What is Mailmark?
Mailmark™ is a postage product launched by Royal Mail in 2014. Following £70 million of investment in advanced optical recognition, Mailmark provides detailed item level reporting to the sender as well as lower postage costs through increased automation within the sortation process.
For a mailing to be sent using the Mailmark service, 2D barcodes must be produced from the mailing’s address data and printed onto the individual items comprising the mailing.
The barcodes are read by Royal Mail at 5 separate points throughout sortation and delivery.
Benefits
Mailmark can be used to improve the performance of both current and future mailings whilst also lowering postage costs.
Tracking of mail and accurate delivery predictions allows for more timely multi-media campaign planning such as follow up email/telephone marketing or time limited online discounts.
Reports on the overall ‘health’ of individual postings enable senders to identify duplicates, miss-sorts and incorrectly addressed items. Databases and mail production processes can be updated to improve the accuracy of subsequent mailings.
Mailmarked items allow highly efficient sortation by Royal Mail which translates into cheaper postage costs. With around a 50% discount when compared to unsorted, standard tariff mail, the savings created by Mailmark far outweigh any extra costs involved with producing the item manifests and barcodes required by the service.
Which Mailings can be Mailmarked?
Mailmark can be used for nearly all Letter and Large Letter mailings.
It requires matching address data to Royal Mail’s DPS database so that the barcodes can be generated for each address and printed onto the envelope or mailing piece during production.
Address data must be at least 90% DPS matched to qualify for Mailmark.
There are also specific design restrictions, such as print-free clear zones as well as requirements on the suitability of the piece for machine reading and sorting.
How Can CMS Help?
CMS Direct Mail have been Mailmark enabled from initial launch and have helped many businesses and organisations to access it’s benefits.
Our range of data processing and cleaning services will ensure as much of your mail is Mailmarked as possible and our experience producing machine readable mail will ensure there are no issues regarding compliance with requirements.
If you would like further information or advice on implementing Mailmark, contact our team today.
