BOSTON, MA--(Marketwire - March 10, 2008) - In the new benchmark report, "Green Marketing:
Leveraging Customer Data to Reduce Direct Mail Waste," the Aberdeen Group,
a Harte-Hanks Company (
NYSE:
HHS), found that companies are facing
ever-growing concerns from consumers and others about the environmental
impact of their direct mail solicitations. In fact, 40% of companies
surveyed ranked direct mail waste reduction as one of the top two areas of
focus when it comes to adopting more eco-friendly business practices.
The research was conducted, in part, to gauge industry readiness with
respect to the Direct Marketing Association's "Green 15" resolution. The
DMA passed the resolution last May and announced that in June of this year
it will establish environment improvement goals for member companies in
several key areas, including consumer list hygiene and customer data
management.
"Customer data has long played a key role in driving marketing improvement
in terms of both revenue growth and cost reduction," said Jeff Zabin,
Research Fellow at Aberdeen. "Today more companies are also waking up to
the value of customer data in the context of direct mail waste reduction,
which, it turns out, is also becoming an economic imperative."
The Aberdeen report provides a roadmap for companies that aim to better
achieve their green marketing objectives through Best-in-Class use of
customer data management and related capabilities. These capabilities speak
to the need to capture, integrate, cleanse, analyze, and act upon customer
data, with a specific focus on customer data quality.
With respect to the DMA's suggested "action steps" related to data hygiene
and mailing accuracy, Aberdeen found that 50% of Best-in-Class companies,
compared to 40% of Laggards, currently merge/purge customer data
"thoroughly." Nearly twice as many Best-in-Class companies as Laggards plan
to start doing so in the future. Of the 54% of companies that use
segmentation and modeling to "select with care" which customer names to be
mailed to, only 47% of Laggards indicated that they do it "very well,"
compared to 83% of Best-in-Class companies.
The report emphasizes the dual benefit of helping shareholders achieve
their financial objectives while mitigating the impact of direct mail
activities on the environment. It shows that direct mail waste reduction is
an area where environmental concerns and shareholder interests coincide.
With respect to the latter, 85% of Best-in-Class companies experience
year-over-year improvement in customer retention levels, compared to 5% of
Laggards. And Best-in-Class companies have achieved a 266% improvement in
customer profitability compared to Laggards.
The research educates readers on how to increase revenues, cut costs, and
reduce environmental waste by adopting key enabling technologies and
implementing various strategic actions and organizational capabilities.
A complimentary copy of this report is made available due in part by the
following underwriters: QAS, an Experian company, and DM Review. To obtain
a complimentary copy of the report, visit:
http://www.aberdeen.com/link/sponsor.asp?cid=4635.
About Aberdeen Group, a Harte-Hanks Company
Aberdeen is a leading provider of fact-based research and market
intelligence that delivers demonstrable results. Having benchmarked more
than 30,000 companies in the past two years, Aberdeen is uniquely
positioned to educate users to action: driving market awareness, creating
demand, enabling sales, and delivering meaningful return-on-investment
analysis. As the trusted advisor to the global technology markets,
corporations turn to Aberdeen™ for insights that drive decisions.
As a Harte-Hanks Company, Aberdeen plays a key role of putting content in
context for the global direct and targeted marketing company. Aberdeen's
analytical and independent view of the "customer optimization" process of
Harte-Hanks (Information - Opportunity - Insight - Engagement -
Interaction) extends the client value and accentuates the strategic role
Harte-Hanks brings to the market. For additional information, visit
Aberdeen
http://www.aberdeen.com or call (617) 723-7890, or to learn more
about Harte-Hanks, call (800) 456-9748 or go to
http://www.harte-hanks.com.
© 2008 Aberdeen Group, Inc., a Harte-Hanks Company
260 Franklin Street
Boston, Massachusetts 02110-3112
Telephone: (617) 723-7890
Fax: (617) 723-7897
www.aberdeen.com
Contact Information: Media Contact:
Jeff Zabin
Aberdeen Harte-Hanks
(617) 854-5356
jeff.zabin@aberdeen.com