Corporate Creations | The Romany & Broudy Study

Frank Romano of the Rochester Institute of Technology and David Broudy, a designer and production consultant, carried out a study of the impact of colour and personalisation on responses to direct mail. Often quoted for the difference it showed between the responses gained for single colour and four colour print, it also looked at two types of personalisation: one where the recipient's name was included in the mailing piece and one using variable data that tailored both the message and the images to the recipient's known preferences and buying patterns.

A full colour mailer with just the name achieved a response rate of 2.25% - in other words, one order for every 44 mailers despatched.

The colour mailer with variable data generated orders from 13.54% of the mailers - that's one in seven.

Although there is a small price premium for the inclusion of variable data, the return on investment is considerable greater: you can send the same number of mailers and receive a larger number of responses, or despatch fewer mailing pieces for the same number of orders.