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Adeveloper of electronic document delivery systems has achieved a 14% response rate so far to a lead-generation mailing sent to top executives.

Captaris Inc. dropped some 50,000 Priority Mail packages in January to chief executives, chief financial officers and other “C-level” execs at manufacturing, healthcare, hospitality and retail companies to promote the latest version of RightFax, a system that enables faxes to be sent from desktop computers.

This response came on top of an 11.5% return from a similar effort conducted in 2003, said Nicole Poulson, marketing development coordinator for the Bellevue, WA firm.

The idea behind these mailings came about last year. Captaris thought it would try a new approach to get direct mail past secretaries who, the company believed, would automatically throw out direct mail without reading it, said Spyro Kourtis, president of The Hacker Group, Captaris' agency.

This problem is similar to the long-standing difficulty of getting business-to-business direct mail forwarded from corporate mailrooms to its intended destination.

“The package was lumpy and gave the impression there was something valuable in it, so people were less likely to throw it away,” said Kourtis.

The solicitation, which came in a Priority Mail envelope, contained a letter, four-page brochure, a remote control device and two batteries. It also came with a reply form that sought such information as number of employees, documents processed per week, fax stations and use of competitive systems. The remote unit powered a free Sharper Image Sleek Solo CD system premium that recipients would get in exchange for scheduling an appointment with Captaris.

Of the 14% who have responded to the mailing thus far, some 30% have asked to meet with one of the more than 1,000 value-added resellers or other channel partners the company uses.

Captaris thought the cost of RightFax was worth the expense: The systems run between $2,000 and $20,000, depending on how widely customers use them in their companies, said Poulson.

RightFax is a fax and electronic document delivery system that integrates and automates the flow of paper and electronic documents and data on computer networks.

By automating these processes, users can cut costs by as much as 90% by eliminating the expenses of labor, postage and paper, according to Captaris.