Today’s businesses are looking for an advantage to help them weather the storm and avoid layoffs or losses in revenue. That’s why companies are focusing on a single task to stay afloat – increasing sales.

Typically a recession drives small businesses to evaluate, re-design and refine their product offerings and marketing processes as they focus on cash flow, costs, customer retention and survival.

There has been an upsurge in Internet and email marketing, yet many top decision-makers in businesses nationwide and even globally still rely on traditional marketing tactics such as direct mail when positioning products, developing media strategies.

In fact, in the past, some people predicted email and online marketing would put an end to direct mail. The Winterberry Group estimated that direct mail spending would be at around $65 billion in 2009.

What is happening now is called “integrated marketing” where traditional direct mail, and television or radio advertising is integrated with online advertising, resulting in even better results and bigger revenues.

It is essential for business marketers to research and learn how to be innovative, send the right message to the right person, and create new opportunities for increasing their revenues despite the economic climate.

According to the U.S. A survey entitled the Postal Service’s Household Diary study was released in August 2009 and stated advertising mail spending was at $59.7 billion in the year 2008, accounting for 22 percent of all advertising spending and ranked only below television, while overall households received 99.about 6 billion pieces of advertising mail in 2008.

This is why small businesses need to learn learn insightful direct mail information about understanding list opportunities, improving mail delivery and reducing postage costs, including:

Direct mail is all about the numbers, benefits and expectations. It is important to learn how to design a business marketing plan that will turn expectations into revenues. You also need to write compelling copy targeting recipients and maximizing responses. Marketers can use offers and a call-to-action to increase conversion rates and return on investment. You MUST test and track direct mail successes for increasingly effective campaigns. -Identify the right prospects. Enrich your customer base for better results, and learn how analytics can help target prospects most likely to do business with you. Any smart marketer can choose from more than 40,000 available lists to get the best response rate. More importantly, learn how to maximize on-time mail delivery through effective address hygiene. You canidentify the “money wasters” in your mailing lists. Taking advantage of postage discounts for mailings is important, and you should learn how to use drop shipping to enhance delivery and cut costs. One last tip – your mail can be tracked through the mail stream with the USPS’s Intelligent Mail Bar Code™.

If you research online, you will learn the answers to the above pointers, you will know how to get new customers, increase your return on investment(ROI)and create comelling direct mail that drives customers.

Check out any one of the direct mail and marketing trade organizations like the Direct Marketing Association.(DMA) They provide a range of current research and resources relating to every aspect of direct marketing, including books, research and other useful resources.

There are also many localized marketers that have set up direct mail crash courses so you can learn more.

It isn’t easy reaching C-level. I’m talking about getting your direct mail letter through to senior executives in a corporations, the ones with the letter “C” for “Chief,” in their titles. Here are just a few of the more common C-level titles . . .CEO – Chief Executive Officer; COO – Chief Operating Officer; CFO – Chief Financial Officer; CMO – Chief Marketing Officer; CIT – Chief of Information Technology; and CTO – Chief Technology Officer.C-level executives, of course, are the decision-makers you want to reach if you’re selling major systems or services. They’re the folks with the power to make big purchase decisions or instruct the appropriate person in the organization to “check out” what you’ve got to offer.Needless to say, everyone wants the ear of the C-level players. Which means that they’re protected by assistants who make sure that junk mail never reaches their desks. So what’s a poor copywriter to do? What tricks can you use to make sure that your  letter gets past the gatekeeper, gets opened by the senior executive, and generates the action you’re asking for?Here are some copywriting tips and techniques which can help get your letter in front of a decision maker.1. Forget about envelope teaser copyEnvelope copy screams “JUNK MAIL” and thus will be tossed out by the executive’s administrator. Some companies actually have internal mailroom policies stating that obvious junk mail should never be delivered to the executive’s desk! This means that you should avoid the junk look at all costs and use a standard #10 business envelope without any teaser copy.2. Use overnight mail or priority mailA better approach, if your budget permits, is to use an express service. When someone sees a FedEx package, they open it. It’s as simple as that. Of course you can’t afford to send a mass mailing via FedEx, but if you’re mailing in onesies and twosies, and following up with a phone call, this is a great way to go!3. Send a dimensional packageIn the jargon of copywriters, a dimensional mailing is a package that actually has something stuffed inside it (i.e. it has three dimensions). Often, by adding an attention-getter, you can be sure your package will get opened. For example, you can enclose a book that you think the prospect might enjoy reading. Or an important report. (Forget about calculators, caps, and any other junky gifts.)4. Use the “Peer-to-Peer” approach.This means you can have your letter signed by a person at your company with the same C-level title as the prospect’s. For example, if you want to send a letter to the Chief Financial Officer at American Widget, have it “written” by the CFO at your company. Play up the fact that both executives face the same challenges, the writer knows from personal experience what the prospect is up against, etc.The take-away message? If you’re writing to C-level executives, you have to cut through the clutter, get past the gatekeeper, and make sure your letter gets read.