Postcard Marketing Campaigns - Fact vs Fiction

If you've been learning about postcard marketing campaigns by reading the websites of postcard printers, you've probably been given some one-sided advice. For example, most of these companies will tell you the repetition is the key to success with any direct mail marketing campaign.

But here's what you have to keep in mind. These companies make money based on the amount postcards your order, not your campaign results. So it's in their best financial interest to encourage repetition. In truth, repetition alone will not bring postcard campaign success. There are many other things involved in the process.

This is just one example of the misinformation you can find online today. So in this article, I'd like to debunk some of the most common (and often dangerous) myths about postcard marketing campaigns and strategies.

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Myth #1 - Repetition is the Key to Direct Mail Success

The argument goes like this. In order to get results with your direct mail postcard campaign, you need to repeat your mailings on a regular basis. The more often you mail, the better. In the beginning, you might be discouraged by a lack of responses to your mailings. But don't worry. Results with come in time. The most important thing is to send more postcards. Over time, people will recognize your name, and your marketing message will begin to sink in. Your postcard marketing campaign will eventually succeed, if you just keep repeating it.

Fact #1 - Repetition Alone Will Not Bring Success

If you repeat a postcard mailing that did not deliver results the first time around, you are simply repeating a failure. In doing so, you are wasting time, energy and money. While it's true that repetition is a key element in postcard marketing campaigns, you should never repeat a failure.

However, if you get a decent ROI from your first mailing, you should certainly repeat it. You should also test different variations with your offer, your design, etc. In this way, you can gradually increase your response rates over time, by repeating the strategies that work. But if your first mailing is a bust, you'd be foolish to repeat it. If it doesn't work the first time, you need to adjust your strategy. If you repeat the same failed strategy over and over, your postcard marketing campaign is going to soak up a lot of resources -- without producing anything in return.

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Myth #2 - Postcard Marketing is Easy

Many printers will tell you that postcard marketing is an easy way to grow your business. It's like magic. Just put your message onto a postcard, send it out to thousands of potential customers, and then sit back and wait for the phone calls and order to roll in. Best of all, anyone can do it. All you need is a product or service, and a mailing list. We will handle everything else for you.

Fact #2 - Postcard Marketing Takes Practice

If the statements above sound too good to be true, that's because they are. Yes, you can use direct mail postcards to increase sales and grow your business. I wouldn't be publishing this blog otherwise. But succeeding with a postcard marketing campaign is not easy. It requires careful research, close monitoring, and constant adjustment. In fact, it's easier to fail with this marketing medium than it is to succeed. That's why I've written this book to help you get it right.

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Myth #3 - Postcard Design Templates are the Way to Go

A lot of web-based direct mail companies offer design "templates" that you can customize online. These are preset designs that allow you to plug in your logo and message. On the surface, this seems like a great idea, and it can certainly make the design process easier. But when it comes to your postcard campaigns, you should use templates with a good deal of caution -- or avoid them altogether. Here's why:

Fact #3 - Templates Can Hurt Your ROI

By their very nature, postcard templates look a lot alike. They also limit you to a fill-in-the-blanks approach to your design. There is a certain convenience to this approach, but there's also the danger of being overly similar. In other words, if your marketing postcard looks like every other postcard the recipient has seen over the years, there's a better chance they'll ignore it all together.

Granted, your offer and the way you present it are the most important components of a postcard marketing campaign -- but the originality of your design runs a close third. Using templates will limit your originality.

There are two circumstances when this might not matter as much:

• The first is a low-competition scenario. If you're in a highly specific niche, with few companies using direct mail postcards for marketing, then the template approach might not dilute your message.
• The other scenario is where you start with a design template, but customize it to the point that it's truly unique from what your competitors are doing.

Aside from these two scenarios, my best advice is to use templates cautiously or avoid them altogether. An original design will always stand out more than a boilerplate design.

Good luck and good marketing!

-Brandon

Postcard Marketing Success - 9 Steps to Success

We've covered a lot of material on this website over the years, and much of it has revolved around postcard marketing success and how to achieve it. So in this article, I thought I would round up some helpful articles from years past in the form of a new article. So without further ado, here are nine steps to achieving postcard marketing success (with links to further reading).

Step 1 — Identify Your Audience

When creating your postcard message, start by identifying your audience. This might seem obvious, but it’s a critical step upon which the rest of the process will rest. To identify your core audience, you simply have to ask yourself a series of questions.

