FOR
IMMEDIATE RELEASE
CONTACT: Tom Ellis
Jan.
02, 2000
Ellis Communications, L.L.C.
Phone (623) 780-4558
E-Mail dellis@syspac.com
PHOENIX
– When it comes to using direct mail as a marketing technique, all
businesses chant the same mantra day in and day out – increase sales and
profits while reducing costs. But
conducting a killer, cost-effective direct mail campaign will be difficult
with the U.S. Postal Service’s new rate increase!
Right?
The answer to that question is
a resounding “wrong,” according to Martin Baird, direct mail expert and
president of Nutritionalmarketing in Phoenix, Ariz.
“Direct mail is merely salesmanship in
print,” Baird said. “And if
you know even a few simple but effective tricks, you can significantly
increase your response rate and counteract the effect of higher postal rates. That’s certainly my definition of a killer direct mail
campaign.”
To
help nutritional retailers invest marketing dollars in direct mail that works
for them, Baird is offering a free report, “Proven Secrets of Direct Mail:
Seven Common Costly Mistakes.” The
report may be downloaded for free from his Web site,
www.nutritionalmarketing.com, a site that provides free marketing information
just for professionals in the nutritional industry.
“More
and more retailers are finding out too late that bad direct mail is stopping
them from becoming top sales people – or worse, causing their businesses to
fail,” Baird said. “It
doesn’t have to be that way. Effective
direct mail is not rocket science.”
Baird’s
report starts by exploring seven costly direct mail mistakes.
Here are a few that any
business should know:
Mistake
Number 1 – Writing a letter and writing direct mail are the same.
Nothing could be further from the truth, according to Baird.
English teachers show their students how to write letters with verbs,
nouns and proper grammar. Direct mail letters are written to get the reader’s
attention, to educate, to encourage the reader to take action.
Mistake
Number 2 – Writing a “I am the greatest” letter.
In his report, Baird points out that people are only interested in what
a company’s product or service can do for them.
They are not interested in a description of how great the business or
product is.
Mistake
Number 3 – The letter must look corporate.
Wrong again. “You
don’t work with corporations, you work with people,” Baird said.
“A corporation doesn’t read your letter, a person does. You need to give it the personal touch.”
Mistake
Number 4 – The standard letter. These
are the letters that everyone recognizes as solicitations without opening
them. Characteristics are No. 10
business envelope, company logo in the corner, bulk postage mark and label on
the front. “These are simple
signs that tell the person receiving the mailer that the sender doesn’t
care,” Baird said.
After
examining common direct mail mistakes, Baird’s report offers additional
information in the form of several proven letter-writing techniques:
Benefits
Sell and Features Tell. Features
say what a product is, but benefits tell the reader what it will do for them.
Mailers should be packed with benefits, Baird said.
Use
Headlines. The headline is
the most heavily read portion of a direct mail letter, sometimes the only
portion. If
the letter doesn’t have a headline, the chances of maximum response
are gone.
Sign
With Blue Ink. Blue ink
doesn’t look like a computer-generated signature.
It stands out as a personalized signature, one of the tricks to
creating a letter with a personal touch.
The reader does care!
Other Personal Touches. Include a note on the letter.
Hand address the envelope. Use
postage stamps instead of bulk
mail, and use two stamps totaling 34 cents rather than one. Multiple stamps in a variety of colors and patterns remind
the reader of letters they have received from relatives.
Add
Sizzle. Use words that sizzle, that draw a beautiful picture for the
reader – words such as save, guaranteed, free and secret. The
better the words describe the offer, the better the response, Baird said.
“Direct mail success is
determined by small, proven techniques,” Baird said.
“Any business will see a jump in response to mailers just by
following some simple steps. Learn
the secrets, reap the rewards and thumb your nose at postage rate
increases!”
Nutritionalmarketing provides a variety of services to nutritional retailers
to help them improve their marketing methods and increase revenues, including
seminars and conference speaking engagements on such topics as referrals,
marketing, goal setting and customer service.
Nutritionalmarketing.com is the premiere Internet-based source for free
marketing advice, information and tools for self-driven, success-oriented
nutritional retailers who are demanding information that helps them market
their business, meet the needs of their customers and increase sales.
It offers such services as a free weekly electronic newsletter, free
reports on how to conduct different kinds of marketing and evaluation of
retailers’ marketing materials that is provided at no charge when the
critique is posted online for all nutritional professionals to read.
Nutritionalmarketing.com also offers an electronic forum where
retailers can learn from each other by discussing common problems, sharing
ideas and gaining new insights from their peers.
