Rewards mail bucks the trend?
Direct mail volume in the financial services sector is down dramatically –as much as 25 percent for 2008 from the 2007 levels but rewards programmes are a growth area together with reverse mortgages.
In the fourth quarter of 2008, Synovate reports that 72 percent of credit card offers were reward or rebate offers, up from 63 percent in the fourth quarter of 2007.
“This is a result of an increase in mailings for co-branded airline cards, such as the Citi/AAdvantage American Express card and the Chase United Mileage Plus card,” said Andrew Davidson, VP of competitive tracking services at Synovate. “In November, the big issuers basically pulled back from mailing everything else, and the only offer they mailed was for co-branded airline cards.”