What kind of person would really want my product or service? Where might I find these people? What's important to them? What do they fear or hope to overcome? What do they want to know? How can I solve their problems? What do I have to offer that might motivate them?

When you've answered these questions, you should be able to write a paragraph from the combined answers. This paragraph is your audience statement, and it will help you set your postcard marketing objectives accordingly. Once you've defined your audience, you can more easily determine the kinds of offers that might motivate them.

Step 2 — Determine Your Objective

For postcard marketing success, the best objective (i.e., most achievable) is lead generation or direct response. Why? Because postcards can actually achieve these things. A postcard cannot convince people that you're the best in your industry. But it can certainly generate a response. And once you generate a response, you'll have an opportunity to show them you're the best.

So if you really want to achieve postcard marketing success, you need to start by determining your direct mail objective.

Step 3 — Identify Your Idea

What's the big idea that will make your postcard different from similar postcards from your competitors? How will you make people say "Wow"? Have you brainstormed? A great postcard is born from the imagination. This gives it a solid skeleton. Then it gets "flesh" from the things we'll talk about next—the value, the offer, the message, etc. But it all starts with the idea.

Step 4 — Pile On the Value

So you've given them a good reason to contact you. But why stop there? Add "layers" of value to your original offer. If you're promoting a seminar, add on a take-home information kit, or some other item of value to the audience. If you're promoting your consulting services, offer a free e-book to respondents, just for calling to talk to you. There's also something to offer. So pile on the value.

Step 5 — Create Your Offer

You've heard me say this several times throughout this book—the value and relevance of your offer will determine the size of your response. That's a basic principle of postcard marketing that people overlook.

If you think of your postcard as a messenger and not a product, this will start to make a lot of sense. A messenger without an important message is worthless. But if the messenger has valuable news or information, everybody wants to hear what he has to say. A strong offer is a key ingredient for direct mail success with postcard marketing.

Step 6 — Shape Your Message

Notice how far down this list the writing and design are? That's intentional. Too many marketers plunge into the message and design before they even have an idea or an offer. What you write about is more important than how you write about it. An interesting offer will leap off the page even when described in plain English.

Remember how groundbreaking the iPod was when it first came out? They didn't have to work too hard to create a message for the iPod, because the iPod was the message. They simply said it's this small, it holds this much music, and it costs this amount. People went crazy.

When you have something interesting to say, the message writes itself. Refer back to my postcard samples to see this in action. Anybody could've written those headlines and messages -- but not everybody could offer a great seminar, a one-of-a-kind information report, or a massive informational website. It's what's behind the message that's important.

So once you've come up with your idea and your offer, the message should be fairly easy to write. All you have to do is describe the offer in clear, straightforward language. All you have to do is connect the dots. This is the essence of direct mail copywriting success.

Step 7 — Design Your Postcard

If you're not familiar with graphic design, it would be a wise investment to hire a designer. Your postcard's design will reflect directly on your organization, so you'll want it to look professional. Your marketing success depends upon it.

Most postcard printers have designers on staff. Their services usually range from $55 - $75 / hour. A competent designer can produce a postcard design in three hours or so. If you have a friend who's handy with Photoshop, Quark or Illustrator, you can probably design a decent card for free.

The important thing to remember is that the design should support the message. Sure, it can be eye-catching, but only as a means of focusing those eyes on the message and the offer before them.

Step 8 — Conduct Your Mailing

If you've decided to use a postcard vendor like I've recommended, this step is going to be fairly easy. Just upload your postcard design and your mailing list, and let the vendor do the rest. They will print it and mail it for you. Be sure to put your own name and address on the list (and maybe a couple of friends or family in the area). That way, you'll know when your postcards go out because you'll get one. This is called "seeding" the list.

Step 9 — Follow-up Activities

So what happens after you send your postcards? Well, hopefully you have some way to track the responses, even if it's as simple as asking people "How did you hear about me?" Tracking allows you to compare one postcard message to another to see which one performs better. Refer back to the "Tracking" section of the book for more on this.

What's Your Long Term Plan?

Before sending your first postcard, it's a good idea to have a long-range plan. You don't need anything elaborate, just a basic plan for how many mailings you want to do. A lot of the time, circumstances will tell you what course to take. For example, if your postcard is a big success and you get a lot of response, your next step should be to send that postcard again!

