I work at a jazz club. I love it. I do it part-time to make a little extra bread, plus it keeps things interesting.  I’ve worked there off and on for the better part of twenty years, when I haven’t been living in Puerto Rico (but that’s another story).  I…

I can’t thank you enough It’s not just a sentiment. It’s an actual campaign here at Prime Data that lasted three months. #CTYE We wanted to thank and recognize clients, colleagues, vendors and everyone else who contributes to our success each and every day. That’s not to say that…

Guest post from Dana Williams,  Manager, Data Programming For the last few years, as head of the Data team at Prime Data, I’ve been blessed to work with a great team. The team members share some commonalities, but it’s the differences in knowledge, experience, culture and personalities that make this…

Everyone loves a good deal. And when it comes to making business decisions, price is generally one of the most important considerations.  But what if you were to reframe the price of a product or service you were considering as an investment in your campaign’s success? On June 12th it’s…

Any proud parent will tell you it’s hard not to brag about your kids. In the same vein, I’m very proud of the team we’ve built at Prime Data. And I need to brag about them a little, because every time I do, our clients’ eyes light up. Clients know…

The following is a guest post from our Senior Sales Executive Ted Haberer My friend Gladys was born and raised on Broadview Avenue, just north of the Danforth in the east end of Toronto. On a summer day, she and her friends would walk down through the wooded valley and…

We just bought a dishwasher. It seems they have a seven-year shelf life, so it’s something we all do with some regularity. But how do you tell the real quality of a dishwasher, anyway? You can be fooled by a lot of glitter and flash…when all you really want is…

When it comes to marketing I’ve spoken before about why aligning digital and print is crucial to creating successful campaigns. The same data that powers your online activities, supercharges the effectiveness of print while closing the circle on the customer journey. Thanks to my co-presenter, Varun…

How listening to your donors helps you reduce the amount you spend to raise a dollar Here are some industry slogans you won’t likely see promoted: Drink less wine – a message from local vintners Keep your old car longer – brought to you by your local car dealers Use…

Marketing today is about crunching numbers and following hard data to make decisions and win over consumers. It’s the reason we’re tracked virtually everywhere we go online. Digital tracking isn’t so scary anymore Visit an eCommerce website to check out some headphones, and you’ll likely see those very same headphones…

It’s standard marketing practice that every purchase, registration or newsletter signup is quickly followed by an autoresponder of some kind. Do you read them? I rarely do. In fact when I see the autoresponder show up I generally just consider it “confirmation by subject line.” “Yup, got it” swipe left….

You don’t often hear of a platform coming back stronger than ever after being decisively thumped by a new technology. But that’s the story of direct mail. It might be hard to remember, but there was a time before the internet and email and Google. It was an era of…

As the Ontario municipal elections approach, towns and cities across the province are gearing up to mail voter registration cards to residents. And if your municipality hasn’t already started, it is certainly one of the big projects looming large on the horizon. In elections past, voter registration cards were usually…

Don’t like videos? Read the transcript! Hey, how’re you doing? Steve Falk here from Prime Data. We’re going to do an unboxing of this box of Cheerios – one of my favorite breakfast treats. Turns out that Canada Post is working with General Mills to do a really neat…

As someone who works in direct mail I’m used to making a solid business case for using print as part of comprehensive multi-channel marketing campaigns. And while I can cite all sorts of stats on the effectiveness and perceived value of sending a real tangible thing through the post it…

Some of the best advice I ever got from my parents was not to hang out with troublemakers because everyone would eventually assume I was a troublemaker as well. In retrospect that was my first experience with branding. I might have been the best kid in school (I wasn’t). But…

Let’s be honest, unless we have a personal link to the it, we don’t often think of accessibility issues. OK, maybe we consider it if there is an accessibility regulation we need to follow. That’s a shame because this means businesses and fundraisers tend to think of accessibility as a…

I once heard that the best way to have people not read something on your site was to name the page “Terms of Service.” After 20 years you’d think somebody would have found a way to simplify the language and bring a little clarity to what happens to your data…

According to a recent article in Forbes your credit card is worth 25 cents. That might not sound like a lot. But when you hear about security breaches in the news, it’s not just one card, but millions that are scooped up and made available to potential scammers. That’s a…

Last week was a big week at Prime Data. We celebrated the expansion and centralizing of our production, IT and administration in Aurora, Ontario. It was a full-on celebration with a Dixieland band, tours of our new location, visits from dignitaries, vendors, customers and local business owners. It was such…

