What do you do when you have a solution in your hand in search of a problem?

If you’re the creator of the solution, you sell, sell, sell, crafting magnificent stories describing the power of your solution to change lives and create profits. That approach is mandated by fiduciary responsibility to those investors who brought your solution to market. The effort and persistence are admirable, but in time the substance of your solution will come clear, as will the reality of market demand for that which you are selling.

There are lots of examples of solutions seeking problems to solve. At the moment, contactless payment, many online reward applications, and almost every piece of exercise equipment sold through infomercials come to mind. One exception in the exercise category is TRX, which I’ve used and think is worth every penny.

I’m also thinking of QR codes.

I’ve written about QR codes before, highlighting the digital curiosity they can create and some practical uses they can provide to connect local merchants to their customers and enhance the value of print media at a time when it is teetering on the edge of destruction.

American Airlines seems to agree with my take, as the envelope I received this month with my AAdvantage frequent flyer status inside carried a big fat QR code on the back. If you own a smartphone and have just a wee bit of marketing curiosity in your blood, I don’t know how you could not click through the code.

I did and it took me to a landing page online which featured special fares and offers that American Airlines is promoting at this time. It took me all of 30 seconds to look at the offers and, while it wasn’t for me this time, I would check back for future offers if presented in the same way.

American’s use of the QR code is a practical example of how to create customer engagement and how to reap a little better return out of every piece of direct mail stuffed in the box. After all, there was nothing but white space on the envelope before this QR experiment, and the ROI calculation must be astronomical as the denominator (cost) is minuscule.

While solution sellers carry on with big promises, brands and marketers are wise to sit back and determine how they can put new technologies to use to meet their own needs. Often the answer is not the one being sold by the creator of the solution.

Some new technologies won’t survive your next brainstorming session. Others, like the QR code, can be selectively used to create customer engagement and help create incremental revenues.

Suppose you had a business whose sales had dropped 13% over the past year, continuing a multi-year sales decline. You’d probably look for ways to run your business more efficiently by cutting expenses. You might even consider reducing your prices to attract more business.

Well if you’re the United States Postal Service (USPS), you have a different take on what to do about a double-digit decline in revenue: you decide to raise your rates to make up for lost income, in some cases dramatically.

According to BtoB Magazine, in early-July the USPS requested that standard-mail letter rates, the kind used most often for commercial direct mail campaigns, be increased 5%. The USPS also asked that standard-mail parcel rates, used to send small-size merchandise and product samples, be raised a whopping 23.3%.

Raising prices to make up for decreasing sales? Is that any way to run a business?

Mail volume is dwindling because consumers are increasingly using electronic communications as alternatives to postal deliveries. That’s an undeniable fact. The proof: from 2007 through 2009, the volume of mail handled by the USPS fell by 36 billion pieces, a 17% decline and the greatest drop in its history.

This year, the USPS is on track to lose a stunning $6.5 billion. Yet, instead of doing something to manage expenses, the Affordable Mail Alliance reports that in 2009 the USPS managed to reduce labor costs by a mere single percentage point, 1%.

I have long been a proponent of direct mail, believing it best to give consumers a choice of communications vehicles. We’ve also seen studies showing that most people still prefer snail mail over e-mail, viewing it as a welcome respite from their clogged inboxes. But this latest plea for another price increase begs the question: At what point does it become cost prohibitive to use a communications medium whose delivery costs can run up to 100 times more than that of its electronic competitors?

I hate to say it, but maybe it’s time to consider eliminating mail—and the USPS—from the marketing mix.

What do you think?

Tom Rapsas is a seasoned Creative Director and Direct / Loyalty Marketing guru. He is also a valued contributor to Loyalty Truth. You can follow him on Twitter: @TomRapsas

How many people still get excited about getting mail delivered to their home?

I remember waiting for the mailman to pull up to the mailbox as a kid and running to see what came. Was there something for Me? A new flyer from my favorite store? A card from Grandma? It is something that stays with you as an adult and gets passed down generations. My son is 4 and gets very excited when the mail truck pulls up in front of the house and he can’t wait to go see what came.

Is this the next thing in our technological society that will cease to exist with the invention of email and the internet? Could be….for the postmaster general of the United States, John E. Potter, has gone to Congress and officially asked for permission to do away with Saturday mail.

According to Bob Greene, CNN writer, he states “His reasoning is hard to argue with. In the e-mail age, usage of the U.S. Postal Service is plummeting. Just about everyone claims to love the look and feel of a handwritten letter, the giddy anticipation of seeing the mail carrier strolling up the sidewalk and wondering what he has inside his bag for you, the orderly, set-your-watch-by-it routine of mail delivery to your home every day of the week except Sunday.” Potter goes on to say stopping mail delivery on Saturdays could save more than $3 billion a year.

In 1957, because of budgetary reasons, the postmaster decided to end Saturday deliveries. This lasted only one Saturday for the public was outraged and forced Dwight D. Eisenhower to sign a bill to provide more funding.

As our society continues to remove the human element from the way we communicate, will we hunger for it even more, and I wonder if we are doing that right now but fail to realize it? We know the importance of the human element and continue to blog and present the importance of the customer experience because we understand that it is needed and is crucial for businesses.

Joseph Campbell, one of my favorite authors and great mythologists states in his book, The Power of Myth, “It’s important to live life with the experience, and therefore the knowledge, of its mystery and your own mystery. This gives life a new radiance, a new harmony, a new splendor.”

As we continue down the road of the “e-world” it will be interesting to see if our society does in fact remove all human elements, imagination, mythology and all the wonderful places the human mind can go or will we realize there is something missing and long for it again.

Maybe the reason why loyalty and the customer experience is so effective is that is gives the customer “good feelings” that email and text messages cannot. Please join in for this discussion with your own thoughts.

Here are some questions I would love to hear your thoughts on:

• Do you like to receive hard mail and does it make you feel good when you get something in the mail such as a greeting card?
• Would you care if Saturday mail is stopped?
• Will the Gen Y and Millennials miss the human element or do they not understand this?