Wedding Direct Marketing

Have a look at this case study of The People’s Award at the Festival of Media Awards: "Ha’Poalim Mortgage Bank identified weddings as a key moment in which to reach out to this potential target market. It [...] sent out dozens of representatives to weddings across the country to [take] advantage of the tradition of putting cash or cheques in envelopes into gift boxes, [by posting] a congratulations card, an Ikea gift voucher and an invitation to meet with the Ha’Poalim mortgage team to discuss the special mortgage package. [...] For eight weeks representatives targeted hundreds of weddings in the Tel Aviv area on Thursdays – the traditional day for weddings. Twenty-five percent of the couples approached called to set up a meeting, and many more came into bank branches. Ha’Poalim will be targeting weddings again in 2009."

I hate it when a super intrusive Direct Marketing campaign like this boasts such a high success rate. Think of it: these sales representatives crash wedding parties to anonymously put a commercial offer in the gift box? It's almost as evil as the sales people who roam the corridors in maternity hospitals to collect post addresses of young parents, so they can come over with their sales pitch later. I had that once when my son was born: she rang at the door one week after birth pretending to work for one of those maternity consultancy services. I almost killed her when I found out she talked herself into my house to sell me cleaning products.

Weddings, births, funerals are important events in people's lives, and most are forced make important buying decisions around these events. But is this really the right time to cross the border between personal and public life?