TM: What process does StoneMor Partners employ in order to optimize response from the 2.7 million pieces of direct mail it sends out each year?
DS: After we pull our specified population from the prospect pool, we run the records through the model algorithm and place them into ranking deciles. And then, based purely on the cutoff points of each decile, we take all the records and mail out to as many people as we can that fall into each of the top deciles, while taking into account the required numbers of records we need to drop a week.
TM: What results has StoneMor Partners seen from this predictive modeling initiative?
DS: From November 2008 and into the beginning of 2009, we have effectively integrated predictive modeling and data mining and have been able to increase our response rate by approx[imately] 96 percent ([from] 0.175 percent before modeling to 0.343 percent after modeling) even through such financially difficult times. This has allowed us to receive 80 more leads a week for our inside sales team.
The Business of Database Marketing