The most real channel for a most unreal age

Tom Roach explores how DM works in harmony with other channels in the digital ecosystem; and suggests that as the AI revolution progresses, AI could help enhance DMs impact even more.

AI’s the only game in town in marketing right now, dominating every conversation, consuming all the oxygen, and promising a future of unprecedented efficiency and personalisation. It’s confusing, exciting, scary, enlivening, all at once.  

But the thing about revolutions is, whilst they always promise to turn everything upside down overnight, they actually succeed over a longer, slower timescale by creating new ways to do things in combination with existing practices. This is exactly what happened with the last marketing revolution, the digital one, and this is what will happen with the new one, the AI revolution.

The digital revolution brought in an array of new platforms and channels. But it wasn’t that suddenly only using search or social media was transformative for companies. It was the smart layering in of new platforms and tactics in combination with established tactics that proved especially effective. For example, TV used together with search, news media combined with social activation, live events amplified with Twitter - really powerful combinations of existing and new channels was often the way to go.

And this proved to be the case with Direct Mail too. 

Digital and Direct Mail work in harmony

It turned out to be a great fit for D2C and digital native brands, especially if they lack a physical presence in retail, bringing a tangibility that can rebalance the overall brand experience. It's trusted, physical, multi-sensorial, and credible.

It makes perfect sense that in a world where brands are increasingly reliant on communicating to their audiences via fleeting digital messages, where attention to ads is scarce and short, that a piece of direct mail can really stand out and bring a brand’s messaging some extra impact and longevity. The average Direct Mail piece gets 108 seconds of attention across 28 days,¹ dwarfing the attention most social ads will get you. It's a physical object that demands human touch and attention, not just a flicker of pixels on a screen that can be easily swiped away. 63% of recipients say mail attracts their undivided focus.² You hold it, you feel its weight, you might even notice its texture or scent. DM even in its simplest forms can deliver engagement and a deeper, more lasting impression. 

It can bridge the gap between the physical and digital worlds, acting as a prompt, a reminder, a tangible invitation to engage further online. It delivers engagement unlike any other channel - 97% of all mail is engaged with.³ And it combines with existing channels to make the total mix work harder - campaigns are 52% more likely to report ROI benefits when mail is in the mix.⁴

Multi-sensory brand building 

But beyond short-term activation, the tangible, multi-sensory experience it provides can make it a strong brand-building tool. In an age where attention is fragmented and scarce, a well-crafted piece of mail can get you a moment of focused attention that can elevate your brand. The act of receiving something personal, in the privacy of your home, can foster a sense of exclusivity. It’s partly what makes mail 49% more memorable than email and 35% more memorable than social media ads.⁵ Emotional responses create memories and associations - which is what brands are made of. 

In 2025, global beauty and skincare brand Trinny London⁶ tested mail in the UK for the first time. Trinny London’s growth was originally driven organically via word of mouth, fuelled by Trinny herself and her loyal community of followers. As the brand grew, the media mix was widened to include paid and organic social content, paid search and email. 

DM was brought in to convey the brand's luxury credentials and deliver a tactile, personal experience to customers in the place where they use the product most, their homes.

Trinny London's first UK mailing drove a 50% increase in sales vs. target and a 26% uplift in average order value.⁷ The mailer acted as a trusted, physical invitation to engage further with their digital storefront, a bridge between the two worlds.

So DM isn’t an escape from a world of digital marketing, but a way for brands to get the most out of it, with unique physical attributes that complement and enhance a brand’s digital activity. 

What’s next in an AI world?

And now with AI, we’re at the start of the next marketing revolution.

In some ways it will supercharge and maybe even complete the promises of the digital revolution - making marketing faster, smarter, more personalised.

AI’s unique qualities will determine the roles it will end up playing in the marketers’ toolbox. And again it will be by combining their complementary qualities that we’ll get the best out of DM and AI together, just as happened with DM and digital.

AI’s all about the virtual, the synthetic, the intangible. In fact in many ways DM’s the total opposite - and that’s why they could turn out to be such strong partners. DM is not defined by algorithms or pixels, but by paper, ink, and the human touch. With AI making our lives ever more virtual, there’s no channel more real, authentic, or tangible. No channel more physically connected to the real world where our consumers' real lives are lived.

We’re about to enter a world where the old certainties around what’s real and what isn’t are going to change dramatically. People’s doubts about the truth and authenticity of what they see on their screens will continue to grow. This will have consequences for brands, both predictable and unpredictable. 87% of people already describe mail as believable and people are four times as likely to associate scams with digital compared to physical mail.⁸ I don’t usually make predictions but the trust gap between DM and other channels will very likely widen as AI content becomes the norm. 

Whatever happens, we can be pretty certain that receiving something solid in the post that you can touch, feel and hold in your hands will become an even more valuable experience for brands and audiences. No one will doubt whether your communication is real or not when it comes through your own letterbox and lands on your mat.

True personalisation at scale

The power of AI to help marketers deliver real personalisation at scale could also prove a strong use case for GenAI execution. Highly personalised mail already gets 45% more interactions than partially or unaddressed mail⁹ - and AI could help DM become even more personalised. AI can help analyze vast datasets to identify precise customer segments, predict needs, and generate even more personalized offers or messages. Instead of delivering these solely through email, which often gets lost in overflowing inboxes or flagged as spam, imagine sending a beautifully designed, AI-crafted direct mail piece.

A luxury car brand could use AI to identify customers approaching a lease end or showing interest in a new model, based on their online behaviour, past purchases, and demographic data. AI then generates a highly personalized brochure, highlighting features directly relevant to their lifestyle. This physical brochure, delivered to their home, carries an undeniable weight and credibility that an email wouldn’t be able to match. Simultaneously AI generated, but also completely real.

So it’s not hard to see how DM and AI could work well together given great DM has long been about smart data analysis and segmentation as well as delivering on marketing’s long held desire for a personalised content at scale. Then harnessing direct mail for its unique ability to deliver that message with impact, trust, and a distinct physical presence. The future strengths of DM could lie in combining the infinite possibilities of the virtual with the undeniable power of the real.

Real, authentic, trusted 

Direct mail is already pretty much the only non-digital channel that regularly enters the home. In an AI world, it has an opportunity to become the only completely trusted one.

The ability to cut through the digital clutter, to capture genuine attention, and to build authentic trust is becoming more valuable than ever before.

So whether as an antidote to the unrealness of AI or the perfect complement to it, Direct Mail is a touchpoint worth any marketers’ consideration.