If ever there was a perfect example of where the world of the theory of direct mail and the world of assumption separate it is here.

Colour, everyone tells me, works.

But in fact, all you are doing is driving more and more information at the recipient.  Let's imagine that we can divide information into packets.  A basic piece of information is 1 Inf - and let's say the most information that we can take in at any time is 40 Infs.

So we have our headline that is there to grab attention - let's say that is 10 words, which means 10 Infs.  But words are more than the sum of their parts.  Our 10 words have meaning, and that meaning hits the brain at the same time as the words (that's the clever thing about the left hemisphere - it can do stuff like this).   The meaning of our ten words is much more complex than the words - so takes up another 30infs.  We have used up 40 Infs.

Being very careful we don't put anything around the headline, which we dutifully place about one third of the way down the page, we find we are all set.  We're still on 40 Infs.

Now we can have the rest of the page used up with text.  Overall that text is going to take up say 200 Infs of words and quite possibly 2000 infs of meaning, but of course no one reads it all at once, so that's not a problem.

But now we think - ah we have to have colour.  Colour is good.   So we put a colour border around our piece, just to show we can do it.   We print our headed paper paraphernalia at the top of the page, with colour logo and all that stuff.   That takes up, what?   Another 10 Infs for the logo, another 10 for the colour border?

And we are overloaded.   But for what benefit?  None at all - just to show off the colour.   And the downside is that our really exciting whizzo wonderful headline has just gone down the drain because all our attention has gone on the colour.

Colour, like everything else, must be there for a purpose, and the vague notion that "colour is good" is really not good enough. Clearly we have to have two colours - the background colour of the paper, and the colour of the print - and by and large black on yellow works quite well.  (It's all to do with the frequencies - yellow being near the middle of the spectrum and so in that regard more neutral - but we have had enough technical talk for one section.)

This is not to say that sometimes some pictures have to be in colour - but then the issue focuses mostly on the question of the picture and whether the picture needs colour.  When it is a basic issue of colour on the page for the sake of colour on the page, the theory once again rightly predicts the answer - colour for colour's sake interferes with the perception and reduces response rate.

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The full set of pages covering The Theory of Direct Mail are shown below.  If you want to move to the next page, just click here

Below is a list of the factors that make up The Total Theory of Direct Mail:

1. Why most firms ignore the theory and produce direct mail that fails.
2. When and where the mailing is received - what the recipient is doing at the moment of impact.
3. The personality of the individual you are mailing, and how that affects the mailing.
4. The envelope - it is the first thing you see - does it make any difference?
5. The interaction between the brain and the paper - there are issues of neurophysiology at work which must be taken into effect.
6. The mail is opened - the next five seconds are vital; so what does mailsort do at this point? 
7. Differentiation - now the customer decides, "Have I seen this sort of stuff before?"
8. The customer decides to read - but then colour can get in the way.
9. Using images to try and hold attention - the grabby image problem.
10. Skipping - no matter what you try, most recipients do it.
11. The end - as likely to effect the result as the start
12. The second page - its function and layout.
13. Subsequent page interference - so unexpected most people refuse to admit it exists - but it really does happen.
14. What do you want the reader to do next?  
15. Ordering - are you making it easy?

This article is an extract from the book "Doubling Response Rates: The Theory and Practice of Direct Mail" (c) Tony Attwood 2006