If your mailing performs poorly, it may be time to adjust your approach and try something new (perhaps by increasing the value and uniqueness of your offer).

Most importantly, keep learning. I'm willing to bet you learn something new each time you speak with a customer. Yes? Well postcard marketing is the same -- you'll learn something new each time you send a postcard. Sometimes the lessons are pleasant, sometimes they're painful. But you'll always learn something. This kind of perpetual education will help you climb the pyramid of postcard marketing success ... and that's the whole point of the process!

Which Postcard Sizes to Use for Marketing

Reader Question: Which postcard sizes are best to use for direct mail marketing campaigns? Are there any studies that show one being better than the other, like a standard size versus a jumbo postcard?

The message and offer you create for your postcard campaign is far more important than the size. When most marketers conduct A/B testing to see what gets the best results, they usually test variations of the headline on the piece, the overall message, the offer and the call-to-action. In most cases, the postcard size is a lesser consideration to these other important factors.

For the purposes of this discussion, commonly used postcard sizes can be defined as:

• Jumbo postcards are usually in the neighborhood of 6" high by 9" wide, give or take a half-inch on either side.
• Standard size postcards are typically 4" x 6" plus or minus a half-inch on the width.

With that being said, "jumbo" postcards will generally outperform standard sizes (with all other things being equal). There are two primary reasons for this. A larger postcard stands out from all of the standard-sized mail in the recipient's mailbox. Also, the larger format allows you to include more information, pictures, features, offers, etc. Both of these things can increase response rates on a direct mail postcard campaign.

Of course, you need to test your direct mail pieces to see what works. If you don't have a good testing program in place, you won't know what's working and what's not.

My advice is to start by defining the specific goals of your direct mail campaign. In other words, what do you want your postcards to accomplish. This will help you shape your marketing message, and you'll then know what size postcard you need to contain your message.

And keep in mind it all starts with the product or service. If your product isn't noteworthy in some way, then all of the postcards in the world won't help you. On the other hand, if your product is truly remarkable, your direct mail campaign will be much more successful.

I hope that answers your question.

Good luck and good marketing!

-Brandon

Business Postcard Marketing - What Makes You Different?

Before you order a bunch of business postcards for marketing purposes ... before you start laboring over the postcard design or headline ... before you start segmenting your list in preparation for a mailing ... you need to ask yourself an important question:

What makes you so different?

To be more specific, what makes your products and/or services different? Better? Easier? These are crucial questions for anyone involved in business postcard marketing today, and for somewhat obvious reasons. It's harder to get people's attention these days, because we are all so flooded by information and marketing messages.

I stress this because all too often a business will use marketing postcards before they are ready to use them. Instead of spending the time needed to create a strong offer around a unique product, they will rush their message to the market. They will design a postcard and send it out with a message that basically says, "Hi there ... we exist."

If somebody pulls your marketing postcard out of the mailbox, reads it, but doesn't immediately see what's new and exciting about your offer ... then your postcards have already failed. And by then, you've wasted a lot of time, money and effort on your business postcard marketing campaign.

Now for the good news. All of this is easy to avoid. To succeed with business postcard marketing you simply need something worth talking about. In truth, the direct mail side of things is the easy part. Developing a product or service worth marketing is the harder part. Once you have something truly special, the postcard copy will be easy to write.

Good luck and good marketing!

-Brandon

Prospecting Postcards Explained

How can postcards be used for prospecting purposes? This is a common question among marketers looking for another way to reach their prospective customers.

To answer this question, we first have to answer another question: What is prospecting in the first place?

Prospecting is a form of marketing. In fact, the two terms are nearly synonymous. When you send out a marketing message in hopes of reaching a prospective customer (and getting that person to respond in some way), you are prospecting.

So it can be defined as a marketing technique used to reach prospective customers, in the hopes of turning them into actual customers.

And here's where direct mail postcards come into the picture.

Postcards are perfectly suited for this role. You can create a highly targeted mailing list made up of your ideal audience -- the people most likely to purchase your products or services. Then you can send prospecting postcards to this list with a strong offer and call-to-action, in order to motivate these prospects toward the action you want them to take.

