Mail Marketing Masters

We found a video that explains in easy to understand format, how, writing a word document and using a mail merge function to personalize each sales letter for a direct mail campaign. Watch and enjoy.

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Direct mail letters are the most effective way to personalize your advertising. This method is very attractive to the person receiving the mail piece. Postcards get glances before they get tossed in the wastebasket, and catalogs usually just get set aside for a time to thumb through that may never come along. Advertising letters are the happy medium that may mean increased sales.

Hand-written touches are the most important thing that attracts attention. First, hand write the addressee’s name. That way the consumer knows you thought of her personally and thought she would enjoy hearing about the product/service or special deal you are offering.

The body of your letter will obviously need to be typed in order to mass produce and insure ease of reading. Take the time to chose a letterhead style that is appealing to the eyes. Use white for the color of the paper and plain text for content, either arial or times roman at 12 point. And of course, a great logo and your business’ contact information.

To close your letter with that personal touch, sign every letter individually. Now, of course if you have extremely large number of letters to go out, there is technology out there that can “recreate” real looking hand written signatures in mass production. You may want to price that out with your printer if they have that option available.

It would also enhance your response if you add a “PS” at the bottom of your letter. Here is where you could add a special offer or thank them for their business…a great business retention technique. It lets the customer know you value them.

In conclusion, always think how to personalize the letter enough to let the customer know you are giving them personal attention and appreciation. After all, isn’t that what we all want?

For your direct mail processing needs call Business Helpers at 480-483-7677. Serving all of Arizona, USA.

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We found a great article that Entreprenuer Magazine did on direct mail marketing…..”99 Tips for Direct Mail Marketing”

http://www.entrepreneur.com/marketing/guerillamarketing/article193436.html

This article was brought to you by Business Helpers in Scottsdale, Arizona.

Here is a quick list of services we are able to assist you with.

• Mail List Preparation: Merge/Purge, clean, remove duplicates, CASS certification (ensure accuracy and deliverability), NCOA (updates change of address)
• Mail Processing: Address (directly onto mail piece), collate, stuff, fold, seal, affix wafer seal closures, sort, stamp/meter, bundle for postage discounts, and deliver to the post office. We can accommodate a wide variety of insert and envelope sizes
• Letter Shop Services: Print personalized, high quality laser letters, folding, tabbing, and inserting while accommodating a wide variety of insert and envelope sizes
• Custom Printing: We find the best price and quickest service available through our printing partners
• Hand Assembly: Quality hand assembly (collating, folding, inserting, labeling and addressing) for custom or unusual jobs

Let us make a no obligation quote for your next mailing job. You will notice the difference on the service and attention we provide! We love what we do and looking forward to helping you.

Call us now at 480-483-7677

At this time, we want to wish all of our customers, vendors and visitors a  most successful and prosperous new year!

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Of course, with the holiday rush, the volume of mailings is going to tax the distribution system even more so this year. As we are still recovering from the recession, private mail distribution companies as well as the good old US Post Office have downsized their staff and equipment.

Warnings always go out to the consumer mail segment to mail early to get delivery in time for the Christmas holidays. This also goes for the businesses at this time of year to mail to their clients and vendors.

Also, be aware of the recipients “attention” span during the holidays. Are you business clients going to notice the business mail that they receive during the month of December? A lot of companies many be shut down for holiday breaks or the recipients are just not in the “mood” to open your mailing during this time. It is important that you know your customer’s mindset at this time of year.

The exception is the customers that depend on your service or product all year long. They are going to open your mail. If it is a product or service that they feel can wait, they will.

From all of us at Business Helpers, we wish you and your families a very Merry Christmas and Happy New Year!!

For your direct mail processing needs call Business Helpers at 480-483-7677. Serving all of Arizona, USA.

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We found the best of the best of a video that truly describes what direct mail marketing is all about. Although this video covers direct mail marketing for printers, the same principles will apply for any type of business.

For those of you who thought you knew, watch this entertaining video and give us your thoughts. Comment back to us by pressing the comment button below.

Direct Mail Marketing in Plain English

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Here is the 5 most common direct mail mistakes most businesses make.

1. Not spending enough time and money on the list. Quite often we throw a direct mail campagin together without a thought to what kind of list we are going to market too. We find out later that the direct mail piece, the message and the call to action was perfect but the list, which we “rushed” to purchase without checking the validity and the integrity of the list broker has let us down.  Think more of the list broker and explore the quality of the list and also the types of buyers the list has. Sometimes it could change the direction of what kind of marketing message you are going to plan for if you find another target market ready to buy your product or service.
2. TESTING! This is a biggie. More than half of direct mail customers will give us a direct mail campaign to mail out, give us the list and fail to give us some parameters of changing out how the mailing piece looks to test the headline, the direct mail piece design, etc. There are so many things to test, the color of the envelope, size of the piece, the message, making it “lumpy,” and so on. Be a test “junkie” and you will find you will be consistently doubling and tripling the money brought in on a campaign.
3. Stress the benefits to the customer in your marketing message as opposed to the features your product or service has. The buying customer does not care about the fancy, schmancy features your product has, as a matter of fact, they do not have the time to listen to how great you are, they want results! What kind of result can you customer achieve by using your product?
4. Have an offer. What is a direct mail campaign good for if you do not have an offer. Even just asking for the order in your message is good enough to get you results. Research what kind of offer you are going to make. It has to be compelling and benefit driven.
5. Lastly, and most importantly FOLLOW UP with your customer list. I highly suggest you get the phone numbers of all your direct mail prospects too. That way, you can follow up and get a good probablity that you will make sales right on the phone from the mailing. Do not underestimate the power of follow ups!

