The most powerful reason for turning to direct mail is that it lets you target your message to select groups of special-interest readers. Yet a surprising number of industrial marketers fail to exploit this opportunity. Aim your mailing at a narrow audience and highlight the solutions your product offers for its specific problems. The same product may offer different benefits to different groups of users. Take microcomputers, for example.
Freelance writers are interested primarily in word-processing capability and reasonable cost.
A small business might be more concerned with service and customized software. A large corporation would want to know if the microcomputer is compatible with current equipment and if multiple micros can be linked in a network. A single mailing that attempted to cover all these points would have far less impact than separate mailings tailored to the three distinct audiences. Know how much to tell. A client asked me to prepare a mailing to generate inquiries about a new evaporator.