Direct mail marketing rules are made to be broken, or

so I’m told. So break this one and see what

happens.

Direct mail pundits, me included, recommend that all

your direct mail pieces have an offer. The offer, as

you know, is the incentive that you give prospects

to encourage them to respond.

Offers are usually bilateral. You promise to do

something if the prospect does something. “Buy two

blouses and we’ll pay the shipping,” for example.

Or “book your appointment before 16 November and

we’ll send you a free Sample Seed Kit.” If the

prospect does nothing, you do nothing. Both of you

must act if the offer is to work. Offers are

bilateral.

Break this rule by making unilateral offers once in a

while. Instead of asking the prospect to do

something, you do something instead. That’s what a

car dealer in Australia did a while back. He mailed a

letter to his customers and enclosed a crisp $50

note. “Your trade-in vehicle sold much quicker than

expected, so we saved ourselves a little money,”

explained the letter. The customer didn’t have to do

anything to get the $50 The offer was

unconditional, or unilateral.

You can see the value in offers that ask for nothing

in return. In this case, which car dealer do you

suppose customers visited the next time they were in

the market for a vehicle?

I received a unilateral offer from Christopher Knight,

founder and publisher of EzineArticles.com.

Unannounced, he mailed me a huge coffee mug and a

wee note thanking me for being an Expert Author. He

didn’t offer me the mug in exchange for anything.

I didn’t have to mail in a coupon or take a survey or

visit a website or refer my grandmother. Christopher

simply made me a unilateral offer. And yet I

responded by phoning him during a busy day to thank

him for his kind gesture. Plus, I continued using his

services. So his unilateral offer did generate a

response from me after all. Funny how that works,

eh?

Everyone wants to get their business out there for everyone to see without costing an arm and a leg. You finally started your online business and now you need to get the customers you need in order for your business to take off. The longer it takes for you to come up with a strategy the longer it will take you to get started. There are a lot of things that will help you decide how you should target the right audience, no matter what method of marketing you will use; the age of the group you want to target, level of income, gender, location and more. Knowing the answers to all of these will help you target the right people without wasting time.

First of all you must define email marketing. It is essentially getting the news out or the product introduction to people using an email address. The internet is endless and almost everyone has an email the only problem with this is that you cannot access their email by simply typing in their name and finding the address. There are several companies that have obtained email addresses and compiled a list together. Then you will simply need to pay for these lists so you can have access to them all. It’s not easy getting a hold of a list that is update, as some are pretty far behind. You may end up paying for a list that has little to no accurate email addresses and you are getting further behind in launching your business. In order to verify the most updated email address list you will need to ask for verification before paying. You may want to request two email addresses on the list so you can use as a sample. You may request to email one of their past customers to see how they found the list to be. Anyone can sell you a list but it is up to you to verify.

Direct mail marketing may take a little longer to see results but then people can sit down whenever they have free time to ready what you have to offer. Sometimes it is not easy to understand an email that has been sent, especially if it is covered in designs or bright colors. This can be very distracting to those that have already put in a hard day at work and just want to relax. Direct mail marketing is more like “the old fashioned way” of doing something. Don’t think of it as snail mail, think of it as reaching people when they are ready.

If you have a product to sell you will appreciate even one or two customers. In order to get started you may want to try a little of both in order to see which one will make a difference and bring you positive results. That way you are not wasting a lot of time on a method that will not work in the end. The best place to start is with your own contact list. Friends and family would love to see you get ahead and introducing the product to them first is the best way to test the waters.

If you are utilizing a menu direct mail service in order to improve the sales of your pizza restaurant or takeout business, you need to make sure that your menu mailers feature great customer incentives and are designed for mailing. With the right advertising and the right distribution you can ensure that your business obtains and retains customers in the future. If either one of these elements is substandard your advertising campaign will have little effect on your business sales.

Tip One.

Make sure your menu direct mail distribution is effective by ensuring you mail to every potential customer in the delivery area of your business. This also includes ensuring you deliver enough flyers to each door to account for flats and student accommodations.

Tip Two.

Make sure your flyer printing design is colorful, tempting and appealing to customers who receive it. A great distribution method and great food is no good on it’s own without a well designed and effective flyer menu. Ensure all imagery is of a high resolution and printed in full color to be more appealing to potential customers.

Tip Three.

Include coupons, discounts and meal deals in your menu design. This will entice potential customers into using your restaurant when they compare it to other local takeout restaurant menus. This can often mean the difference when customers are considering takeout restaurants to order from. Many people often just go with the cheapest option for the food that they want.

Tip Four.

Replenish your customer’s supply of takeout menus regularly. This means regular menu direct mailing and including an additional menu flyer in every order. You can also keep extra menu flyers around the store so that passers by can pick up a takeout menu for later on. Menus are easily discarded, damaged or misplaced so they will need constantly re-issuing using menu direct mail.

Tip Five.

Create a new look for your menu’s regularly. It may seem like a lot of hassle to redesign your flyer every so often but it can help you in a number of ways. Firstly it will make your business seem new and fresh to old and new customers and generally increases sales as they want to try out the “new” you. Secondly, it will keep the customers updated about your prices and deals if they change so they are in the loop and not disappointed with “we don’t do that anymore” when they come to ordering. Finally, in addition to this, it can also provide valuable marketing statistics that show which flyer menu designs are the most effective, which appeal more to customers and so forth. You will eventually learn which types of design attract more customers for future design considerations.

Remember that menu direct mailing is only a successful advertising method when used with an effective menu design and pricing strategy. However, if coupled with these two effective tools it is sure to provide instant increases in sales and customer retention when used effectively. Follow these advertising tips to ensure your menu direct mail campaign is as effective as possible.

Do you own an auto detailing shop or aftermarket auto accessories business? Are you looking to fill your shop up or add an additional bay? Are you looking for ways to increase business and get new high paying clientele and potential customers? Are you looking to expand your business and customer base? Do you have a marketing strategy and have you considered what type of advertising you are currently using and if it is working for you?

May I recommend direct mail and direct mail marketing advertising for auto detailing companies and aftermarket auto accessory businesses? The reason I recommend this is for many years I ran a company called; The Detail Guys. We found that when we wished to open a new auto detailing shop or expand an existing detailing shop that direct-mail and direct-mail marketing coupon packages worked extremely well for our company.

What we did is offer discounts to new customers and we sent out to direct-mail marketing coupon packages in all the zip codes within a 10 mile radius. Each time we did this we got new customers and those customers once satisfy gave us referrals and helped us with word-of-mouth advertising.

This is why I recommend direct mail marketing and those little coupon books you see that are sent out as a good way to market an auto detail shop or an aftermarket auto accessory business. Please consider this in 2006.