For your direct mail processing needs call Business Helpers at 480-483-7677. Serving all of Arizona, USA.

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Have you ever wondered what your recipient does with incoming mail, mail that you may have sent to them via a direct mail marketing campaign? They have a “ritual” in which they sort out the bills, personal mail, interesting looking mail, and the all famous – “junk mail.”

We are all guilty of this sorting process of our mail whether it is at home or at the office. Mail is quite often the first thing we give our attention to, so that is a good thing to direct mail marketers. But the most important thing here is to make sure your mail piece is personalized or somehow geared towards getting the attention of the recipient to open your mail piece. It should not be gaudy or obnoxious, slightly business-like, and non “salesy.”

We have a video below from a direct mail marketer that should drive out point, when thinking about your next direct mail campaign.

The Secret of Direct Mail Success

For your direct mail processing needs call Business Helpers at 480-483-7677. Serving all of Arizona, USA.

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Quite often the simplest way of mailing is the best. I am talking about a simple letter on your custom printed letter head and stuffed inside of a #10 business envelope with your logo on the return address and sent to your targeted prospect list.

This could be a simple introduction of your services to a full trial coupon of your product or service attached. Sending something on your stationary is far better than sending it in a postcard or fancy custom cut piece. Personalized stationary builds strong branding to the eyes of your prospects.

Sending personalized letters just to thank the customer or to continue to expose the prospect with the kinds of products and services you offer is a great goodwill builder with prospects. Remember the old sales adage, a minimum of “7 touches” is required before anyone will buy from you. What better way to send at least as series of 7 letters to your prospects to get their trust and attention.

Whatever you do, keep consistent with mailing out your letters or mail pieces. Believe it or not it will eventually convert at a modest rate and make your mailings pay for itself.

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Direct mail is the most important part of your marketing plan. Developing and executing the campaign can be very confusing. Today’s mailing regulations are getting more complicated–postage rates are changing all the time and the flood of mail makes it harder to get noticed. The right message and presentation is very important and must get to your target market in the correct way. Capturing your reader must happen quickly and your reader must be motivated to take action.

Here are some valuable tips when planning out your direct marketing campaign:

• consult with a direct mailing house before planning your next campaign
• keep your mailing piece simple and readable
• consult with a copywriter regarding your sales content
• use a reputable list broker
• use colored envelopes to get attention
• personalize the message in your mail piece
• have a clear message on what you offer
• insert a strong call to action – call in, fax in or mail back
• develop a free gift to further intice action
• offer a free trial period of your product or service
• have a professional graphic artist design art work
• mention guarantees (risk avoidance)

This is only a partial list of direct mail marketing techniques, but you get the idea. There are so many things to develop for your next mailing. Always remember to test and change things slightly to measure the effectiveness of your mailings. For example, the wording of the headline on the mail piece can be changed to make two or three versions. You measure the response rate of each headline….the headline that brings in the best return or response will prevail on all mailings from now on.

Stay tuned for more valuable tips and tricks from Mail Marketing Masters!

Make a comment here if you have some tips you can share with our readers. Just click on the comment button below.

For your direct mail processing needs call Business Helpers at 480-483-7677. Serving all of Arizona, USA.

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Before you start your direct mail campaign, make sure you know your target audience thoroughly before spending any money on renting a list to mail to.

You have spent some good money on making a great product, and you know that it fits what your market needs, you composed attention grabbing copy on your sales piece and you have all your call center in place to take orders. But remember that the most important thing is the mailing list you are sending mail to. What good is your sales piece going to do if you send it to a poor performing list?

Here are some pointers on how to “shop” for a profitable mailing list.

One of the most important things you can do when selecting a mail list house is to look in the Standard Rate & Data Service Directory under mailing list brokers. This is a very reputable publication that only contains good to very good list brokers. These brokers explain within the directory the different lists that are available for rent, what kind of buyers the lists are made up of, and the date the list was last cleaned–that is, the last time all the names on the list were verified relative to the correctness of addresses.

Once you narrow down your list brokers to a select few companies, contact them and let them know about your current mailing campaign and ask them if they have good lists to attract their specific lists. Quite often, a good list broker will have much knowledge and start asking you pertinent questions to further help you. When you get the feeling that you are talking to a sincere list broker, ask them for their minimum list of names along with prices. Then call on the other companies you were also intersted in and see if you can spot a trend of pricing and kind of lists available.

Once you and the list broker and have decided upon the mailing list best suited to your offer, the broker will require you to rent a minimum of 5,000 names. The going price will range from $35 to $95 per thousand names. This may seem like a lot of money to you at first, but you have to look at the quality of the list that the broker will give you to translate those names into “paying customers.”

Remember too, that the list brokers have their own interests to get repeat busines from you and will do their darnest to give you a quality list.

For all your direct mailing service needs, call us at 480-483-7677.

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