The IPM received the very sad news that Alan Crossman had passed away at his home in Bedford.

Alan was one of the early pioneers in Door-to-Door marketing with Circular Distributors and then Marketforce in the days when just a few companies had delivery teams across the UK delivering to millions of households on weekly frequencies, long before Free newspapers and demographic targeting came to dominate this service. His prominence within our industry was evidenced by his election to the IPM Board (ISP at it was then) and then acknowledged further by his appointment as a Fellow of the ISP. In the mid 90’s Alan then joined the wider promotional marketing services group Mailcom as Sales Director.

Alan was very well known throughout the industry professionally and socially. ISP Summer Lunches were all the better for Alan’s presence where he would ensure everyone had the best time they possibly could. He was a real character in the truest way always insightful and always a person you wanted to be around. On behalf of the IPM and its members we send our deepest condolences to his wife Sandy and his two son’s and daughters. Alan’s funeral took place on the 15^th of February in Bedford.

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In the second of our 6 featured cases from campaigns carried out through the Covid pandemic we have another case that we think showcases our industry’s specialism and creativity in overcoming very difficult circumstance.

All of the 6 case studies were selected by a panel of judges from a much wider pool of impressive work carried out by IPM member organisations and this week we are featuring this submission from Whistl.

Whistl

Campaign Management

Karen Roberts, Account Director and Mark Davies, Managing Director, Whistl (Doordrop Media) Ltd

Becs Phillips. Marketing Manager, RNLI

An impressive doordrop rescue

Many of the RNLI’s conventional forms of fundraising were closed-down due to Covid 19 restrictions, stemming vital funding. In addition, the organisation faced increased cost in ensuring their lifesavers were kept Covid safe during continued operations. Alternative methods of fundraising needed to be found to raise a targeted £880k in donations.

The RNLI turned to Whistl who by using donor data and their refined predictive modelling techniques identified specific areas to target potential donors. Whistl also provided support in the creative to help ensure it had maximum impact on delivery.

The campaign helped raise almost £1 million for RNLI, exceeding previous expectations and ensuring that Covid‐19 hadn’t meant a lost summer of fundraising for this remarkable life‐ saving cause. The ROI on this campaign was outstanding and the very nature of this technique meant that 45% of responding donors were new to the RNLI.

Judges’ quote

Whistl did what all good marketing should – target people where they are most receptive. And during a national lockdown the power of doordrops became even more relevant, helping a well-deserving cause stay front of mind even when they couldn’t be face to face, to exceed RNLI’s fundraising targets

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Sparks hits the mark for Marks & Spencer

‘National Treasure’ Marks and Spencer introduced its first store card, ‘Sparks’, in 2016, offering a personalised loyalty scheme and benefits to both food and clothing customers. Aimed at generating maximum take up of the loyalty card, a major pre-launch campaign was developed including high profile media coverage and an extensive direct mail campaign.

Challenge

M&S approached The Lettershop Group (TLG) to help with the challenge of how to best capture the interest of 2.7 million customers with an informative and interesting direct mail campaign, which would encourage recipients to register online for the Sparks card.

Solution

No matter how complex the idea, TLG always works on the principal that ideas can be made a reality by creative thinking and clever engineering. Print and Scheffer finishing lines were designed and then made by the in-house engineering team to produce a premium product to meet the clients’ needs.

Results

A premium-feel pack was created using an offset 6-page double thickness carrier which was inserted into a paper wrap.  The loyalty cards were attached mechanically inline, ensuring such a large mailing was cost-effective whilst being turned around quickly and to the highest standard, as expected of this leading brand. Within weeks of launch the campaign had over 3.6 million registered Sparks customers.

An M&S spokesperson says: “We approached the Lettershop team with an idea which they made into a very effective reality, engaging with our customers and promoting the benefits of Sparks.”

The Lettershop Group is a sponsor of the IPM Awards 2016.

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