7 steps to successful mail promotions - Sales and Marketing

Home Office Computing, May, 1992 by Steve Morgenstern

Neither snow nor rain, nor heat, nor gloom of night stays these couriers from the swift delivery of your marketing message.

All right, maybe that's nor precisely the way the chiseled stone over the door at the main post office in New York City reads; but it does reflect the way many small companies grow big, and the way many big companies stay big--through well-designed and skillfully executed mailings.

You don't need Ed McMahon and millions of dollars in prizes to build your business through the mail. This month we'll explore ways to combine your desktop-publishing capability with a little postage to create mail promotions that work.

STEP 1: WORK STRATEGICALLY

There are two overriding factors in planning a successful mailing: the audience and the offer.

The most productive mailings generally go to a select group--your current customers. These are the folks who know your product or work and, with any luck, think highly of your. You already have more than your foot in the door with current customers: You know how to contact them, they have some experience dealing with you, and they are likely to be receptive to an offer tailored to their needs.

There's another target group that shares many of your current customers' characteristics--your past customers. Mailings reaching out to lapsed clients or customers often pay off handsomely.

The underlying strategic concept in mailing to these two groups is called relationship marketing. No, you're not offering to make somebody your cousin for $100. You're trying to maintain and enhance a productive business relationship. In fact, relationship marketing is the driving principle behind many successful small businesses--the personal touch and attention to detail that distinguishes little guys like us from cold, massive corporations.

Mailings are cost-effective ingredients in nurturing those ongoing relationships. In essence, you can make a sales call for the cost of a stamp and a laser-printed document.

Coming up with an appropriate offer for existing or lapsed customers often involves a creative analysis of their past buying history. For example, the home-based caterer might create holiday mailings targeted to businesses that have sponsored seasonal gatherings in the past. If you sell goods directly through the mail, related items make good follow-up mail offerings.

A more difficult but still important way to use a mailing is to kick off a business relationship in a process called prospecting. Frankly, prospecting for new customers will initially bring in a low return on your investment. That's why, before undertaking such mailings, you should forecast the value of a customer to your business over time. Large companies think that way all the time--did you really imagine record clubs give you eight CDs for the price of one because they're overflowing with kindness? Somebody examined sales history, analyzed the value of an individual customer over time, and determined that the eight-for-one offer makes economic sense.

You can adopt the same strategic thinking on a smaller scale. The neighborhood hardware store that offers a free tape measure with my first purchase may lose money on that single transaction. But without that coupon, I might never have set foot in the store, or known what they sell, or met the proprietor, or established an ongoing business relationship.

STEP 2: EXPLORE MAILING OPTIONS

When designing a mailing, there are basically two categories to consider: first class or third class (sometimes called bulk rate or presorted). Each has its own weight and size limitations, postage rates, and rules.

Strategic thinking is in order as well. Professional direct marketers know that mailings sent first class almost invariably draw greater responses than those sent third class. They also know that stamped pieces draw greater responses than postage-metered mail (and remember, you can send bulk mailings with stamps). Interestingly, some tests have shown that envelopes with stamps stuck on crookedly draw better respoonses than those with neatly placed stamps, and an envelope with two stamps draws better than an envelope with one. That personal touch is important--even if it's from a machine that affixes crooked stamps.

STEP 3: DESIGN FOR IMPACT

Whether your target audience is an individual or a business, you're undoubtedly competing with a lot of other mail. Jump right out and make them take immediate notice with eye-catching design.

The place to start is the envelope. It is probably prohibitively expensive to custom print every new marketing message onto your envelopes, unless you're running a sizable direct-mail marketing business. However, envelopes printed with a prominent company logo are appropriate for any size business. On top of that, consider printing promotion-specific stickers to attach to your envelopes. Even a rubber-stamped message can add drama to a mailing at almost no cost per impression. And don't overlook the potential of colorful or oversized envelopes to make your material stand out from the pack (although large envelopes might be more expensive to mail than standard-size envelopes).