C. Clint Bolte & Associates

The largest gathering (6,500+) and most number of exhibitors (160+) in seven years assembled April 2-5 to participate in the National Postal Forum. These attendees came to network with one another, attend some of the 138 workshops (95 new topics), and enjoy sunny Orlando, Florida.

Mistakenly too many printers think that this conference must delve into the intricacies of the United States Postal Service mail regulations and other mundane nuances. Hence, the general commercial print owners or their top management group delegate their mailing department head as their sole representative. While attendees can certainly get any type of question answered by either the myriad USPS professional staff and experienced, willing-to-share mailing service providers present, the strategic marketing and product development ideas presented by some of the leading practitioners on the continent is where the big payoff could exist. This article will highlight several of these opportunities and rest assured they are not Disney Magic.

The immediate and on-going use of the Internet by mailers and the USPS was an underlying Forum theme in two specific arenas. First, the success stories of utilizing opt-in e-mail and well designed web sites as complementary and supplementary elements to direct mail in multi-media marketing campaigns was trumpeted by small and large corporate entities alike. Secondly, the USPS has completed the successful testing of electronic operational information flow between their mailing services vendors and themselves to eliminate paperwork and reduce the cycle time of getting the mail to its ultimate recipients. The first has received ample, well-deserved media coverage, but not the second.

This later initiative could be a home run by creating the most substantial degree of hard-core efficiencies experienced by both the Postal Service and printer-mailers since the pony express gave way to the iron horse in the delivery of mail. Ms. Pritha Mehra, USPS Manager of Marketing Technology and Channel Management, participated on a number of panel presentations with mail service providers who had completed successful beta tests of electronic collaboration with the USPS. There are six facets to this electronic information flow; (1) advance notification of mail to come, (2) e-check payment, (3) USPS yard management of vehicles arriving, (4) actual receipt or induction of pallets of mail, (5) client visibility of the mail throughout the processing and (6) client interface with USPS records to keep track of their own account. Many of these are working now. Others have been proven in Beta tests and will be rolled out nationwide over the next eighteen months.

The key attributes of this electronic concept is that the client mailers are working from a self serve model with a PC window into the USPS, no more tedious forms, no more telephone tag and no more hand carrying checks to the USPS.