TruckersB2B is finding that direct mail is the best way to communicate with its members and is planning to nearly double the amount it sends out in 2006 over last year.
The Indianapolis-based company, a volume buying service for smaller truck fleets, plans to increase its total direct mailings to 60,000 per quarter, up from about 35,000 pieces, says Sommer Sweeney, marketing director. That’s because more and more of the company’s customers are not opening e-mails but are opting to receive faxes.
The company has grown steadily over the past few years, moving up from 11,400 fleets and 319,300 trucks at the end of 2002 to 19,929 fleets and 424,981 trucks in December 2005.
For at least three years, the company has been sending out about 2,500 e-mails per month to keep its members up on how much they’re receiving in rebates from TruckersB2B’s vendor partners, as well as to introduce new products, she notes.
But direct mail is the mainstay of how TruckersB2B markets its vendors’ wares.
Each quarter, the company mails to segments of its member base on behalf of its marketing partners. Last year, for example, the firm sent oversized postcards to 7,000 fleets promoting Wabash National Trailer Corp., which led to a three-fold increase in purchases from this company during the following three months, says Sweeney. The firm has also used co-branded letters and coupon booklets in mailings with other vendors like Michelin.
Actually, direct mail has worked for TruckersB2B for some time now. More than two years ago, the firm got a 3.1% response rate from a 14,000-piece coupon mailing promoting tires from Goodyear Tire & Rubber Co.
The mailing, budgeted at less than $50,000, was designed to increase Goodyear’s sales and market share among TruckersB2B.com members, while building the group’s membership base. The coupons entitled recipients to $20-per-tire rebates on purchases of up to 100 select Goodyear commercial truck tires.
From that mailing, 580 coupons were turned in for rebates. Of those, 256 came from new members who joined when they used the coupons. The remaining 324 were redeemed by existing members.
The mailing piece asked for information like principal contact names, the number of commercial tires and retreads bought within the past year and whether recipients used Goodyear tires or a competing brand. Recipients responded by a toll-free telephone number, by fax or by mail.
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