The Primary Ingredients of a Prospecting Postcard

So what do you need to pull this off? Well, first you need a product or service that's worth promoting. I know that seems like a no-brainer, but I always like to start with that point. A truly remarkable product or service will make your postcard marketing efforts a whole let easier.

You'll also need a good mailing list made up of the people who are most inclined to need / want what you're offering. This mailing list should be highly targeted to a specific group. That way, your prospecting postcards can speak specifically to those folks, with a message and offer tailored just for them.

You'll also need a good postcard design and strong copy geared toward your prospects.

And, of course, you'll need to work with a postcard printing service who can take the logistical hassle off your hands. You'll have to handle the marketing strategy yourself (or outsource it to a direct marketing firm), but the printing company can handle the production and distribution of the prospecting postcards for you. One less thing to worry about!

Good luck and good marketing!

-Brandon

Modern Challenges to Postcard Marketing

The following is an excerpt from the e-book, Postcard Marketing - A Modern Approach

Alternately, I could have labeled this section "Modern Challenges to Marketing in General" because the challenges I'm about to list apply to all marketers. But this is a book on postcard marketing, so we shall narrow our focus to that medium.

Challenge #1 - An Army of Marketers
As the postcard marketing industry continues to grow in size and advance in technologically, the cost of postcard marketing decreases for the individual marketer. There's a lot of competition in the industry, so postcard printers are always trying to add services and undercut each other's pricing. As a result, the number of postcard marketers has increased steadily over the years.

What does this mean to the average consumer? You guessed it—they have more mail in their mailboxes than ever before. That leads us to the next challenge of postcard marketing ... information overload.

Challenge #2 - Information Overload
As if your competitors weren’t enough, you also face increasing resistance from your potential customers, especially those who don't already know you. Why? Because they bring more skepticism to the table than ever before.

The average consumer gets bombarded with more than 3,000 advertisements in a given day. Magazine ads, banner ads, popup ads, direct mail, spam, billboards, TV and radio spots … it’s a blanket under which nothing can grow but skepticism and selectiveness.

We encounter more information in a single day than our grandparents encountered in a year. The result? Noise, clutter and information overload—especially on the Web. The extended result is that your audience is highly selective. They are selective in what they read, what they watch, and what they respond to.

They have become “info-savvy.”

Challenge #3 - The Info-Savvy Consumer
I put this challenge in quotes, because it's actually an opportunity as well as a challenge. But let's start with the challenging side of things:

We live and work in an information economy. Words and content have become powerful tools. They drive us forward, help us succeed, make our lives more fruitful and our businesses more profitable—when they're used properly.

Your clients and prospects know this. Accordingly, they demand more of what they read.

What do I mean by info-savvy? Let's look at an industry-specific example using real estate. Think back fifteen or twenty years. It’s 1985, and you’re a homeowner. You receive a direct mail piece from a real estate agent that says, “I’m your neighborhood real estate professional, and I’m here to help with any real estate needs you have.”

How do you research this person? How do you find out who else is a real estate professional in your neighborhood? You pick up the phone and call, that’s how. And then you’ve exposed yourself as an interested prospect. In other words, there’s no easy way to conduct research anonymously.

Now return to the present. You get the same postcard (and probably a dozen more just like it). How can you research the Realtor now?

For starters, you can type the agent’s name into a search engine like GoogleTM and see what comes up. You can visit the Realtor’s website, if it’s included on the postcard. You can even visit the Realtor’s company website to see what information is listed there.

Or, maybe you just toss the postcard aside and conduct an Internet search from scratch, perhaps by typing “Realtor +your city name” into one of the major search engines.

And while you’re at it, maybe you’ll visit HouseValues.com or Zillow.com to get a rough estimate of your home’s current value. Maybe you’ll view recent sales in the area, or maybe you’ll visit HomeBuyingInstitute.com to learn all about mortgages.

The point is, times have changed, and consumers today have much more information at their fingertips than the consumers of 1985.

This Means Three Things:

1. Your potential customers have free and instant access to information previously unavailable to them.

2. Consumers do not have to call a company they are interested in right from the start. They can (and do) use the Internet to research the company first.

3. To succeed with postcard marketing, you need to accept these realities and take a modern approach.

But Not to Worry...
Don't be discouraged by all this. Because though the course of this book, I'm going to show you how to avoid the mistakes so many of your competitors have made (and continue to make). I'm going to teach you postcard marketing strategies that have the power to motivate the modern consumer. I'm going to introduce you to the "Super Cards."

