The study found that 73 percent prefer receiving mail about new products and offers from companies rather than email, which pulled in just 18 percent of respondent preferences. This was also true for unsolicited mail, as 70 percent preferred mail over other communicative approaches.

The numbers spike when speaking of confidential communications such as bills, bank statements and financial reports as 86 percent preferred receiving that information via mail, compared to just 10 percent for email. Also, that number is unchanged since 2004.

“The research clearly shows that consumers still prefer mail over e-mail,” said Stacy DeWalt, vice president, Vertical Market Development and Marketing, Pitney Bowes Management Services (PBMS). "In working with our customers, we continue to find that mail is the most effective marketing tool businesses can use when communicating with their customers."

Yes, that is convenient.

Thirty-one percent were less likely to discard unopened mail like new product brochures, catalogs or other advertising materials than they are unsolicited email about new products. Over 53 percent said they were more likely to delete unopened emails about new products.

When framing the rest of the findings, PB spins a bit though, reversing the numbers to appear more positive toward mail it seems, and placing them at the end of the press release. Note also the difficulty of finding this survey at ICR’s site.

Other findings:

45.3 percent (that’s it?) think mail is less intrusive than unsolicited email or telephone calls (The only thing I hate worse than spam is a phone call).

40.2 percent think mail is more convenient, allowing them to browse at leisure. (Does that mean almost 60 percent don’t think it’s more convenient?)

30.2 percent think mail is less high-pressured.

22.7 percent think mail is more descriptive.

12 percent think mail is more persuasive.

That last one’s especially interesting, indicating that a vast 88 percent find other forms of communication more persuasive. I’m old school, so I definitely prefer snail mail for unsolicited messages – but that usually means I just toss it in the garbage or put it into the basket with all the rest and forget about it.

Road Trippin’ With MapQuest

An online poll of 1,023 individuals (conducted by ICR), as well as interviews of 3,000 people, determined that a tool like Route Builder “was the #1 requested feature among the millions of MapQuest consumers.” Now in beta form, it can be found here.

Route Builder will offer many of the same options that MapQuest has traditionally presented. Its features include the ability to “add up to 10 location destinations along a route; optimize route to avoid highways or toll roads; find gas stations, hotels, restaurants, ATMs, and other places along the way; re-order stops by dragging and dropping and automatically recalculate driving directions; and choose to show or hide directions as the route is plotted.”

There’s nothing revolutionary here, but MapQuest isn’t claiming to have made any groundbreaking advancements. Route Builder just offers a more efficient means of planning a complicated route. It should help the company maintain its standing as “both the top mapping and directories site on the Web.”

The MapQuest site does indeed see a lot of traffic; it “served more than 50 million users in May, 2006.” And the company expects to continue getting visitors, despite the effect high gas prices have had on some people’s travel plans. Although the May 2006 MapQuest Road Trips survey found that “72% of those planning to take a road trip this year said that gas prices were affecting their summer travel plans . . . . nearly half of Americans (49%) plan to take a road trip this summer nevertheless.”

MapQuest Route Builder could be a handy tool in planning road trips, and, as the company points out, it’s been released “just in time for the busy July 4th travel weekend.”

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Doug is a staff writer for WebProNews. Visit WebProNews for the latest eBusiness news.