run the list through the National Change of Address (NCOA) database to identify eligible address updates and help ensure mail is sent to the most current address available through the service.

Other Ways to Target a Mailing Audience

Businesses and industries use direct mail to narrow down their target audiences in different ways. For example:

• Salons – Target women in different age ranges.
• Barbershops – Can target men only.
• Real estate – Agents target the closest given number of homes to a newly-listed or newly-sold home.
• Restaurants – Mail to the closest 5,000 homes around their location with an occupant list/saturation mailing.
• Dentists/orthodontists – Target the nearest 5,000 homes with children age 5-17.
• Churches – Target all addresses within a five-mile radius with an occupant/resident list.
• Pet Stores or veterinarian offices – Target homes with dogs or pets.
• Nonprofit organizations – Target communities to participate in charitable causes.

These are examples of how different businesses can define a direct mail audience based on location, demographics, household characteristics or other available data.

National Change of Address (NCOA)

National Change of Address (NCOA) is a USPS service that helps identify address changes reported by people and businesses to the Postal Service. Smartpress can process direct mail lists through NCOA as part of its mailing process.

When we print direct mail for you, we run your list through the National Change of Address database. When processing your list through NCOA, we need to know whether you want eligible move updates retained in the list or removed based on your mailing criteria.

For example, if you’re a dentist and we’re mailing a monthly newsletter for you, you most likely won’t want to mail to someone who’s moved out of state or outside of the geographic area you’ve selected. In that case, move updates outside your selected geographic area can be removed from your mailing list.

Mailing Audience FAQ

What is a mailing audience?

A mailing audience is the specific group of people or households you want to reach with a direct mail campaign. It can be defined using demographics, geographic location, household characteristics, customer data or other criteria.

How can I target a direct mail audience?

You can target a direct mail audience by factors such as age, income, gender, homeowner or renter status, household characteristics, geographic location or specific addressees.

Can Smartpress help process my mailing list?

Yes. Smartpress can process a mailing list to identify duplicate records and apply household-level mailing preferences.

What is NCOA?

NCOA stands for National Change of Address. It is a USPS service used to identify eligible address changes reported to the Postal Service.

Why should I use NCOA for direct mail?

NCOA processing can help update mailing addresses when eligible move information is available, which can help reduce mail being sent to outdated addresses.

Can I target households instead of individuals?

Yes. Direct mail can be targeted to households using geographic, demographic and other available criteria. Smartpress can also process your list according to whether you want to mail to individuals or households.

Note: When purchasing a mailing from us, we request you include a direct mail product in your order.