7 Steps to Direct Mail Success For Your Business

Direct mail is still one of the most popular means used to reach out to your customers. To increase the effectiveness of your direct mail campaign, follow this step-by-step guide.

First, come up with a targeted marketing plan. Set a goal for your direct marketing piece, such as lead generation or sales. Make sure your direct mail is working with your other marketing channels. Plan to deliver your mail at least four times to get a response.

Second, create a targeted mailing list. Profile your target market and create a list that you can send direct mail to at least four times. Categorize the names on the list into existing customers, prospects/leads, and suspects. Make sure there are no duplicates and that all the information is complete and accurate.

Third, define the offer you will give. Your offer must be relevant to your target market and create a sense of exclusiveness and urgency to action. Your offer must be specific and only promote one thing at a time. Try offering a dollar amount in savings, rather than a percentage, and give a guarantee when possible.

Fourth, choose an appropriate mailing format. Your options include postcards, catalogs, flyers, packages, dimensional, and letters. According to the DMA, postcards are the most readable format you can choose, but contain the least amount of space for detailed information.

Fifth, design your mailer. To increase readability, create a large and short headline, and a body in which least 65% of the words are five letters or less. Only create one call-to-action, a strong image, and include your contact information.

Sixth, find a way to save on postage. Postcards are cheaper to send than parcels, and standard mail is cheaper than first class. You can receive an additional discount if you sort your mail by zip code.

Seventh, track your results. Your metrics should be based on the goals of your campaign. You can do this by tracking orders, or asking customers how they heard about your company.

About #GravesPrinting.com

Gary Graves is the Principal of the GravesPrinting.com.  #GravesPrinting.com helps small business owners and company purchasers to maximize their dollars being spent by ordering online and providing a high-quality product.  Once an order is placed you can track the order from uploading to proofing, to printing and cutting and finally delivery to your front door.  #GravesPrinting.com offer all printed business products such as business cards, letterhead, brochures, flyer, postcards as well as direct mail services and digital printing for small quantities.

How #Hashtags Increase Your Business Visibility

Have you tried using hashtags yet on your Twitter, Google+, and Facebook? Hashtags are an effective way to organize your posts in your social media channels. Hashtags improve connectivity and have been considered a pivotal tool in social media marketing.

   

What is a #Hashtag?

Hashtags are created by placing the "#" symbol in front of a word or phrase with no spaces. Here is an example of a hashtag in action on a Twitter or Facebook post:

Business Owner @BizOwner
#BestBusinessPractices may actually be anchoring you to #fail - see how to succeed by visiting this link.

How Does a #Hashtag Work?

A Twitter user may post something like, "Just found five ways to motivate my staff #BestBusinessPractices." When another Twitter user types, "#BestBusinessPractices," in the search bar, the results will include posts that also used #BestBusinessPractices.

The ideology behind the hashtag is to create an easy way for users to connect with each other. Users can find out what other people are saying about a particular topic.

Hashtags as an Essential #MarketingTool

Hashtags are tools for social media marketing that take your visibility to the next level.  Use hashtags in your market research to find out what your customers are saying about your industry or product. Learn about their needs, goals, and values and utilize that information in your business strategy.

Use hashtags to direct your messages to your target market. Find out what your market segment is searching for, and create hashtags that match. Incorporate SEO tools like Google Analytics to find which keywords to use at what time of year.

Hashtags give a categorical alternative to organizing information from the traditional timeline sequence. Ultimately, they give more people the chance to participate in conversations that would have been previously buried under more recent, or irrelevant content.

To find out how to use hashtags more effectively, follow Gary Graves on Twitter at www.twitter.com.garygraves.

About #GravesPrinting.com

Gary Graves is the Principal of the GravesPrinting.com.  #GravesPrinting.com helps small business owners and company purchasers to maximize their dollars being spent by ordering online and providing a high-quality product.  Once an order is placed you can track the order from uploading to proofing, to printing and cutting and finally delivery to your front door.  #GravesPrinting.com offer all printed business products such as business cards, letterhead, brochures, flyer, postcards as well as direct mail services and digital printing for small quantities.

How to Get Your Customers to Read Your Brochure

Creating a brochure for your business gives you something you can hand out to your customers. A brochure provides key information that a business card cannot. When designing your brochure, your first consideration should be why you need a brochure in the first place.

Are you trying to sell your product or service? Do you want a customer to contact you for a product or service? Is your sales team using this brochure during their presentations? Pinpoint your goal for distributing your brochure and tailor its design. To create a stunning piece of marketing material that stays out of the trash, keep these three tips in mind:

Keep it visual: Color brochures attract more attention and stand out. For business owners who are tight on cash, print the cover in color. Use a photograph and help your customers connect with the brochure before picking it up.  Stock photos are available online, and they can often be used more than once.

