Clemson, SC - What is “Failed Mail”? Mail will fail, if a mail piece is designed that does not meet the USPS requirements for letters, flats, or parcels; you will lose the discount and in many cases pay a surcharge on top of the full price postage. Mail will fail, if it is not prepare the properly for processing by the USPS; you may not receive all the discounts possible from the USPS or you could lose them all. Mail will fail, if the address information is not properly researched and validated [and running it through the USPS National Change of Address (NCOA^®) is not enough]; it will not be delivered. Mail will fail, if the mail piece is not targeted to the right audience; it will not serve the purpose for which you sent it. And finally mail will fail, if the mail piece design is not set up to entice the receipting to open the letter and to clearly present the offer for the customer. So “Failed Mail” is spending more than needed to mail the piece, mailing to the wrong people or designing a mail piece that fails to create an action from the reader. Does your company need a tune up to make sure it is properly serving the customer so they get the most out of their mailing? 

Clemson University has been teaching a summer class that focuses on Mailing, Fulfillment and Marketing Services for the past 5 years—they offer 10 of the nights to the industry as a recorded webinar series. Think about the last mailing mistake that made it through the plant, how much did it cost to fix it or was there just a higher postage bill then expected? Would the customer be happy if you came up with a new strategy for delivering the mail to local post offices that saved 5, 10 or 20% of the overall cost of the mailing? If 10% of the bad addresses on the customer’s mailing list that shows up as undeliverable addresses were resolved and made active again, would that be worth something to your customer? 

When this course has been presented to companies in the past, one statement people have said is, “We have a mail specialist in the company, and if we needed a webinar or training we would have them do it.” Just how long would it take to create twenty 50-minute webinars? This course is designed for the CSR, the sales person, the IT person that manages the data, or the designer that needs to better understand the value of target marketing. It also helps the operators that do not understand why the USPS is so picky as to preparing the mail. 

The webinar series starts on May 26^th and is held live every Tuesday night, 7 to 9 PM, throughout the summer. Industry participants can sign on live or listen to recording posted the next day. Different people in the company may be more interested in some sessions more than others. The webinars are available on-demand until December 31^st. The proposed schedule is listed on the web page link below.

“Failed Mail” happens when we do not do our job right and sometimes we do not even know it could have been done for less. If you would like to register for the webinar series or to find out more about this webinar series you can go to http://bit.ly/mailing-at-cu. The cost of the webinar series is $400, but if you register on-line and list WTT.com as the trade group you heard about the series you will receive a $50 discount.

John Leininger is the teacher of this webinar series (along with several guest speakers from the industry). He started offering it to the industry as a webinar series when he found printers were having trouble educating their employees on mailing and the ever-changing rules from the USPS. John has been attending and presenting at the National Postal Forum for the last six years and tries to keep the content current, but presents it in a format that people can manage the information and apply it to the work being done in their plant. 

“Stopping Failed Mail” starts with knowing there is a problem.