Direct Tips on Direct Marketing

Who Are Your Customers?

Tim Raines — Sun, 09 Sep 2007 19:17:17 +0000

So you’ve got a list of your customers. But what do you really know about them?

I’m always shocked when I speak to marketers who think they know who their customers are, but can’t answer simple questions like:

What percent of your customers are male vs. female?
How many of your customers have incomes over $X?
What is the average age of your customer?
How many people are employed by your average business customer?

The good news is that you can find the answers to these questions (and many more) even if you haven’t stored the dataâ€”or even requested it from your customersâ€”using data appending/overlaying. In fact, sometimes you’ll only need (and you can often get) the answers to the questions without necessarily paying to append the data.

For example, you may only be interested in the answers to decide which lists or list segments to rent for an upcoming promo you’re mailing. Why spend money to send your sales literature to everyone in the state when your best prospects are located in a 50-mile radius of your store? Why go through the effort to market to all consumers when the majority of your customers are over 50 years old?

Before you make any more marketing decisions, get to know your customers first. You may be surprised and shocked by who they really are.

Keep in Touch

Tim Raines — Tue, 07 Nov 2006 17:56:56 +0000

A colleage is fond of telling anyone who’ll listen, “You haven’t started selling until you hear the word ‘No’.” Let’s face it: anyone can take an order. A customer calling for a repeat order doesn’t require a lot of skill. But once the prospect declines your offer, the real selling begins.

Many marketers, however, give up after a few tries. After all the money and work that goes into generating a bona fide prospect, why toss the lead into the garbage?

If you’re not adding these people to some sort of database, you’re missing a lot of opportunities. These prospects should receive a note, promo, postcard, phone call or some form of communication on a regular basis. Afterall, this is the most targeted list you’ll ever get your hands on. Use it wiselyâ€”keep in touch.

Today’s the Day

Tim Raines — Tue, 07 Nov 2006 14:57:39 +0000

No matter your politics, please take a moment to consider the precious right you have to participate in your governmentâ€”a right that was made all the more precious by lives sacrificed to ensure it. Please don’t cheapen those sacrifices by wasting the opportunity. Vote.

Want a Sample?

Tim Raines — Mon, 06 Nov 2006 18:19:22 +0000

Wendy Maynard is talking about what she calls “Tiny Spoon Marketing” and it’s a great piece:

When you walk into an ice cream store and look at all of the flavors, it can be a bit overwhelming. So, you ask for a taste. And they give you a little bit of ice cream on a tiny spoon to help you decide. Donâ€™t you love those tiny spoons filled with yumminess?

This is a brilliant strategy that ensures that you purchase a cone or cup at that moment. Itâ€™s also a way to get you to try something new, like their flavor of the day. A lot of times, it also entices you to buy a pint or two of ice cream flavors to take home.

What can your business do to attract customers using this method? Here’s a few ideas:

Offer free samples of your product
Get prospects to sign up for your newsletter
Create a “special report” of articles, research or comparisons of your competitors’ products
Offer a free consultation
Create an e-book or informational website about your industry or a topic you have knowledge in and give it away
Give something away to prospects just for listening to your pitch

Choose Your Words Wisely

Tim Raines — Mon, 06 Nov 2006 18:06:15 +0000

Every year, the staff at Webster’s New World College Dictionary hold a Word-of-the-Year contest to find the word or phrase that best shows the times we live in and the changes the English language goes through.

According to SmartPhoneToday, the lexicographers and researches chose the word “CrackBerry”. While the tongue-in-cheek term has been used for a number of years to describe the addictive nature of the popular BlackBerry device, the staff chose to recognize it this year, as it’s finally become mainstream. The question is: how manistream?

And that’s the question for every word you use in your direct marketing pitch, too. Using “catch phrases”, acronyms and trendy, cute language is fineâ€”if you’re 100% certain that your target audience “gets it”. More often than not, however, they don’t.

The KISS (Keep It Simple, Stupid) principle is a clichÃ© for a reason: it’s dead on. Make sure your audience understands every word of your message.

Nine Deadly Sins in Database Marketing

Tim Raines — Wed, 25 Oct 2006 13:55:35 +0000

Developing and making use of your own in-house database of prospects and customers can be very lucrative. Which means that if it was easy, everyone would be doing itâ€”and doing it well. Of course, we know that’s not the case.

