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One of the best ways to keep direct mail production costs down is to minimize postage expenses. Here are a few simple tips to keep in mind that will help keep postage costs as low as possible — and maybe reduce cycle times and improve response rates in the process.

When it comes to direct mail, a letter-size piece is often the most economical. Unless you think your mail concept will pull enough response to make it worth the extra money, keep it small. Letter-size mail can be up to 6.125 by 11.5 inches and 0.25 inch thick. Anything larger or thicker — up to 12 by 15 inches and 0.75 inch thick — is a “flat.”

In addition, keep it light — postage adds up fast when a mail piece gets bulky. Paying attention to the paper stocks you use and adjusting finished piece sizes can help keep the weight of the mail piece under control. Ideally, a direct mail piece should weigh less than 3.3 ounces for standard mail and less than 1 ounce for first class mail.

First class mail can offer slightly faster delivery and additional services such as forwarding or return to sender, but such services come at a higher charge. Pieces weighing more than 1 ounce require additional postage and will cost even more. Ask yourself if you are really using the extra services you are paying for with first class.

Standard mail offers no-frills delivery at a lower cost than first class. Also, piece weight can be heavier (3.3 ounces) without incurring additional postage, and drop shipment discounts can add significantly to postage savings. Combining standard mail with other services such as commingling and destination entry (drop shipment) can significantly improve delivery times without the added expense of first class.

Caution: U.S. Postal Service regulations require that certain types of content must be sent as first class mail. The four basic criteria are:

• Mail composed of handwriting or typewriting.
• Mail closed against postal inspection.
• Mail having the character of actual and personal correspondence.
• Bills and statements of account.

Give the USPS the tools to efficiently process your mail by taking advantage of postal automation. Designing automation-friendly pieces and pre-barcoding your mail can result in big savings.

When designing an automation-friendly piece, remember that letter-size mail must have an aspect ratio (length/height) between 1.3 and 2.5 to be compatible with automation equipment. Also, letter-size mail must be flexible enough to bend through USPS sorting equipment. Reasonably flexible items such as plastic cards are permitted, but pencils, keys and other rigid premiums are not allowed in automation-rate letter-size mail.

Some of the rules for flat-size automation mail are less restrictive than those for letter-size. Mail pieces still have to be rectangular, but no longer need to meet a specific aspect ratio. Also, flats don't need to be as flexible as letters, so some bulkier flat-size mail pieces are still eligible for automation discounts. Do remember that flats have generally higher postage rates than letters, so don't just make your letter-size piece bigger to preserve automation discounts without carefully checking the applicable rates.

Pre-barcoding your automation-friendly mail means the USPS can sort the mail using automated equipment, rather than manually. If you're using a window envelope, be sure the barcode is visible through the window no matter how the insert moves inside. The USPS must be able to locate and read the barcode for it to help with mail sorting. Make a point of asking your mailing vendor if its personalization technology produces high-quality Postnet barcodes that pass Merlin evaluation. [“Merlin” is the Mail Evaluation Readability and Look-up Instrument, a relatively new USPS device for automatically testing barcode quality and other attributes to ensure that mail qualifies for the discounted rates being claimed.]

Participate in the USPS destination entry drop-shipment program for standard mail by trucking your mail to a postal processing facility near where it will be delivered. Discounts of $21 per thousand for delivery to a bulk mail center or $26 per thousand for moving the mail even further into the postal processing system and delivering to a sectional center facility can substantially lower postage costs.

In addition to postage savings, using destination entry will reduce how often your mail is handled, minimizing the potential for damage in transit. This means that, in the end, the mail piece will be more appealing to your prospect. Destination entry also can mean your mail will be in-home faster and provide you with tighter control of the in-home date. By timing the arrival of trucks at postal processing facilities around the country, you can achieve uniform in-home arrival throughout the nation.

Savvy marketers are continually testing various aspects of their mailings. Commingling your small tests into a single mail stream improves postal presort qualification, frequently to the five-digit level. The smallest tests benefit the most from commingling, but even trials as large as 500,000 names can earn savings.

You'll also see more accurate analysis of test results. Because all the tests and the control are in the same mail trays, they receive the same postal handling and arrive in-home at the same time.

You can go even further by finding a partner who can commingle your mail with other mail volume for even bigger discounts. The larger the group, the better the savings. Commingling your mail with the mail of others can add an extra measure of security. Once your mail is interspersed with a larger mail stream it becomes a less tempting target for fraud.

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Kurt Ruppel is marketing services manager at The Instant Web Companies, Chanhassen, MN.