Many of these strategies will embrace the behaviors of modern consumers. We know they like to conduct further research about a company online, so let's cater to that! Let's connect our postcard to our website in a cohesive way that increases the chance that both mediums will produce results.

Let's modernize our postcard marketing so that we may climb the Pyramid of Postcard Success.

What? I haven't mentioned the Pyramid yet? Well, then let's take a look...


Read the rest by downloading your copy of the postcard book.

How to Become a Postcard Marketing Ninja

If you are reading this introduction, it's probably because the article's headline did its job. That's what you must do in your postcard marketing campaigns, and you must do it in five seconds or less. This is where postcard headlines come into play.

What's a Postcard Marketing Ninja?
Postcard marketing ninjas are rare. At last count, there were only about a dozen of them worldwide. So while you may never actually join the ranks of the postcard marketing ninjas, you can certainly adopt some of their practices -- and by doing so, you will elevate your postcard marketing program to new levels of success.

Postcard marketing ninjas have truly mastered the art of direct mail marketing with postcards. As a result, they can achieve response rates that "mortals" like you and I can only dream about. But we can certainly emulate them to improve our own success.

Postcard Headlines - A Tool of the Ninja
Your postcard headlines are a great place to employ ninja wisdom. Direct mail postcards must grab the reader's attention with the promise of something gained. With only a glance, the reader must understand what he or she has to gain by reading the rest of the postcard. Otherwise, the postcard will be tossed aside. Postcard marketing ninjas never have their postcards tossed aside, so we must strive to be like them.

Here are some ways to sharpen your headline to a fine point, thus transforming it into a highly effective tool for postcard marketing success.

Make Your Headlines Simple and Clear
Complexity is the enemy of direct mail headlines, so keep your headline simple and straightforward. Your recipients should get your point and understand the benefit right away. They should not have to read the headline twice or scratch their heads over it. Rewrite your headline until it's as clear as possible at first glance.

Follow the Rule of Ten
The Rule of Ten suggests you should write your headline ten different ways, and then systematically eliminate the weaker ones. You can eliminate them in a number of ways. Try reading them out loud to see if any sound awkward. If so, remove them from the list. Then try showing the other to friends or colleagues (or to test subjects, if you really want to get fancy). Ask which one motivates or interests them the most, and why.

Repeat this until you narrow your list down to the top three headlines. Then put the list aside for at least a day. When you return to it, ask yourself the questions below:

• Does my headline offer a benefit?


• Is that benefit crystal-clear?


• Does the headline identify my primary audience in some way?


• Will it entice them into the postcard message?


• Does it suggest something of value to my reader?


• Does this headline identify my primary audience in some way?


• Is it honest and relevant to my product or service?

Conclusion
Headlines have the power to make or break a postcard marketing campaign. Postcard marketing ninjas know this and treat their headlines accordingly, honing them until they are razor-sharp and on-target. Write them. Revise them. Hone them. Track and test them. And then start the process over again. You can't afford to do anything less.

Good luck and good marketing!

-Brandon

Postcard Marketing Tips - The Headline

Few elements of the direct mail postcard carry as much weight as the postcard's headline. Sure, all elements of postcard marketing are important in their own right -- the list, the design, the offer.

But the direct mail postcard's headline plays a special role. It must capture the reader's attention, connect with the reader on some emotional level, and promise something of such value that the reader cannot resist reading on. And the postcard headline must do all of this in just a few words.

That's a lot to ask of a sentence, and that's why you must perfect the art of direct mail headlines if you hope to succeed with postcard marketing. When your recipient pulls that postcard out of the mailbox, he or she will give it only a glance. Within that glance, they will decide whether to toss the postcard aside or save it for further consideration. And the postcard's headline carries most of the responsibility for this quick decision.

When creating your postcard marketing message, always give extra effort to the headline. After all, a direct mail postcard with a weak headline is a failure from the start ... even if the rest of the copy is well-crafted.

On this website we have a wealth of advice on direct mail copywriting in general, and direct mail headlines in particular. Take some time to read through the articles we have provided. They will put you on solid footing with regard to direct mail headlines. After that, it will be up to you to perfect the art and science of postcard headlines. Your postcard marketing success depends upon it!

Good luck and good marketing.