Courtesy of Chief Marketer, here’s a quick round-up of Arthur Hughes’s session last week at DMA06 in San Francisco on the Nine Deadly Mistakes in Database Marketing:

Lack of a marketing strategy

A focus on price instead of service

Failure to use tests and controls

Lack of a segment strategy

Failure to use the web

Building the database inhouse

Treating all customers alike

Failure to develop a retention program

Lack of a foreful leader.

Ignore these mistakes and your database success will go away.

Direct Marketing On The Rise

Tim Raines — Mon, 23 Oct 2006 18:50:22 +0000

According to Direct Marketing Association President & CEO, John A. Greco Jr., the direct marketing industry’s sales will reach $1.939 trillion, an increase ofÂ 7.4% over last year. “Direct marketing-driven sales now make up 10.3% of the GDP.”

Is it time to get your piece of the pie?

Build Your Own Prospecting List

Tim Raines — Thu, 05 Oct 2006 18:50:52 +0000

Sometimes asking for a sale right away isn’t the best thing you can do. Often, your prospects need more information or don’t have a need for your product or service right now. But if they’re interested, they’re certainly more valuable as a prospect than anyone on a list you’re planning to rent.

Rather than only asking for the sale, you should include a “maybe” answer. In fact, you’d be wise to include three options:

Yes! I’m ready to buy!
Maybe. Please send me more information.
No. I’d prefer not to receive any more contact from your company.

Why allow your prospects the third option? Having a suppress list can make a lot of sense. First, you’re letting prospects know that you value their preferences and their privacy. Second, why spend the money to contact people who don’t want to hear from you? Marketing to customers and prospects is hard enough. Why make your job even more difficult.

Why allow your prospects to say “maybe” when you may be able to convince them to say “yes”? There are a million reasons why a prospect might not be ready to buy. Sure, you could pressure a small percentage of this group to buy now. But the ones who don’t will likely leave the table with a bad taste in their mouth. By getting their permission make contact again in the future, you’re in effect creating your own prospecting listâ€”perhaps the most targeted and lowest-cost sales leads you’ll ever get your hands on.

This prospecting list will truly become one of the most valuable assets your firm owns.

Where Are All These Customers Coming From?

Tim Raines — Thu, 28 Sep 2006 20:26:40 +0000

That phrase conjures up the idea of too many customers for most people. But that’s not what I’m going to write about here. I’m thinking more about the idea of knowing who your customers are and, specifically, where they live or work (depending on whether they are businesses or consumers).

If your product or service is easily distributed nationally, you can probably skip the rest of this article. The rest of you, however, should stick around.

Spending a bit of time and money now to clean up your customer list can save you thousands of dollars in lost marketing efforts. Your customer list is just too important to have incomplete or inaccurate information.

Getting your list of customers plotted on a map can help you visualize the geographic area where you should focus your marketing. Buying an ad or a mailing list that covers the entire state doesn’t make much sense if 90% of your customers come from the 5 surrounding towns.

Once you know where your existing customers are coming from, it’s a pretty safe bet that most of your new customers will be from the same areas, as well. Why spend money trying to recruit customers from 3 counties away?

This, of course, is where direct marketing really outshines the mass media. Radio, TV and even local newspapers have a hard time targeting pinpoint geographic areas. Direct mail lists, on the other hand, can generally zoom in on just certain roads in a town and even which side of the street. Again, if you’re selling basement waterproofing, you’ll likely find that your customers aren’t from the houses on top of the hill.

Stop Complicating Your Communications

Tim Raines — Wed, 27 Sep 2006 16:37:09 +0000

See if you can figure out what this means:

Lessor shall be entitled at its absolute discretion to vary the proportion of the Service Costs payable by the Lessee as defined in clause 1(n) in the event of rights being granted pursuant to the terms of paragraph 5 of the Fifth Schedule hereto Provided that such variation shall not result in the said Service Charge proportion being increased

Even if you understand it, would you read it if you didn’t have to? Of course not. While this is an extreme example, many marketers continue to use similar language to:

Sound intelligent
Be grammatically correct

And…possibly the worst reason of all…

To make an inferior product, service or idea sound better (we all know by now that good marketing starts with a good product, right?)

