Definition

Physical marketing materials delivered via postal service, the analog dinosaur that refuses to go extinct because it still converts. What millennials call 'junk mail' and what marketers call 'tangible touchpoints.'

Example Usage

Our direct mail campaign to high-value prospects included personalized letters and samples, achieving a 4.2% response rate.

Origin

Marketing channel dating back centuries, formalized with modern postal systems in the 19th century.

Fun Fact

Direct mail has higher response rates than email in many demographics, particularly affluent consumers over 50.

Source: Traditional marketing channels

Related Terms

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brand

The carefully crafted identity and perception of a company, product, or person that marketing teams obsess over and consumers either love or completely ignore. A brand is more than just a logo—it's the entire emotional experience and associations people have with your business, from Apple's minimalist elegance to that local pizza place with the angry owner. It's what makes people pay $200 for sneakers that cost $20 to manufacture.

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relabel

The business equivalent of putting a new sticker over the old one—whether you're rebranding a product, reorganizing files, or giving a failed initiative a fresh name to try again. In tech, it's reassigning labels in databases or systems; in marketing, it's how last quarter's disaster becomes this quarter's 'learning opportunity.' Same thing, better branding.

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real-time bidding

Automated auction-based ad buying where impressions are sold individually in milliseconds as pages load. High-frequency trading energy applied to banner ads, because markets apparently need to operate at inhuman speeds everywhere.

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attribution model

A mathematical framework for assigning credit to various marketing touchpoints that led to a conversion, because apparently one person needs to get the glory even when seventeen different campaigns were involved. Think of it as the participation trophy debate of digital marketing.

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See “direct mail” in Corporate Speak, Gen-Z Slang, Pirate Speak, and more.

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