Provided by the United States Postal Service (USPS), Informed Delivery is an opt-in service that enables residential customers to digitally preview their mail and manage their package delivery options.
Image Source: USPS
Adding Supplemental Content to Mailing Campaigns
Can mailers take advantage of Informed Delivery, too? Yes! When the USPS created Informed Delivery, one of its primary goals was to merge the world of physical mail with the digital landscape. Mailers can extend their physical mail items with custom images and external website links. This supplemental content can then be accessed through the user interface options of Informed Delivery, including e-mail and mobile apps. Using a single mailer ID (MID) encased within an intelligent mail barcode (IMB), mailers can craft and direct multiple campaigns with every single piece of hardcopy mail they send.
Informed Delivery features open the door to increased engagement. Recipients can interact with brand offers via direct mail, increasing its value and allowing the mailer to begin communicating before the mail item has even reached the mailbox. According to data collected by the USPS, should the interaction prompt an e-mail, 60% of that e-mail on average will be opened and engaged with on a daily basis. If others within that same household are also part of the Informed Delivery service, the mailer can communicate to them, too—regardless of whether their name was included on the envelope.
Informed Delivery also enables the creation of elaborate multi-channel marketing campaigns with pieces of physical mail while providing better tracking data. Communicating companies know whether a mail recipient has engaged with their communications as well as how the recipient engaged with them.
By leveraging Informed Delivery, marketers can create multiple, measurable digital interactions from a single physical touch point, optimize physical mail, and increase its return on investment without tying up significant resources.