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The Benefits of the Postcard Campaign

Written by: Barbara Spagnola

Article Overview: Most of us think of postcards as something we send to our friends and relatives while we are away on vacation. But this communication piece is now favored by many businesses as well.

The Benefits of the Postcard Campaign

Most of us think of postcards as something we send to our friends and relatives while we are away on vacation. But this communication piece is now favored by many businesses as well.

Using postcards as a part of your overall marketing plan is the simplest and most cost effective method for communicating with new and current customers. They are the perfect tool for announcing a new store opening; offering special discounts or just enticing the reader to find out more about you or your business.

With the overload of information from both the post office, email and at our workplace, it is likely that we take the time only to skim the front of the envelopes or the email subject line in determining what gets our attention and what doesn’t. Many of us have spam filtering software on our computers to automatically delete anything that looks like junk mail. Postcards achieve almost 100% readership.

Because there is no envelope to open and hopefully an attention grabbing headline and graphic on the front, it will take less than a few seconds for the recipient to decide to continue reading or toss the card in the trash can. Either way, you have been successful in registering your company with the reader, even for only a few seconds.

Postcards are inexpensive to design, print and mail when compared to other advertising methods. Let’s say the overall cost of printing and mailing 10,000 cards is $3,200. In this example, the cost of each postcard is $.32. A 1% response rate to this campaign is 100 inquiries. If you converted 40% of these inquiries into sales (40 new customers), at an average of $500 per sale, you received $20,000 in revenue from an advertising piece that cost only $3,200. This equals nearly a 700% return on your original investment of $3,200! You would be hard pressed to achieve this type of results from other, more costly types of advertising.

Postcards allow you the advantage of getting your message in front of your targeted market more than once. As human beings, we tend to remember things when we repeat them over and over again. Because postcards are inexpensive, you can afford to mail them frequently, thus increasing the probable recognition of your company and products over time. This is a very effective technique for building your business incrementally with each mailing.

Postcards have been around for a long time and now businesses are taking advantage of their simplicity. They are quite effective when used as a part of an overall marketing plan.

Related Articles
  Tracking Postcard Campaign Results
  Planning Your Postcard Campaign
  Designing a High Impact Post Card
  Repeat Mailings for More Business
  Postal Service Postcard Mailing Guidelines

Article Tags: advertising methods, advertising postcards, communication piece, cost effective method, email, envelopes, filtering software, human beings, inquiries, junk mail, mail postcards, marketing plan, post office, postcard, readership, recipient, relatives, response rate, subject line, targeted market



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Re: SES Toronto Next Week - In that case, how about the following? Track: Get Me Up to Speed * State of Search Marketing in Canada Track: Practical & Actionable * Beyond Linkbait: Getting Authoritative Online Mentions Track: Advanced * User Search Behavior * Social Media Success * Web 2.0 & Search Engines * Giving Credit Where It’s Due: Which Campaign Sold What?
Re: Marketing to Wealthy Consumers - [quote="RussellWebb":3n7zrqzn]Thanks for the suggestions Shri and Andy. [quote:3n7zrqzn]Would it be expensive or time consuming to create a mini-rug (say postcard size) and send it to affluent clients. The mini-rug could be a picture of their pet or company logo etc.[/quote:3n7zrqzn] We have done this on special occasions - it's labor intensive and not a simple process. Although we will do it when we we're aiming at a big project. On average,the cost per lead is much more than I want to spend. Postcard size is too small... We have lot's of photos that we can show, this combined with sending the client color swatches from the mill (mill pays for ship) has proven to be very effective. Shri, We're aware of this market, but haven't done the research. I can think of a few home builders that fit the bill... great idea. Now in this case I might create a small custom mat and send it to them. Any suggestions on the content of the newsletter, if we were to go in that direction? If we focused the newsletter on all the high-end clients... I don't even know where to start. I suppose if it's JV related, then target all the floor-covering suppliers, maybe designers and decorators. OR maybe target past customers?[/quote:3n7zrqzn] Hi Russell, Like I mentioned in an earlier post, you should fill the content of your newsletter with things that interest wealthy consumers. No offence, but if you only filled the pages with news about your rugs, then it wouldn't be very exciting. I'd suggest you follow in Acura's footsteps and include news on the latest fashion styles, ways to relieve stress, golf/vacation destinations, golf and sailing events, exquisite food recipes, etc. Why not partner with potential sponsors so they can provide you with written content? This way, you'll only have to focus on writing columns for your own product. In terms of branding... I'd suggest that each newsletter have a specific theme. For example, since the summer weather is just around the corner, you can talk about "lakehouse" homes, since most affluent people own one. Then you can fill your newsletter with info about matching rugs and fashion trends for cottage/lakehouse living, luxury foods like lobster tails to BBQ, etc. ***In your newsletter magazine, why not have a feature each time on one of your existing wealthy customers? Write a story about that person and post pictures of how he/she uses your rugs to accentuate his/her home. That's the best form of "testimony" or referral. For the time being, I'd suggest targeting your existing customers first since most of them could already be on your mailing list.


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