Temple University was so impressed with the way printed mail delivered results in a recent study, they’ve made it part of their multi-channel marketing program to enrol Masters students. The study conducted by Temple University and paid for by the United States Postal Service (USPS) has found that email and…

Extinguish PR fires with a little bit of paper Your customer engagement plan is never a “set it and forget it” proposition. You can bring everyone together to map out a strategy and put execution plans in place one month, and then have an unexpected event turn everything on its…

Building a great vehicle can’t be easy. The effort that goes into engineering a product that is safe AND reliable AND sexy to consumers is incredible. But the automotive industry has got it figured out. And as a result, not only has the overall quality and safety of vehicles steadily…

There is a very old marketing adage that goes something like this: “Half of my marketing budget is wasted. I just wish I knew which half.” For the longest time measuring results was an inexact science. Long before A/B testing, retailers had little choice but to toss everything at the…

Anyone who’s ever been in the sales game knows that it’s cheaper to keep and sell to an existing customer than to find, market and convert a new one. Never has this been more important than online. Once a visitor is converted from a first-time customer to make a second…

I heard that Bill Gates reads 50 books a year!  He’s always learning. Our marketing technology landscape is evolving so fast it feels like you need to read the equivalent of a book a week to keep up with it. But it’s a fun part of the job. At Prime…

Did you hear the one about the guy who went to a digital party and an analog turntable stole the show? Well it’s no joke. This happened to me last week at Dx3 in Toronto. As Canada’s premier digital marketing event you’d be right to assume that most of the…

Need it be said that we live in an increasingly digital world? We communicate with email, do research and purchase products online. And we are hit up with more marketing messages on a daily basis than at any other period in history. Even our ebooks have ads! Digital marketing is…

When a person misreads their audience, we call them tone-deaf. But when it comes to eCommerce I believe a lot of retailers have developed a bad case of tech-blindness. And by that I mean they don’t see the opportunities right in front of them because they are overwhelmed by the…

It’s hard to believe that January marked the 10th anniversary of the first iPhone. Looking back, it’s shocking to consider just what kind of revolution that one piece of technology unleashed. With a single product launch Apple basically killed the Blackberry, while creating an exploding market for smartphones that eventually…

My prediction for 2017? This will be the year of the rising importance that “Analog” — the tactile objects and real interactions with which we imbue so much meaning — becomes recognized for its importance in our digital-hyped marketing world. Admittedly, predicting exactly what’s going to happen between now and…

One of the guys who does some marketing work for us told me recently that he’d completely finished his Christmas shopping. And he hadn’t set foot in a mall.  My father buys nearly everything online too, and he’s no millennial. Every present on their gift-giving list was ordered online and…

Mail is dead. Long live mail! It’s like an internet meme that just won’t die. If mail isn’t already going the way of the dinosaurs then the metaphorical internet meteor is certainly on it’s way to deliver the fatal blow at some point in the near future.   Of course…

I certainly understand the branding behind Giving Tuesday. After Black Friday and Cyber Monday, having a day that promotes charity over consumption is a great way to add a bit of balance to the season. This year, online sales during the holidays are set to jump an astounding 17%…

Whenever I attend an event  I like to take a deep dive into the sessions ahead of time to make sure I map out an experience that allows me to come away with new ideas to make Prime Data even more responsive to client’s needs.This year’s Association of Professional Fundraisers…

I’m a big proponent for breaking down the silos between online and offline marketing and communications efforts.  In fact, finding the value in the physical, or analog was the the topic of a book launch I attended last night in Toronto, for David Sax’s, Revenge of the Analog.  He writes…

Print marketing is dead. Newspapers are finished. Physical books should be used for fuel as we read our Kindles by the light of books’ glowing embers in the fireplace. I’ve been in this business a long time and I’ve heard it all over the years. But as Public Enemy once…

4 Days to Act ! Next steps for Businesses, e-commerce and charities Do you use mail to support the activities of your business or charity? If you do then there is little   doubt you experienced some impact on your business as the threat of a mail disruption loomed this summer….

Dylan Hicks and Herbie MartinThe marketing technology industry is changing fast. What was breakthrough technology last year, is old news today.It wasn’t always like that. For decades our specialty, variable data print technology and the industry as a whole, lived in it’s own little bubble. Marginal…