Marketing Outside City Limits

Think Rural markets represent a dead end for direct marketers? Think again. Today, small-town folks are more likely to own their own business than be itinerant farm workers. And they are more likely to purchase goods and services through direct mail-if marketers can get offers to them.

For DMers, consumers living in C and D county census tracts may conjure up images of poor rural people with little discretionary income. The reality is that economics play less of a part in determining a C or D tract than population density, or lack thereof, making saturation co-op mailings difficult.

Additionally, a co-op program often requires a local sales representative. When the consumer base is diffused throughout a sparsely populated area, it is not economically feasible for a company to set up a beachhead for a local rep, and they have to rely on national accounts.

This was one of the founding principles behind Echo Media, a Smyrna, GA, firm recently acquired by Bethesda, MD-based conglomerate Snyder Communications. The ability to target C and D households through retail circular ride-alongs, according to Echo president Bill Bradford, is what gets his sales reps in some doors.

The responsiveness of these consumers bears out his efforts. “I don’t think there is any magic,” he says. “It’s lack of clutter. The mail volume isn’t there.”

Offers are sent out through ride-alongs in store circulars, such as those mailed by Pamida, a retailer with more than 140 stores in 15 states, primarily in D counties. The company mails 2 million circulars each month throughout the Midwest, and Echo can place up to four pieces in each one. Bill’s Dollar Store solo-mails its store circulars into C and D counties throughout the South, and will accept up to four inserts per mailing.

Jo-Ann Fabrics and Crafts, a specialty retailer with stores in 49 states and the District of Columbia, is willing to include three. Its circular, which goes out 16 times a year to 3 million recipients, has the additional benefit of being managed by a highly segmentable database.

For Echo, the challenge is finding outlets that will allow him to piggyback offers. Cable companies, for instance, don’t have the rural penetration the company needs. Instead, Echo tries to get into as may power company mailings as it can. If Echo can’t get into the actual bill, it will look for electric companies that publish newsletters.

One concern held by potential participants is that inserts dilute the effectiveness of the chain’s own circulars. To date, says Bradford, there has been no proof of that. In fact, he has worked with several retailers on a long-term basis.

Diversity of offers is a significant problem facing these programs, however. Pizza delivery services, for example, a staple of metropolitan package insert programs, need a certain amount of population density for their promotions to be cost effective.

Another danger is loading up the inserts with other, national staples, such as customized check offers and insurance policy information. While C and D county programs have higher open and read rates than those in metro areas, it’s a rare consumer who will open an envelope for the fourth time if the first three held the same offers.

One way to get diverse offers into these programs is to include catalog request cards, which are becoming increasingly popular in rural insert efforts. But such offers may ultimately cut into the effectiveness of C and D county co-ops. While alternative media programs for these consumers are not as ubiquitous as those for metro-based targets, once a bounce-back card is returned, the rural consumer becomes a prospect. And if that prospect actually makes a purchase, the name enters the list arena with the most desirable status: as a customer.

Bradford feels that of all the media aimed at consumers, this will represent the strongest competition to C and D co-ops. Direct response TV, he says, may also offer other immediate options to these consumers.

But he is surprisingly confident that the Internet, even as its penetration into America increases, will not present a direct challenge. The Internet, he feels, does not have the immediacy of direct mail.

“[With the Internet] the consumer still has to be driven to sit down at a computer. There is nothing more intrusive than print media in your mailbox.”