In this new era of marketing, emerging channels and performance
measurement pressures, multiple vendor management can be challenging,
requiring intense coordination in creative formats and technologies
that don’t easily work together. Working through a direct marketing
agency may relieve you from the management and coordination
activities but mark-ups take a big bite out of your budget.
Costco is a great example of a company that values its relationship
with its service providers. For example, it understood that community-
based marketing was critical to its regional and individual warehouse
success. However, the home office marketing groups were spending much
of their time and resources to customize and personalize messages and
materials for the regions and warehouses. Costco approached a
marketing service provider with this challenge, which resulted in the
creation of one fluid process within the Costco enterprise using a
web-to-print application.
Now, instead of waiting three to four weeks for custom materials,
regional offices and warehouses receive materials with customized
messaging within three days. This solution created additional
departmental bandwidth, saves money in wasted materials, allows
corporate to maintain branding control and enables regional offices
and warehouses to create the materials they need to reach their
community. The localized messaging reinforces Costco’s presence in
the community, creates greater connectivity with customers and drives
additional traffic and membership.
By partnering with a marketing service provider, multiple
capabilities like agency, technology, digital print, mail and
fulfillment were combined to create one solution. With a reduction in
the number of vendors to manage, the installation of the solution was
only 60 days, achieving a near-immediate positive ROI for Costco.
Lead generation, lead nurturing and lead distribution are also ideal
areas to explore a partnership with a marketing service provider.
Traditionally, lead generation programs involve direct response or
integrated agencies, data and analytic services, technology services,
print and mail shops. And somehow the campaign metrics need to tie to
actual sales to close the loop and provide meaningful measures. This
traditional process eats away at valuable time coordinating the
messaging through the right channels, with the right vendors at the
right time.
As an example, Dominican University, listed as one of U.S. News’ top
100 schools, deployed marketing service provider expertise to design
and create targeted lead generation programs aimed at high school
juniors. It nurtured each prospective student with targeted messaging
through multiple channels and ripened the lead over several months
before distribution to the university’s recruiter. The partnership
has yielded Dominican with an unprecedented application base and
quality enrollment and advanced its reputation.
