Businesses continue to rely on direct dialog with customers

The importance of direct-response marketing continues to grow in the German advertising landscape.

In the wake of this trend, Deutsche Post has changed the long-standing name of its marketing study - "Direkt Marketing Monitor" - to "Dialog Marketing Monitor" [Dialog-Marketing is the German term for direct-response marketing].

The extensive study provides the latest data and facts on direct-response marketing in Germany and will be published for the 20th time this year. According to one of the study's findings, EUR 32.7 billion were spent on direct-response marketing in 2007, an increase of more than two percent over the previous year.

The growth rate for the overall advertising market has slowed. In this sector, a total of EUR 71.6 billion was spent, an increase of some 1.6 percent. Thus more than two-thirds of the money expended on marketing last year was invested in direct response media. The advertising market as a whole is increasingly uncoupled from the overall economic trend. The share that total advertising spending comprises in Germany's gross national product fell last year to the lowest level since the study has been published.

Online business booming

The number of businesses using direct-response media has increased slightly, as have the budgets of the leading sectors that make use of direct-response media. For example, the budgets at service providers and in the trade sector are growing slightly while spending in the manufacturing sector matches the previous year's level.

Although more and more small and medium-sized businesses choose direct-response marketing, large companies continue to account for most of the spending on advertising. Approximately 60 percent of advertising spending comes from companies with more than EUR 25 million in annual sales. A look at the direct-response media being used reveals that mailings in general and addressed advertising mailings in particular are the medium garnering the most spending by far. Spending on mailings is stable.

Businesses thus continue to rely on targeted direct-response marketing. The online segment also continued to boom in 2007, with the largest usership and the fastest growth in spending (nearly nine percent). According to the study's findings, telephone marketing is the loser in the direct-response media rankings. On the other hand however the downward trend in the use of response elements could be stopped.

Much more precise picture of the marketing pros

Based on this, the trends in the advertising market can be read as follows: As a result of the advertising market having uncoupled from the overall economy, the advertising industry no longer benefits from the overall economic trend. At the same time however, the direct-response market is growing faster than the overall advertising market. The trend away from offline media and toward online media continues unabated, but addressed mailings will retain their importance.

The IPSOS opinion research institute surveyed 3,091 companies for the Dialog Marketing Monitor 2008. The study was developed together with Deutsche Post's Market Research Service Center (MRSC). For the first time, top advertisers were interviewed in person rather than surveyed in telephone interviews. As a result, the picture of these direct-response marketing professionals, their activities and their assessment of the market is much more precise. The Dialog Marketing Monitor can be downloaded for free at www.deutschepost.de/dmm.