Matt at 37signals has some great thoughts on this:

Einsteinâ€™s scientific writing may be tough for the layman to understand. But itâ€™s interesting to note how he could tone down his ideas for mass consumption too. He often used simple words that both physicists and regular people could understand.

Keep the language used in your copy to an 8th- or even 6th-grade reading level. Not because your prospects are stupid, but because your job is to get the desired reactionâ€”a sale, an inquiry, an understanding of your ideaâ€”with the least work on the part of the person you’re communicating with.

Credit Card and Loan “Junk Mail” Under Fire

Tim Raines — Mon, 25 Sep 2006 19:35:12 +0000

Unsolicited credit offers are irking politicians in the UK, some of whom are calling for increased regulation. Liberal Democrat MP Norman Baker said: “Junk mail selling washing powder is irritating and wasteful. But junk mail that encourages people to make decisions that can lead to losing their houses is altogether more serious.”

From this article:

[Capital One] has mailed an estimated one million fake Â£100,000 cheques to households to entice them to borrow up to that sum. The loan is secured against their property even if they have a mortgage.

Official-looking reply addresses, checks and other tricks may get your direct mail piece opened, but then what? You’ve attempted to start a customer relationship under false pretenses. Is that the image you want your customers (and, worse…the 90% plus prospects that do NOT respond to your offer) to have of your company?

Put your best foot forward in your marketing efforts. Just make sure it’s the truth.

Imagine Your Marketing Piece Being Read By Everyone Who Receives It…

Tim Raines — Tue, 12 Sep 2006 20:06:11 +0000

Arguably the most important copy in your mailpiece is the teaser copy that will appear on the outside envelope. Teasers can, of course, be used elsewhere (as a headline to your letter, for example). But the most common place they’re used is on the envelope. This is where you give the prospect a reason to open your package and read more. You have just a moment to convice them that the paper in their hand doesn’t belong in the trash.

So how do you do it?

Be Emotional
Start with emotions. No one makes a decision based on facts alone. There is always at least one emotion involved (and more often, many emotions): fear of losing one’s job if they make the wrong decision, pride at making the correct choice, desire to own the product or service being purchased, and so on. If your copy appeals to an emotion, you’ll be helping the prospect focus on the emotion you want them to.

Be Sensitive
Get your prospect’s senses involved. How will your product or service taste, look, feel, smell and sound? While you may very well have the best steaks in all the world, “The best steaks in all the world” is not nearly as effective as “Our succulent steaks will satisfy your hunger bite after juicy bite”.

Be Active
Don’t settle for telling your prospects about your product or service. You want them to picture themselves actually using it. If you’re selling a car, don’t talk about the car. Talk about them driving it. Tell them about the wind through their hair, the feel of the engine effortlessly obeying every subtle change, the smell of the new leather, etc. If you’re marketing your babysitting service, paint a picture of a night on the town with their spouse, the taste of the wine they’ll enjoy over a quiet(!) dinner.

Be Brief
Finally, keep it short. Your prospects are likely being bombarded with thousands of advertising messages a day. They don’t have time for one that sticks out for the wrong reason: it’s too hard to read. You only have a few moments, as mentioned earlier. Making the teaser copy too long will result in a sub-conscious feeling of “this looks like too much work for me to read”. And that will likely result in a 3-foot toss to the garbage.

Of course, writing teaser copy is more art than science. Knowing your customers and your prospects is the most important step before trying to communicate with them.

Got any additional tips? I’d love to hear them.

Don’t Know Your Customers AT ALL?

Tim Raines — Fri, 08 Sep 2006 20:02:45 +0000

Learning more about your customers is all well and good, but what if you don’t have a list of your customers at all?

Short answer: Start Building One Now!

The 80/20 rule states that 80 percent of your business comes from 20% of your customers. Can you afford not to market to your customers?

How do you get information from your customers? ~~Ask nicely~~. OK, that’s usually not enough. Here’s a few ideas that might work:

Sign up for our free giveaway
Join our mailing list for special discounts and seasonal savings
Give us the following information to save 10% on this order
Join our perks program to be invited to our monthly members-only party

Of course, these are just some generic ideas to get you thinking. You’ll need to tailor them to your own business situation.