Source: http://www.novascotiabusinessjournal.com/index.cfm?sid=102996&sc=107

Direct Marketing Success

When it comes to advertising their company, most small business owners rely on a handful of resources: a sign on the door front, a phone book ad and merchandise bags with their company’s name and logo. A few go a step further and dabble in radio, local television and newspaper ads, but their efforts are typically inconsistent and they neglect to measure the ads’ effectiveness. No wonder so many small businesses feel they can’t compete with the big national chains. However, by employing some simple direct marketing strategies, you can attract more customers and enjoy the long-term business growth you desire.

“But wait a minute,” you may be thinking, “I tried mailing postcards to customers a few years ago and got zero response. So direct marketing won’t work for me.” Realize that just because a previous direct marketing campaign didn’t work doesn’t mean you should give up. Perhaps you targeted the wrong type of client. Or maybe the campaign did work, but you didn’t have a proper way to measure the response, so you mistakenly thought it was a flop.

The fact is that direct marketing can and does work in a number of industries, for companies of all sizes. While you likely don’t have a multi-billion advertising budget, you can employ the following suggestions to create a successful direct marketing campaign. 

Develop a fan base: Your fans are your best customers. Not only do they buy from you often, but they also recommend your company to others. Look through your customer data and pinpoint who your fans are. Where do they live? What product or service do they purchase most often? What problems do they have that your company can solve? By knowing the type of customer who buys from you the most, you can target other people in that same demographic. Remember that the objective of any direct marketing effort is not just to get a response or make a sale; it’s to build customers. When you market directly to your fan base, you leverage the 80-20 rule, which states that 80% of your business will come from 20% of your customers. Therefore, identify your 20% and then market to them and others like them.

Select the right media: No one specific advertising medium is the right choice for every company. Depending on your customers, you may need to use direct mail pieces, Internet marketing, radio ads, newspaper coupons, or some combination thereof. Knowing your customers makes the decision easier.
 For example, if you’re marketing a truly broad-based product, then direct mail will probably not be the way to go. It is too expensive on a per-thousand basis and takes too long to execute. Television will probably be a better route. Once you produce a “spot,” the cost of buying television is less per thousand than direct mail. On the other hand, if you have a niche or micro-market, television normally isn’t the best route. For targeting, direct mail and print advertising work best. The key is to pick the medium that makes the most sense for your customers and your budget.  

Make the right offer: An offer is what you are willing to give and what you want in exchange for a particular response from prospects. Included in the offer are price, terms, guarantees, and extras. The right offer doesn’t necessarily mean the one that generates the most responses or the one that generates the highest profitability from the individual effort. The right offer is the one that ultimately contributes the most profit to your business.
 Offers are normally categorized by the objective of the direct marketing effort: Lead Generation (for field sales or telephone follow-up), Traffic-Building (to a retail location, trade show booth, or Web site), or Direct Sell to business or consumer markets. In lead generation, you have both hard and soft offers. The harder the offer, the fewer but more qualified the responses. Hard offers generally will ask prospects for considerably more information about themselves and their buying intentions, ask for an appointment or demonstration, mention the cost of the product or service, and refrain from offering any type of gift or premium. Traffic-building offers normally involve premiums, special discounts, or exclusives. In direct-sell situations, free trials, samples, premiums, and discounts can all work to draw attention to your promotion and to boost response. Whenever possible, offer a guarantee.
 Certain offers will help you move customers from being one-time buyers to fans. Loyalty programs deserve consideration from almost every marketer. Then, depending on the product or service, you can consider offers like automatic shipment, membership clubs and continuity programs.

Get a response and build a relationship: You need to break through all the communications clutter in the marketplace in a way that’s credible. For example, a drugstore owner can put a photo of a cute baby on the envelope of a direct mail package to get it opened. But they have to tie the product to the baby (such as flavoring for children’s medicine) or it will have attracted attention but not delivered in terms of marketing.
 Good direct response advertising involves the recipient. In direct mail, personalization, tokens and rub-offs, stamps, and quizzes all aid involvement. Good direct response advertising also makes it as convenient as possible for a prospect or customer to respond. Use as many vehicles as possible, including toll-free phone numbers, pre-paid reply envelopes, fax numbers, and e-mail.

Find a niche or unique selling proposition: Small business owners must find their unique selling proposition in order to compete against “The Big Boys.” This could mean free home delivery or phone call reminders when it’s time to purchase or use a service again. Another way small businesses can compete with the national chains is to develop a niche in a target market. For example, with the aging of the “Baby Boomers,” there are many unmet needs, ranging from health care to travel to investing to real estate needs. Pinpoint what’s unique about your company or what niche you fall into and target that market directly.

Analyze Response to Improve Profitability: One of direct marketing’s great assets is that you can easily measure its effectiveness. Using key codes and coupons are great ways to determine if a particular campaign is working, as is simply asking people, “How did you hear about us?” The more you can measure your campaign’s effectiveness, the more you can improve. But the only way to improve is to test on a continuous basis.

Critical factors to test include:
–The media used – Which brings in new customers most inexpensively? Are they “better” customers?
–The effectiveness of the offers – Which offers pull the best response and produce the most fans repeatedly time after time?
–The creative approaches – What strategy best separates your company from your competitors?
–The timing – What months are best for the specific product or service? What’s the ideal time between efforts for particular prospect and customer groups?

A cure for what ails you: If lagging sales are putting the squeeze on your business, or if you simply want to expand your company’s market reach, then direct marketing may be for you. And regardless of your personal opinion about pharmaceutical companies advertising directly to consumers, the bottom line is that it works. In fact, most consumers report that they appreciate pharmaceutical ads, as it alerts them to treatment options and makes starting a discussion with their physician easier. When you start doing some direct marketing for your company (and measure the response), you’ll be able to target your message appropriately and reap the most rewards. 

