We live in a world where advertising exposure dominates our time spent on social media and online. If you’ve fully mobilised on emails, and relentless social media ads, you might think direct mail is a relic of the past.
You’d be wrong.
For Shopify brands in the UK looking to cut through the digital noise in 2025, direct mail isn’t just relevant — it’s a secret weapon.
Here’s why:
1. The Digital Fatigue Is Real
Consumers are drowning in online messages and we need look no further than the inboxes on our smartphones to validate this. Take for example email, which is leant on heavily to communicate marketing promotion. Think about the last time you truly engaged with an email in the inbox? Chances are the message landed with you at the right time or at the very least for every one email you might engage with, 10 are thrown straight into the junk folder.Inboxes are cluttered. Feeds are overloaded. Attention spans are shorter than ever.
Physical mail, though? It feels different. It’s tangible. It demands attention without competing with a thousand other tabs. And more importantly it allows the customer to engage with the channel at a time that is right for them. At Paperplanes we typically see that it takes customers 11 days to engage with direct mail after it lands at home, that is the power of long-term tracking.
2. Direct Mail Creates Emotional Engagement
Touch triggers memory. It is well reported that the sense of touch builds trust. When someone holds a piece of well-designed direct mail, the experience is personal and real. And when it’s personalised based on previous purchase behaviour it drives increased basket spend. We see order value increases as high as 54% for basket campaigns.
Studies show direct mail delivers higher brand recall than digital advertising alone. In an age where trust is currency, physical mail builds deeper connections. What do deeper connections create? Increased
likelihood for customers to return for multiple purchases.
3. Highly Targeted — Especially with Shopify Data
Shopify brands sit on a goldmine of customer data:
- Purchase history
- Browsing habits
- Location
With smart segmentation, you can deliver highly personalised direct mail campaigns that feel tailor-made. Automations mean you can even trigger a mailing after an abandoned cart.
Paperplanes works with eCommerce brands every day to drive campaigns that get noticed. We like to think that a collaborative approach will help us create opportunities for the best performing campaigns. But of course smart segmentation is only as good as the data it generates. This is why we provide clients access to campaign analytics and insights via ‘InFlight’ our in-house data platform enabling you to build knowledge of your direct mail spend.
4. Higher Open Rates, Less Competition
Email open rates are dropping, social media algorithms for exposure and cost can be unpredictable and Google can be very expensive based on the bid and the selection criteria you are looking for.
Meanwhile, Royal Mail reports that 90% of mail gets opened in the UK. Paperplanes research shows that direct mail campaigns drive around 60-70% of total exposed audiences back to websites.
Why is this? Is there some sort of simple reason as to why this occurs? Because the letterbox is now less crowded than the inbox. Think about the last time you received a post, not junk, spam, pizza or estate
agents but high quality, premium content. Perfect post personalised and relevant to your tastes and buying habits and offering you a compelling reason to re-engage with a brand you recently showed interest in.
5. Direct Mail Drives Online Action
There are some tried and tested paths you could lean on here, QR codes, personalised URLs, discount codes — But this is just the tip of the iceberg. Imagine how powerful it can be to receive live info on conversion, basket spend, time to purchase, web return rates, CPAs and repeat purchase rates? You could have your CMO jumping for joy when you are not only able to show a return from direct mail but you can lean on Paperplanes to provide attribution for the DM channel through well thought out incrementality tests. Direct mail doesn’t replace digital. It amplifies it.
Done right, a piece of mail drives customers straight to your Shopify store. And with tracking tools like Paperplanes’ unique InFlight dashboard, you can measure the ROI as clearly as you do with email and paid ads.
6. It Builds Brand Authority
Final Thought: Smart Brands Go Where Attention Is
Direct mail isn’t “dead.” It’s underutilised. If you want to revive a strategy to create sales this is your chance or if you have never used it don’t sleep on the channel! Paperplanes has spent 8 years working with eComm brands to create a strong and compelling backlog of content to help mobilise the channel.
Attention is the ultimate commodity and smart Shopify brands will go where competition is lowest and impact is highest… Straight through the letterbox. Allow us to guide you through that journey.
Want to know how to build a direct mail strategy that integrates seamlessly with your Shopify store? Let’s chat.