~Brandon

Postcard Marketing With Web Assist - New Article

Do you use postcard marketing as part of your overall marketing program? Do you also have a company website? (Of course you do, right?) In that case, do you use your marketing postcards and your website in mutually reinforcing ways?

If I lost you with that last one, we have a new article that's right up your alley! These days, one of the best ways to use postcard marketing is in conjunction with a website landing page. When you use a marketing postcard that directs people to a specific section of your website for a specific (and beneficial reason), you stand to increase your postcard response rates.

If you'd like to learn the right way and the wrong way to go about this, read our new article on Postcard Marketing: How to Incorporate Your Website.

Good luck and good marketing!

-Brandon

Postcard Printing - New Article Posted

I'm not sure why, but I've been in the mood to write about postcard printing companies lately. Probably because I've worked for two of them and I feel comfortable with the subject matter.

In any case, I've posted a new article to help you choose the postcard printing company that's right for you. In this particular article, we will discuss a very important criteria you should look for in your chosen postcard service -- and that's the convenience factor.

Convenience is a big deal when it comes to postcard printing / postcard marketing. Printing and mailing postcards is a technical, multi-faceted process. Anything you can do to simplify the process is worth doing. In the article below, I explain some things that can help.

Postcard Printing Companies - The Convenience Factor

Good luck and good marketing!

-Brandon

Postcard marketing tips - 55 of them!

I've just posted a new article to the Postcard Basics section of the website. It offers 55 -- count 'em, 55 -- tips for postcard marketing success. Why 55? Because I had planned for 99 but ran out of material. And 55 has a nice ring to it, don't you think?

This article covers the entire process of postcard marketing, from the initial idea to the final execution. Planning your postcard marketing strategy, writing your message, designing your postcards, tracking the results ... it's all here.

Read the article:
55 Tips for Postcard Marketing Success

Good luck and good marketing!

~Brandon

Postcard Marketing Tips from Around the Web

Want postcard marketing articles? You got 'em!

I thought it would make a good Friday post if I scoured the Internet and rounded up some of my favorite articles on postcard marketing.

So, I've done just that. Here are some postcard marketing tips, articles and resources from various authors around the Web.

7 Tips for Successful Postcard Marketing
Marketing guru Bob Leduc offers some tips for effective postcard marketing. This is a good one -- full of straightforward, sound advice.

Postcard Marketing: The Small Business Marketing Weapon
In this article, author David Frey gives you four reasons to use postcard marketing to grow your business, and four tips for improving your postcard marketing program.

Postcard Design Articles
A variety of tips and articles related to the design aspects of postcard marketing. How to design your postcard for maximum impact, how to create your own marketing postcards, and more.

Postcard Marketing: Low-Tech Marketing Advice
The Sloan brothers from StartupNation offer advice on the "old-fashioned" but still effective world of postcard marketing.

Six Steps to Successful Postcard Marketing
Martha Retallick, author of the book Postcard Marketing Secrets, offers you a six-step plan for postcard marketing success.

Good luck and good marketing!

~Brandon

Postcard Marketing Book - Now Available

I'm happy to announce that my postcard marketing book is now available for purchase. Better still, it's in e-book format, which means you can download it today and start applying the lessons tomorrow.

Why I wrote this book
After spending a few years in the direct mail and printing industry, I realized one thing above all else. There are a lot of people spending good money on postcard marketing while overlooking the best practices of that medium.

Day after day, I saw companies sending out postcards that could have delivered twice the ROI, with only minor adjustments. Back then I couldn't do much about it. But I can now. This book is my way of sharing what I've learned about postcard marketing with anyone who wants to know.

Learn more about the book

Direct Mail Postcards - Improving Direct Mail Response

Direct Mail Postcards - 10 Ways to Improve Response Rates

This post is part of a 10-part series on direct mail postcards. In this series, we will look at ways to improve your direct mail response rates by following the best practices of postcard marketing.

#1 - Start with a big idea.
Pretty postcards do not motivate people to respond. But a good offer will motivate them. So before worrying about things like copywriting and postcard design, make sure you have a good reason to send your postcards in the first place. What's your big idea? What do you have to offer? What are you going to put on your direct mail postcard to make it more than "just another postcard"?

Answer these questions before you mail a single postcard, and you'll be on the track to better response rates.

Other ways to improve direct mail response.

Good luck and good marketing!

