1. Attention – It must attract attention and attract the prospect to your offer
2. Interest – It must create an interest or be compelling to the reader of your marketing message.
3. Desire – It must create desire for your product by providing education about the product, niche or industry.
4. Action – Probably the most important item, it must have a call to action where the prospect either buys the product or makes inquiry for further information on the product.

The above are fundementals of direct sales techniques that have been used for over 100 years. This is the way cowboys sold wagons and horses! It feeds on the psychology of human nature and how to lead a prospect through the sales process.

Direct mail makes use of all these basic sales/marketing principles. So when creating your next direct mail campaign, make sure you use these principles as your guide for better response rate.

In our next post, we will cover the topic of direct mail response rates.

Here is a video from Ford Saeks that explains how important it is to match the sales message to the target market. Do it right the first time!

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!

1) Postal Rate Calculator

2) Zip Code Look Up

3) USPS direct mail resource page

shows how to create your mail piece
direct mail defined
create mail list
sending procedures
mailing and shipping tools
direct mail research

4) Glossary of Postal Terms

We hope you find these resources helpful to your next direct mail campaign. Remember to always do your due diligence when hiring a direct mail house to process your mailing. Check on their references, their past history of clients and programs they worked on, check with the Better Business Bureau, and make sure they are proactive in following up with you.

Here is an ingenius direct mail campaign that was implemented by an ad agency. Check out how they used a simple approach but got a lot of attention.

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

For those of you in the Phoenix, Arizona area, please make sure you visit us at our location and say “hello.” For visitors here from out of town, contact us either through our contact form or just call us for a cheerful, no obligation quote on your next job. We will always go the “extra mile” for you.

Call us at (480) 483-7677

Press Release
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
Business Helpers Mail Center Receives 2009 Best of Scottsdale Award
U.S. Commerce Association’s Award Plaque Honors the Achievement
WASHINGTON D.C., June 8, 2009 — Business Helpers has been selected for the 2009 Best of Scottsdale Award in the Direct Mail Advertising Services category by the U.S. Commerce Association (USCA).
The USCA “Best of Local Business” Award Program recognizes outstanding local businesses throughout the country. Each year, the USCA identifies companies that they believe have achieved exceptional marketing success in their local community and business category. These are local companies that enhance the positive image of small business through service to their customers and community.
Various sources of information were gathered and analyzed to choose the winners in each category. The 2009 USCA Award Program focused on quality, not quantity. Winners are determined based on the information gathered both internally by the USCA and data provided by third parties.
About U.S. Commerce Association (USCA)
U.S. Commerce Association (USCA) is a Washington D.C. based organization funded by local businesses operating in towns, large and small, across America. The purpose of USCA is to promote local business through public relations, marketing and advertising.
The USCA was established to recognize the best of local businesses in their community. Our organization works exclusively with local business owners, trade groups, professional associations, chambers of commerce and other business advertising and marketing groups. Our mission is to be an advocate for small and medium size businesses and business entrepreneurs across America.
SOURCE: U.S. Commerce Association

CONTACT:
U.S. Commerce Association
Email: PublicRelations@us-ca.org
URL: http://www.us-ca.org

EMAIL
So, email is supposed to be the “saviour” of getting your advertising message out to the thousands, hundred thousands and millions of people on your list. It is supposed to be cheaper to execute, doesn’t irriate the recipient by the ugly “junk” mails in their real mailbox, more efficient because you can measure ROI metrics within minutes of doing an email blast.

DIRECT MAIL
Direct mail’s cost per thousand prospect names are, in reality, cheaper than buying, or shall I say renting a list of like quantity in the online world. Undeliverability is up 20% lately from these online lists for the internet marketing crowd. Reason is there is more spam filters, corporate firewalls are set even tighter to keep out even legitimate emails, and the higher frequency of the recipient to mass delete emails for fear of email overload. Direct mail, on the other hand gets almost a 95% deliverability rate because good list managers scrub their lists on a regular basis.

Finally, with email, you only get 2 seconds or less to get the attention of the receiver or it gets deleted. Direct mail gives you 5 seconds or more to catch the attention of the receiver. That is huge!

So when thinking “old school” direct mail, always know it has a useful function in your marketing arsenal!