Design, Design, Design…

During my education at Seneca @ York for Creative Advertising, I was introduced to Creative Suite 2. (Photoshop, Illustrator & Indesign)  We learned the basics and through much practice, my knowledge of the programs increased.  I’m no graphic designer, but I can hold my own with the best of them.  As I began working at WPS I was introduced to Corel Draw, which was the tool of choice and used to create the current promotional material.  I played with the program and learned enough to create a couple of pieces that were printed and used as part as our mail outs.  Personally, I still prefer the CS program and with the guidance of a helpful printer, I’m learning the required layouts and file formats.

 

This was created with the use of all three CS3 program and my favourite piece designed to date .  This piece is a promotional Valentine’s Day card that will go out to our top 100 clients in 5 particular areas found within the GTA. 

We are working on a card to send for all major Canadian holidays, next up is St. Patrick’s Day.  The layout is pretty much complete, but still working on some clever copy…

We get all of our work printed at Markham Litho, which are a fast and reliable printing shop.  Their knowledgeable staff helped guide me on the correct designing path, as I have a tendency to use Photoshop to create the entire promotional piece.  Photoshop (for those who don’t know, which I knew) is a raster-based program, while Illustrator is vector based. So, to get the crispest printing pertaining to the text, us must use Illustrator and then use Indesign to layout the piece.  

Anyways, these were some of the problems I’ve encountered so far as a rookie marketing assistant at Warehoused Plastic Sales.  Here are some more pieces that we have created using CS3 and Corel Draw.

The Folding Machine

Among the post cards, flyers and newsletters are another direct mail piece that we utilize in our direct marketing arsenal.  Just about every consumer can recall receiving an overwhelming amount of flyers in their mail, but from a business’ point of view, enough people read (and often act upon them) making flyers an effective platform for spreading their message.  We have just sent out a 400 plus agricultural flyers, promoting the plastic uses in the farming industry to specific pig and poultry farms throughout the province of Ontario, Canada.  The flyers went into a #10 standard envelope, which meant 400 plus flyers had to be Z-folded and inserted into these envelopes.  So, basically, with the assistance of my marketing manager and a couple volunteers around the office, we sat down at our desk and began the monotonous chore of folding hundreds of flyers.  I’m defiantly no speed folder and have a tendency to accurately measure every fold, this only guaranteed that the folding these flyers would take hours.  But yesterday that had all changed as my marketing manager called me into his office to introduce the,

“Martin Yale P7200.” (It’s a paper-folding machine) 

I watched in amazement as it folded 30 sheets in under 30 seconds, which probably would have taken me at least 30 minutes to do.  This machine will definitely increase productivity and make my job a little easier.  This folding machine has it all and can do just about anything: 

• High speed machine automatically feeds and folds a stack of documents up to8 1/2″ x 14″ 

• Precision paper skew adjustment 

• Creates five different folds: letter (except with 8 1/2″ x 14″), half, z-fold, double parallel, and right angle. 

• Operates at a speed of up to 8,000 sheets per hour 

• Handles sheet sizes from 3 1/2″ x 5″ to 8 1/2″ x 14″, 16-28 lb. bond 

• Feed table capacity of 30 sheets 

• Stapled sets of up to 3 sheets can be folded by hand-feeding documents into the feedtable bypass 

Early next week, we plan to send out a 600 plus newsletters that explains our company’s expansion into Kitchener.  I cant wait to get the newsletters back from the printers and load up the folder, sit back, and let the machine fold those sheets in seconds.

Post Cards And Direct Marketing

Direct marketing is a great why to keep your targeted audience informed about your company and the products you sell.  Post cards are a vital addition to our arsenal and I have noticed that they have induced a great response from the targeted audience.  I found this great article written by Travis Batting, which display all the benefits of this imperative marketing tool.  Read the article through, it might convert some of those direct mail non-believers.

Source:  http://www.articlesbase.com/direct-mail-articles/postcard-marketing-228160.html 

Postcards are a “key tool” in today’s world of modern marketing.   A brief and captivating message, combined with an enticing offer, will generate sales, inform customers, and increase brand awareness.

Gain Competitive Advantage

Postcards are for everybody!   We can show you how to maximize your marketing dollars and assist you in creating a postcard mailing campaign that will give your company a competitive edge and open doors to greater business opportunities.  Our experienced staff, and in-depth understanding of how to reach your target audience, can be a valuable component in the success of your campaign.

Benefits of Postcard Advertising

• Keep your name in front of customers.
• Postcards generate a high ROI
• Flexible, informative and creative.
• Postcards are high impact and low cost
• Separate yourself from the competition.
• Establish regular communication between you, your customers and future customers.
• A well-produced postcard establishes a bond with customers.
• Postcards sell products and services.

Uses of Postcard Advertising

• Generate website traffic and sales leads.
• A cost effective way to promote new specials.
• Promote company awareness.
• Announce new products, web sites, store locations, etc.
• Inexpensive, effective way to thank customers.
• Use as a coupon and/or survey for clients.
• A great way to test market new products and measure advertising campaign responses.
• Tradeshow/Event promotion.
• Maintaining customer contact.

Marketing With Postcards

Regular postcard mailings will give you the optimal results.  Repetition is key to your marketing success and you’ll see an impressive growth in your business over a 12-month period. A year long postcard marketing campaign will cost approximately $6.00 per name per year – a very cost effective way to build your business.