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It’s tough for any business to do without direct mailing these days. You might mail prospective customers using the Internet or maybe you prefer to rely on the postal system. Maybe you use a combination of both. Whatever your preference, the writing on the wall for any business is clear: you need direct mail. Used effectively, this is your trigger to sales.

How do you go about it? You need lists. Maybe you already have one. Use it as a first phase to tell your customers about what you have for them that’s new. If you don’t have anything new, set about correcting that. Whatever it is – a promotion, free offer, discount, – use direct mail to make sure your customer knows about it. Your product, your company name, must be top of mind for him. This will only happen with reminders.

Are emails effective for direct mail? Not always. Thanks to the huge amount of spam mail pouring into people’s email boxes every day, chances are your promotion email might also get relegated into the junk folder. Yes, it’s a cheap method of mailing but is it effective? The problem is, you never know for sure. It could get deleted without reading or it could get read right through.

Mailing works better. Once you have a customer’s postal address, you can cross-check to see if there is a spurt in sales soon after you mailed to that particular area. Or you could work the other way around. If you find that one area has more people buying, send more mail there with offers and special schemes. You cannot do this with just an email address.

If you do have a response form that has to be sent or given back, don’t tire the customer out, or worse still bore him with long forms to fill out. Just his name, address, phone number and email address should do. Information gathering should be quick, easy and pleasant, not seen as a chore. You can always fill in another form if you need more information. Here, too, do it bit by bit so it does not seem like some kind of cross-questioning which puts most people off. It sometimes even intimidates them. Don’t ever ask for anything too personal.

Like we said, inform your customers about new promotions or offers or products through direct mail. Don’t waste his time if there is nothing to say. It might just rebound on you if you waste his time on what he considers unimportant and uninteresting.

If you are doing a cold mailing exercise to companies, do remember to put a name on it – not something impersonal as ‘Supervisor’ or ‘Manager’. Find out from the web or from a directory what the relevant person’s name is and address the mail accordingly. If you have huge mailings, a business directory could be just the thing you need. Get one that has all the companies you deal with listed. Having it all in one place is time-saving even though business directories can cost a bit. This would probably take you ages if you were to compile it from the Internet. Unless of course you get lucky and an online directory that suits your line of business happens to be listed!

For more informatin about direct mail, visit:

http://www.directmailmarketingus.com

One of the first things I do with clients is determine their relationship with the post office. Why? Because in order to be an effective marketing organization, they will need to get pretty cozy with them. I admonish you to shake off the image of our mail system as being anything other than a highly reliable and valuable strategic business partner. After all, they help to deliver your message to a targeted group of prospects in an inexpensive way. And these prospects will buy depending upon the right message. Think of your mail carrier as a kind of sales director and the letters as sales sentinels without the downside of having to pay benefits.

Direct mail has been and remains the marketing champ for efficiency. It is still the most cost-effective tool for creating and maintaining interest as well as gaining valuable information to re-use in other marketing media. In terms of return, you need to determine how much a sale is worth to you over the lifetime of the client. Let’s say for widgets, that it’s $3000 over 5 years. In one year, by writing say, six letters to them to create the dialogue, you’ve spent 75 cents times 6 which is about $5. $5 in acquisition costs compared to $3000 in value of the client. can you beat that? Even if you factor in all the mailers in that campaign with no one else buying, you’re still probably ahead.

Whether you’ve never used mail to market your business or you’ve tried and done poorly, I encourage you to pick it up again, plan, modify and learn until it works for you. Direct mail is a tactic that you need to be patient with. It might not bring results in the first couple of tries, but as long as you’ve identified a good list and your message is sound, it will pay off. And after you’ve seen good results from it, you’ll work this method into your marketing efforts permanently.

Get to know the costs: the supplies, the printing, the postage, the delivery times, and the specific results. Try different copy to different groups on your list. Tinker with it, try different things. Call a few prospects on the list for feedback. This is how you remove the guesswork out of your marketing efforts!

Once you get calls or inquiries from the mailers, you can use that message in your advertising and the results should be similar.

Again, be patient with direct mail. Expect to send out six different pieces to someone before you get a response. And send out different types of copy to them each time, such as newsletters, postcards, or press releases. Include yourself in some of the mailings to get an idea of what and how they’re receiving. The bottom line is that you act similarly to them…that is, you’re probably not going to call until you see the name and the offer several times. Be steadfast, and after some time, you’ll be sold on the mail as well.

Scott Campbell owns Impact Marketing, Inc out of Atlanta, GA. He installs a marketing system, called the “Ultimate Marketing System”, into small businesses and practices in the Atlanta, GA area.

Learn more about Impact Marketing and its solutions here at http://www.impactyourcompany.com.

Direct mail marketing has become more and more popular over the past couple of years. Companies have been searching for direct marketing solutions that help to grow their business for the cheapest amount of money possible. Direct mail marketing has stepped to the forefront in this arena, which is obvious by all of the direct marketing solutions firms that are being formed every year.

A simple internet search will give you results for thousands of direct mail marketing firms. After checking out some of the sites you will realize that while most of them are generally the same, their prices and quality of information can vary greatly.

By this point you are probably wondering what some of the benefits and features of direct mail marketing are. Some people may even be wondering what direct mail marketing consists of. Direct mail marketing means basically what it says. It is a way for companies to market their products and services to potential clients through mail sent directly to them.

You may be wondering where the company secures the names of potential clients. Most companies that are advertising themselves as direct marketing solutions firms have mailing lists that they will sell to you. Depending on the quality of the list, and the number of names the price will vary. You can buy a list for your direct mail marketing efforts that target only people in your field of interest. In other words if you own or work for an accounting firm, you can buy a list that is specialized to get you in touch with accounting professionals, or someone who may need accounting assistance.

Some other lists that direct mail marketing companies can provide include: lists broken down by profession (doctors, etc.), zip code, state, new homeowners in an area, library, and even lists for particular ethnic groups. In other words, if you are looking for a particular list for your direct mail marketing efforts you will more than likely be able to find it in one place or the next.

But mailing lists are not the only direct marketing solutions available. Another direct marketing technique that is used on a consistent basis is telemarketing. Telemarketing has lost some of its steam over the past few years because of all the fuss over the “do-not-call” lists that are available. This has forced many companies to go the direct mail marketing route because they do not want to deal with possible lawsuits brought forth by calling the wrong people, etc. Though telemarketing is not as popular as it once was, it can still be very effective. It costs less than direct mail marketing, and you can reach thousands of people in a very short amount of time.

If you are looking for a direct marketing solutions firm be sure to check out all of their services and prices before signing on. Remember, all of them offer the same services but you will be most interested in obtaining quality work for your money.

Kevin Dark is an online marketer. His upcoming project is available at http://www.geoz.info

In my last article I gave you a template for hooking the reader