Help Me Get the Best Response from Snail Mail Postcards...

I've done a fair amount of marketing with postcards.

I usually use what is called a 2-step marketing process.
The postcard goes to a list of appropriate businesses. I print
them up in small numbers - cards with dense, newsy text
are best - and lick'n'stick 'em.

A website URL is ok if your followup is going to be on
the internet only. Ideally you'll want to offer an expanded
direct mail package with a 8-10 page salesletter, special
report, lift letter, grabber item, involvement device, etc....

Assuming you have the ability to write it all yourself,
Putting out the direct mail packet will cost you a couple
of bucks just to print and mail it so you want to make
sure the prospects have said "YES - I want the free report".

you'll want to hit the same businesses with different
postcards for a year or more, every 6 weeks is good.
You'll be surprised at how many exposures it can take
before they request the free report packet.

For 1000 mailing addresses you'll probably send less
than 50 report/sales letter packets... so hand assembling
them and addressing them is not big deal - in fact it's
a good idea to make it look like you care - have a woman
do the addressing, too.

Also once you've got the report sent out you follow up on
the phone to make sure they got it.

Then you send at least 3 follow up emails at 10 day intervals...
single page ones are ok. Obnoxious colors like Goldenrod
pull better response on the follow-ups.

It's a little intricate but it's not hard to do. Of course where
you win is because 98% of your competition is to darn lazy and
unfocused to bother with anything half as caring.

I'm happy to help you out so PM me if you have any questions
or whatever - this sort of marketing is fun to do for me.

Target design agencies, advertising agencies, and web development companies, in addition to the general businesses in your area. The advertising agencies/web development firms are always looking for talented people for projects.

oh. Sorry. I meant to say follow-up direct mailings
with the goldenrod paper - also lime green is a good
one. You can do email too but Direct Mail gets people
in a different state of mind.

Try this first...

Ask your *current* clients to send a letter "from" them, to THEIR customers/friends/biz assoc's. all about how great you are and how you helped them out, etc.

Make it EASY for your current cust's to do this (read: you do everything, they do nothing) -- you write the letter, you stuff the envel's, etc. The only thing they do is to allow YOU to make it SEEM like the letters are coming from THEM.

You can give those current cust's a cut of the biz that comes to you that way, or just give them some free services in exchange for doing the endorsed mailing to their list(s) of clients, etc.

Make this procedure into a system that works the same every time, and you'll never have to mail out a postcard in the first place. Why work (too hard at it)? Work smarter.

-- TW

I used handwritten invitation-sized ivory envelopes (available at Office Depot). I put my address label (no name) on the back and stamped them with bright commemorative first-class postage. I enclosed a personalized handwritten letter on a yellow-pad. My rate of returen was 60% to a targeted list. It is by far the most successful direct mail campaign I ever did and I used it over and over again.

The handwritten envelopes were the most time consuming. For the letters, I used a custom handwriting font to create the copy. I then tore pages from yellow pads and fed them into my color printer. You truly could not tell they were not originals.

The message was very simple and I had the potential clients calling me!

Send me a PM if you want more details.

Post cards are also powerful. The key is to test, test and test some more! Depending on your niche, you usually need to mail about 5000 to have a worthy test. But if you list is more targeted, then you can mail to smaller numbers.

Finally, if you are promoting a business offer, then mail to businesses and not to homeowners.

I hope this helps.

Years ago when I did some post card advertising, I used postcards with pictures of historic/classis cars on them.
My idea was that a "decorative card" might be kept longer than some generic card that would likely as not get tossed as soon as it was seen as advertising.