Category Archives: Advertising

Economies of Scale… Marketing with Postcards

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Postcard_smallA postcard mailing campaign, properly planned and carried out, is an efficient and cost effective way to market to customers and prospects. Less time-consuming and costly to produce than a brochure or folded self-mailer, a postcard is more affordable, yet no less effective. Whether your objective is business promotion, product or service advertising, brand identity, donation solicitation, or a service or event reminder, a postcard gets the job done efficiently and cost-effectively.

Because postcards don’t require opening for the message to be seen, they have an impact even on those who don’t actively engage with them. A well-designed postcard has the main message in plain view and catches the reader’s eye with a strong headline or graphic, resulting in a high read rate. Although a postcard typically — though not always — has less space to deliver the message than a self-mailer, the postcard’s reach can be extended by referring to a website for more details. Postcards have a longer “shelf life” than e-mail, and are easy to file for future reference.

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A USPS Partnership… Brings Direct Mail Success

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MailBoxUSPSAn active direct mail program is more than the offer, the printed piece, and the mailing list. It is also the United States Postal Service (USPS) delivering the mail piece to the intended target. We admit that it can sometimes be hard to understand and follow the rules set down by the USPS to qualify for postage discounts. But we also recognize that without the USPS, direct mail campaigns would be more expensive and possibly less effective.

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USPS EDDM… Direct Mail Made Easy

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MailLadyIn our last issue of Printips, we discussed the viability of direct mail as a marketing tool and presented the elements that make up a successful direct mail marketing campaign.
In this issue we are introducing a simple
first-step campaign for businesses that are new to direct mail or have a smaller budget. The program is called Every Door Direct Mail (EDDM), and it does just what its name implies — the letter carrier delivers your direct mail piece to every single active address in a neighborhood along with the rest of the day’s
mail.

Here’s what makes EDDM different from regular direct mail marketing:
• you don’t have to put an address on the mail piece, and
• the postage rate is the lowest one offered by the USPS — currently about 15 cents per piece mailed.
So in addition to saving between 40% and 70% on postage, there is no need to spend money on purchasing a mail list, checking the names and addresses for deliverability, or affixing labels.

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Direct Mail… Your Additional Salesperson

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mailbox_loresHere is an easy way to add an extra salesperson to your marketing staff: develop an ongoing direct mail marketing campaign. While the goal of advertising is to create brand awareness and a connection to potential buyers, direct mail marketing aims to motivate a prospect to take action and complete a transaction. A carefully planned and executed direct mail campaign can do just that.

Today more companies are turning to direct mail. According to research conducted by IBIS World and published in its October 2012 report Direct Mail Advertising in the U.S., direct mail is expected to grow 1.4% annually in the next five years. This is in contrast to the 1.2% contraction direct mail has averaged since 2008. Part of this is due to incentives provided by the United States Postal Service (USPS), such as direct mail that includes QR codes and Every Door Direct Mail.

In its 2011 Channel Preference Study, Epsilon Targeting found that direct mail is the top choice of consumers for receiving brand communications, even among 18-34 year olds. Other interesting findings include:
• 26% of U.S. consumers and 30% of Canadians said direct mail is more trustworthy than email;
• 50% of U.S. consumers and 48% of Canadians said they pay more attention to postal mail than email;
• 30% of U.S. consumers said they’re receiving more mail that interests them compared to a year ago, and just 50% (down from 63% in 2010) said more information is sent to them in the mail — indicating marketers are improving targeting efforts;
• The perception that reading email is faster declined among U.S. email account holders to 45% in 2011 (from 47% in 2010), suggesting clogged inboxes are draining time.

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A Website is Not a Brochure: Why You Need Both

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brochure_web_lrWhen it comes to providing information about your company and its products and services, a good website offers a lot of advantages. It allows prospects to find you, regardless of their geographic proximity. Searching for information is fast and easy. The prospect has complete control, spending as much or as little time as desired on the site.

But all the information gathering can be done anonymously. That means you don’t know the extent of the prospect’s interest – whether an early-stage shopper (slight interest, may not have intention to buy); information seeker (gathering information from more than one source); qualified buyer (has the interest, authority, and budget to make a decision); or someone actually ready to purchase. You can’t answer questions, counter misinterpretations, or offer additional information. In short, you have no control over the sales process.

An effective brochure, on the other hand, returns control to you. It also requires you to think through exactly how to tell a compelling story about your company and its products and services – the basis of any marketing effort, regardless of the strategy used to carry it out.

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Six Printed Items… Every Business Needs

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AA000167Every business, regardless of size, has a few fundamental needs: accurate financial statements to provide management information; an organization chart so employees know their duties and responsibilities; and sales and marketing material to support the sales effort. Each is an important contributor to the overall success of the business.

In the past, all sales and marketing materials were printed. Later, the Internet added new ways to reach customers and prospects, and later still, provided a way to interact with them, sometimes in real time. Over time, Internet-based marketing replaced some printed materials; enhanced others; and also provided new marketing tools.

Despite the popularity and success of these new marketing techniques, there remain some basic printed items that all businesses need:

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The 3 Essential Elements of Direct Mail Marketing

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200394313-001Despite the popularity of e-marketing — e-mail campaigns, SMS messaging, and social media — direct mail is still a proven way to generate new business from existing customers and identify potential new customers from among prospects. Used correctly, direct mail can generate leads, communicate with customers, build name recognition or brand awareness, and build traffic.

A strong direct mail program is built on three essential elements. In this issue of Printips, we’ll explain the importance of each one.

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The ABCs of VDP… Why Its Use is Increasing

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The availability of digital technology for gathering, analyzing, and storing information, combined with the efficiency of digital printing, has greatly expanded the ability of businesses and organizations of any size to reach out to customers and prospects with a customized message. This ability, called one-to-one marketing, is very different from the one-to-many marketing messages of traditional media.

In one-to-many marketing, the same content is sent to the entire audience, who are assumed to share an interest in the content being sent. In contrast, one-to-one marketing sends a custom message to each individual in the audience, often producing a response of “How did they know I was interested in that?!”

The process for conducting one-to-one marketing is called variable data printing (VDP).

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Printed Brochures… How to Make Them Effective

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Consider the elegant simplicity of a printed brochure – it is a concise, attractive, and versatile compilation of information about a company, product, service, event, or location.

It can be handed out during a person-to-person sales call or distributed as direct mail; made available in a literature rack or on a table at a trade show; sent in response to an inquiry or left behind on a cold call. It can be economically printed in both small and large quantities. As a sales tool, a brochure is appropriate for almost any selling situation.

Planning a brochure
A brochure is made up of three elements: the copy; the design; and the physical specifications. All are equally important for creating an effective brochure.

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Integrating Print Into Your Marketing Mix

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A few months ago in this newsletter we introduced you to the power of combining traditional direct mail marketing with web-based communication, and provided supporting research for the concept. Since then, new research has been published, providing even more evidence for the idea that print remains a viable and valuable part of any marketing campaign.

FedEx Office, in conjunction with the Ketchum Global Research Network and Braun Research, conducted the third annual Sign of the Times small business survey in spring 2010. The survey respondents were small business owners employing 5 to 100 employees and whose companies generate over $100,000 in annual revenue; over 500 interviews were completed. Survey results include:

• 87% of survey respondents indicated that printed marketing and advertising tools are somewhat to very effective in driving customers to their businesses.

• 57% of owners aged 18-34 believe in the power of flyers and brochures – more than their older counterparts (47%).

In addition, 44% of respondents said they plan to increase communication with existing and potential customers via a printed piece – a newsletter or direct mail.

http://www.macgra.com/1012Printips.pdf