-Brandon

Postcard Marketing - Brandon's Favorite Articles

I thought I'd do a little roundup of my favorite postcard marketing articles on the website. Hope you find them helpful...

Postcard Printing Services: How to Choose
If you are wrestling with your postcard marketing program because you're trying to handle the logistics yourself, let me offer this advice. Stop it! A postcard printing company can simplify the process for you, and you'd be surprised at how affordable they are. Here are some tips on choosing a postcard printing company that's right for you.

Direct Mail Postcards: 10 Ways to Increase Response
Postcard marketing is a numbers game. Those who are successful with postcard marketing know how to apply proven tactics to boost response rates. Here are a few of those tactics.

Postcard Marketing Calls for Stopping Power
In postcard marketing, you have a precious opportunity to capture your reader's attention. I call it the "golden glimpse" of postcard marketing, and it requires a certain amount of stopping power from your postcards.

Real Estate Postcards + Website = Leads
Though this postcard marketing article is written or real estate agents, anyone can benefit from reading it. The concept is universal, and it can help you boost ROI in your own direct mail program as well.

Direct Mail Marketing with Postcards - The Headline Factor
We mentioned the "golden glimpse" of postcard marketing, when you have a brief chance to capture your reader's attention. The headline plays a major role in this juncture between grabbing 'em and losing 'em.

So there you have them ... a few of my favorite articles from around the website. We post new articles all the time, so be sure to check back often. I hope these articles and resources help you get more out of your postcard marketing program!

Until next time,

~Brandon

Postcard Marketing - Improving Postcard Response Rates

Postcard marketing is a response-based medium, plain and simple. Postcards won't build a brand or position a product, so they should be used for the one thing they're good at -- generating some form of response.

Within this realm of response, there's a wide spectrum. Some postcards barely yield a break-even ROI, while other postcards enjoy huge success and get repeated many times.

So what's the secret to shooting the high end of postcard marketing response? Well, there are no secrets really ... just proven practices that you can apply to your own postcard marketing and learn from through experience.

Here are some of those proven practices:
How to Increase Postcard Marketing Response


Good luck and good marketing!

-Brandon

Choosing a Postcard Printing Company

Postcard marketing has exploded in popularity over the last few years. This is partly due to advances in the postcard printing industry that make the medium easier and more affordable than ever.

But with so many postcard printing services to choose from, where do you even begin? How do you compare one postcard service to another, and what questions should you ask?

A Guide to Postcard Printing Services
We've posted an article on the site to help you research postcard vendors and choose one that's right for you. This article also gives a good overview of the services you can expect from modern postcard companies.

Go there now:
How to Choose a Postcard Printing Company

I hope you find this article helpful. If you need any help choosing a postcard printing service, be sure to contact me.

~Brandon

Direct Mail Post Cards - New Article Posted

Greetings!

I just wanted to make a quick blog post to let you know about a new article posted. If you use direct mail post cards as part of your overall marketing program, you'll find this article helpful.

Direct Mail Post Cards - How to Improve Response Rates
The article is a list of ways to improve response rates on direct mail post cards, drawn from my experiences in the direct mail industry.

Go there now

~Brandon

Direct Mail for Financial Services - New Article Posted

Direct mail postcards can accomplish many different marketing objectives -- most of them associated with some form of lead generation.

But are postcards the right tool to use for financial services companies who want to generate face-to-face meetings?

I think you could pull it off if you used the postcard in conjunction with a website landing page that explained the meeting in greater detail. That way, you could build the trust that direct mail copywriter Alan Sharpe thinks is missing from this approach.

Read the article here:
Postcards for Financial Services Lead Generation

Good luck and good marketing!

-Brandon from PostcardSmart.com

Postcard Marketing for Your Small Business

Small businesses have unique challenges when it comes to marketing. Chief among these challenges is the budget picture. By nature, small business often have small marketing budgets.

This makes it important to find a marketing system that's (A) easy to manage, (B) easy to repeat, and (C) affordable and cost-flexible.

Enter postcard marketing.

Direct mail postcards fulfill the three criteria listed above, and then some. Small business direct mail marketing can be a strong addition to your overall marketing system. Here are some of the reasons why:

• Postcards - Inexpensive Communication
• Postcards - Great for Referrals
• Postcards - Highly Versatile

Good luck and good marketing!

-Brandon