The secret to cutting through the clutter with direct mail is always in plain sight when you sort through the mail you receive at home every day.

Unfortunately, many of the marketing folks creating direct mail pieces and approving them appear blind to this secret clearly visible to them.

Over the years, I’ve become convinced that the creative types working for general media agencies either are unaware of this secret or choose to ignore it for aesthetics reasons.  It’s simply impossible to ignore if you spend any time studying an assortment of direct mail samples which is mandatory to be successful in this channel.

Whatever the reason or motivation for this behavior, ignoring this secret usually harms the direct mail piece – leading to fewer consumers stopping to read the marketing message it bears and therefore failing to take advantage of the offer being made.

Those most harmed by this are the mailer relying on the expertise of the creative team and the consumer who misses out on a valuable offer because she isn’t “teased” to read the entire sales copy.

While most major users of the traditional direct mail channel are well-aware of, and make extensive use of, this secret, perhaps the award for the number one practitioner is the credit card companies.  Just take a look at the front and back sides of this oversized, window envelope that arrived in my mail box recently.

The common thread among all these major users is that they all depend on experienced direct response marketers with extensive experience using the traditional direct mail channel.

Experienced direct response marketers understand the role of the “teaser” copy appearing on the front and back of the outer envelopes, the front of the postcard, and the front side of the self-mailer.

It’s called “teaser” copy because it has one very simple role to play – to tease the prospect with enough information to persuade her to either stop sorting the mail and read the entire sales message either inside or on the other panels or to set the piece aside for reading later.

Fellow blogger Joe Swatek covered this same issue in yesterday’s blog, “Tell Me, What ARE You Selling?,” available below.

Teaser copy is the secret that gets your direct mail piece quickly noticed by your recipient and hopefully read and the desired action taken.  It helps your message cut through whatever clutter exists that day in your mail box.