How Direct Mail is Powering Customer Acquisition in 2025

JICMAIL’s Latest Data Proves Mail’s Impact in 2025

We’re excited to share the latest insights from JICMAIL’s 2025 Response Rate Tracker, highlighting the rising impact of mail as a powerful channel for customer acquisition. With significant improvements in response rates and ROI for Cold Direct Mail and Door Drop campaigns, this data confirms mail’s role as a “Super Touchpoint” in cutting through digital clutter. At Citipost Mail, we combine industry expertise with innovative solutions to help brands maximise the reach and effectiveness of their direct mail campaigns in today’s competitive market.

Key Performance Benchmarks for 2025:

Channel	Response Rate	ROI (£)	No. of Campaigns
Warm Direct Mail	7.2%	£9.00	1,735
Cold Direct Mail	0.9%	£3.20	1,659
Door Drops	0.5%	£2.90	324

Cold Direct Mail and Door Drops: On the Rise

The Response Rate Tracker, now based on data from 3,800 campaigns contributed by fifteen organisations, reveals that Cold Direct Mail response rates grew by 24% year-on-year in 2024, while Door Drop ROI surged by 41%. These figures highlight the increasing effectiveness of mail for prospecting, helping businesses expand their customer base even as digital channels become more crowded and competitive.

The Power of Scale and Repeat Sending

Larger campaign volumes drive higher ROI: Cold Direct Mail campaigns with up to 25,000 items achieve an average ROI of £2.50, but this rises to £3.60 when volumes exceed 100,000 items.

Repeat sends outperform new campaigns: Sending repeat Cold Direct Mail campaigns results in a 37% higher ROI and 2.5 times higher response rates compared to first-time campaigns. These repeat efforts also see higher average order values and lower cost per acquisition.

Expert Perspectives

Ian Gibbs, JICMAIL’s Director of Data Leadership and Learning, commented:

“Prospecting for new customers is vital to the future success of businesses, yet performance marketing as a discipline faces challenges in measurement, transparency and creativity. It is heartening therefore to see that the mail channel is bucking this trend with response rates growing at a healthy rate for Cold DM and Door Drops alike. With the upcoming Data Usage and Access Bill bringing greater clarity to businesses looking to employ a data-driven approach to customer acquisition, this set of Response Rate Tracker results are very timely for the mail channel.”

Mark Cross, JICMAIL’s Engagement Director, added:

“Thanks to this industry collaboration we are continuing to grow the evidence base that supports the case for mail as a super touchpoint with some great new insights from this year’s tracker. Dual purpose brand and response comms works best, ROI improves with reach and with the brilliantly simple, but overlooked, insight of just repeat send to drive up response and ROI.”

Direct mail continues to prove its value for customer acquisition in 2025, with rising response rates, strong ROI, and clear strategies for boosting performance through scale, repeat sends, and dual-purpose campaigns. For businesses looking to grow, mail remains a powerful and measurable channel in the marketing mix.

Citipost Mail specialises in direct mail marketing, helping businesses create meaningful connections that drive loyalty and sales. In today’s crowded market, direct mail stands out by engaging customers effectively and complementing your wider marketing strategy. Whether you want to win new customers or boost existing relationships, our expert team is here to support you. Contact Citipost Mail today to unlock the full potential of this powerful marketing channel.