Over the last few weeks in my publications class we created direct mailers. This project was actually pretty fun, but I tell you I had no idea where I was going to start. The first thing was to identify the target audiences. For our project we had to use our school, The University of Oklahoma, and create something for an audience that could potentially be associated with OU.
I knew for sure that students would be the first target, but that is very broad so I limited the range to high school juniors. I chose to write about the educational options available at OU to help those in high school get acquainted with what the university has to offer and what they should look for when they apply next year as a senior. Here’s a look at the first direct mailer.
I wanted to stick with something that OU is known for doing design wise. The top of numerous mailers have the white ribbon bleeding off the page with The University of Oklahoma on it and they also use white horizontal lines to show what the focus is on. The only other thing I wanted to do with this mailer was stick to the colors and add a few drop shadows to the OU logos to make them stand out a bit.
For the second mailer, I chose to target parents who may have trouble supporting their child financially. I chose to write about the grants, scholarships, and Oklahoma’s Promise Commitment as available options parents can look into. Here’s a look at the second mailer.
On the design side, I wanted to make the mailer immediately target parents. I chose a photo that just capture the university and for the back I chose grid paper because I usually associate grids with math. So I figured since I was writing about financial options grids would fit well. Other than that I continued with the OU color scheme and tried to keep it simple.
I had a lot of fun doing this project. One last thing, I will say it is best to look for inspiration when designing a direct mailer. I used this mailer I found on Pinterest for inspiration.
I also used direct mailers that we’ve had in the past at OU. But yes, use tons of inspiration and figure out your audiences and narrow them as much as possible. Hope you all enjoyed this post and the mailers I created.
-Tori
Originally posted at Tori Beechum - PR Pubs