Keep it brief: Many business owners feel remorse when they do not include every detail.  You may be thinking, “What if that one point was not made in the brochure and I lose that one customer?” Customers pick up your brochure because they quickly want to know who you are and what you do. When you write a draft for your brochure, set it aside and revisit it later. Consolidate points and cut out information you don’t need.

Keep it classy: Some business owners try and save money by printing in-house on cheap copy paper with an old printer. The need to cut expenses is understandable. However, a quality brochure leads to a sale, and a cheap brochure turns customers away. Printing your brochure on superior glossy or matte paper gives your business credibility. (Plus, printing a nice brochure can be affordable!)

About GravesPrinting.com

Gary Graves is the Principal of the GravesPrinting.com.  GravesPrinting.com helps small business owners and company purchasers to maximize their dollars being spent by ordering online and providing a high-quality product.  Once an order is placed you can track the order from uploading to proofing, to printing and cutting and finally delivery to your front door.  GravesPrinting.com offer all printed business products such as business cards, letterhead, brochures, flyer, postcards as well as direct mail services and digital printing for small quantities.

How to Bridge the Gap Between Print Advertising and Sales

Advertising is completely necessary as a basic marketing principle. The more often your customers are reminded of your brand, the more likely they will choose you in their decision making process. But simply seeing your product in an advertisement will not necessarily lead to a purchase. Between you and your customer is a huge chasm of skepticism and loyalty to other brands that you must overcome in order to increase your sales. So how do you a build a bridge to connect your customers to your brand?

When you use print advertising as one of your media channels, there are levels of interaction that you can create. Ultimately, continuous advertising allows you to build a relationship with your customer over time. When the place, price, product are available to your customers at the right time for them, they will make the purchase.

Part of successful advertising is knowing your target market. It is advisable that you conduct both primary and secondary research. This gives you access to empirical data that you can use in your designs and campaigns. Advertising is not just about informing your target market about your product. Advertising answers questions and solves problems.

Because you cannot read your customers' minds, well-designed primary research can extract information. You can ask customers questions with surveys or respond quickly to comments made on message boards and social media. For secondary research, you can access trade journals, reports from colleges and universities, the Small Business Association, or Chambers of Commerce.

Finally, it is important to realize that what you are selling may not be the focus for your blog business. For example, a financial planner is in the business of creating peace of mind, rather than merely solving debt issues and money management. Advertising peace of mind hits the core of what that target market truly desires. If the financial planner appeals to the dream of financial freedom, their clients are more inspired by the task to manage their money.

Bridge the gap between your customers and yourself by advertising their hopes and dreams. Once you have their attention, they can investigate the details of your business.

About GravesPrinting.com

Gary Graves is the Principal of the GravesPrinting.com.  GravesPrinting.com helps small business owners and company purchasers to maximize their dollars being spent by ordering online and providing a high-quality product.  Once an order is placed you can track the order from uploading to proofing, to printing and cutting and finally delivery to your front door.  GravesPrinting.com offer all printed business products such as business cards, letterhead, brochures, flyer, postcards as well as direct mail services and digital printing for small quantities.

How to Test Your Printed Materials Advertising Campaign

Print advertising differs from television advertising campaigns. Television advertisements are normally limited to a 15 to 30 second slot. A lasting and impressionable image must be created within a few seconds. However, print materials advertisements are not bound by time, like television ads. Instead, printed advertising is bound by space.  An advertisement could be a single page flyer or fractional page spread, but the goal remains to communicate a message to the target market.

Measuring Quality

The reader is in complete control of their experience while reading a printed advertisement. This means that even though a printed advertisement is placed in high circulation and reaches a great number of readers, it does not mean it is effective. Even if readers look at an advertisement, it does not mean that it motivates them to any action.

Variety is Crucial

The method of evaluation should be multifaceted when determining the effectiveness of an advertisement. Testing for only one measure makes it difficult to draw comprehensive conclusions. Advertisements should be analyzed before with pretests and assessed afterwards with post tests to gather the most precise data about a campaign.

Metrics

Metrics to use during testing can include audience engagement, interaction rate, interaction over time, or length of time engaging with the advertisement. Common metrics for brand effectiveness include: ad recall, whether or not a brand is favorite, and purchase intent.

Suggested Tests

While it is highly recommended that you conduct some sort of testing on your advertising campaigns, the level of accuracy in your conclusions is affected by how much you invest. Simple post testing methods such as inquiry tests account for how many inquiries were made about your product after the printed advertisement went into circulation. Focus groups and well designed questionnaires give you more information, but require more investment. Highly structured laboratory research eliminates variables, but removes the ability to observe natural behavior in the field.

About GravesPrinting.com

Gary Graves is the Principal of the GravesPrinting.com.  GravesPrinting.com helps small business owners and company purchasers to maximize their dollars being spent by ordering online and still get a high-quality product.  Once an order is placed you can track the order from uploading to proofing, to printing and cutting and finally delivery to your front door.  GravesPrinting.com offer all business products such as business cards, letterhead, brochures, flyer, postcards as well as direct mail services and digital printing for small quantities.