Programmatic direct mail delivers Sykes Cottages 8,000 bookings from 75,000 mailers, a 10.66% conversion rate

For the finest cottage holidays in the best locations, you can count on Sykes Cottages - one of the UK's leading independent holiday cottage rental agencies with over 25 years experience. Sykes Cottages have offered a huge range of over 15,000 handpicked holiday cottages to rent across the UK and Ireland. Their diverse selection of cottage holidays include pet-friendly cottages and large holiday homes to cottages with hot tubs.

Pepper helped Sykes to use direct mail to re-engage their customers with the digital journey - 75% of people who redeemed their code opted back into digital communications

Background

Following the onset of GDPR Sykes Cottages lost over 70% of their email list. Without regular contact to customers, repeat holiday bookings decreased.
Sykes Cottages wanted an effective, timely way to communicate with customers to follow up on their holiday experiences and encourage them to re-engage with digital channels.

Approach

Pepper suggested sending a programmatic weekly mailer to customers who have just returned from their holiday to encourage customers to rebook.

To make sure all engagement could be tracked, a custom code for a discount offer was printed on each mailer. The codes linked back to individual customers.

Outcome

This campaign is ongoing, but to date:

Costs to total sales ratio 1:24, for every £1 spent, £24 sales made.

45% activated their discount offer code
Over 10% of customers re-booked - more than double than any previous campaign.
A huge 75% of customers re-engaged with digital channels

I have experience with mailing but wanted to know more about the options to maximise the potential of our data. We wanted to try something other than an expensive brochure. The guys at Pepper talked me through the possibilities for programmatic direct mail and the benefits of personalisation. We’re really happy with how this campaign has performed, it’s been a huge success for us in driving direct holiday sales and supporting our digital strategy. We are now looking to roll this programmatic direct mailer out across our other brands.

Marketing Manager - Sykes Cottages

Programmatic direct mail delivers Sykes Cottages 8,000 bookings from 75,000 mailers, a 10.66% conversion rate

Programmatic direct mail results

Pepper helped Sykes to use direct mail to re-engage their customers with the digital journey - 75% of people who redeemed their code opted back into digital communications

Get the latest updates