Two Cases of Direct Mail Done Wrong

Direct Mail Marketing is one of the absolute best marketing tools you can use. It allows you to have the United States Postal Service hand deliver your message directly into the hands of your prospects and client.

We received two very bad pieces of direct mail done wrong in just 3 days. Let’s take a look at these pieces of direct mail and how to avoid repeating their mistakes.

BAD DIRECT MAIL EXHIBIT A

This sales solicitation letter came to us in a handwritten envelope – with just our address. The return address was imprinted in a perfectly acceptable way using a rubber stamp, BUT had the phone number written the same way as in the letter, with an extra dash….
Clearly this was produced by someone who does not have strong written English skills. But for those of us who DO, the lesson is pretty clear: Have people look at the sales pieces you want to mail out before you spend the money to send them. If it is your business, take pride in it no matter what you do for a living and show your professionalism…. In this case, it makes me think “If I have questions or comments, will I be able to effectively communicate with Art?”
And if price is the main selling point of Art’s service, what corners is he cutting to get that price down?

BAD DIRECT MAIL EXHIBIT B

The other piece of direct mail done wrong was this envelope (two, actually, addressed differently so it cost the advertiser double) that appears to be sent from a home and garden shop. On the other side is an ad for a copier company. On one of the two envelopes this second side was misprinted at an angle. A very confusing piece of direct mail even before we get inside the envelope.
Oh – and there was nothing inside the envelope. They were empty.
This isn’t direct mail done wrong, it’s direct mail done stupid.

Direct mail is more than just making a wild a$$ guess. To do it exceptionally is very hard. But to not do it wrong, is much easier.

SOME GOOD DIRECT MAIL PIECES

Since I just showed you a couple of ways companies did their direct marketing incorrectly, let me add a sample of some direct mail that was done incredibly well.

This first piece of direct mail was scent by Ascendant Financial. What is very fun about it is that they included a Two Dollar Bill inside. Two dollars is not a lot of money, but that two dollar bill instantly attracts attention because there are not a lot of them in circulation. I know a lot of people who even keep one or two of them in their wallet as a lucky charm. Some of them MIGHT remember who sent them the bill. We use currency in our mailings from time to time. The way we love to use them is when we have an in-person Small Business Breakthrough Bootcamp. A couple of weeks prior to the bootcamp we mail a package of information to the participants and include a dollar bill. The message that goes along with them is “Why is there a $2 bill in this mailing? To show you that your investment in coming to the Small Business Breakthrough Bootcamp is already paying off.”

Here is a piece of direct mail that we continuously look forward to receiving. A local restaurant, Sound Bites Grill, sends out discount coupons to each of us on our birthdays and they send one to both of us on our Anniversary. They hand write the envelope, clearly showing where it comes from, and we instantly recognize what is inside. Here are a couple of ways that Sound Bites could improve their direct mail program. As soon as someone signs up for the mailing list, they should send a coupon immediately, with a note that says THANK YOU FOR JOINING OUR MAILING LIST and telling us what to expect coming from them. They could also send a coupon on their 2 slowest weeks of the year, when there are very few tourists to come into the restaurant. They can call it LOCALS ONLY WEEK.

We worked with James Malinchak, best known for being on ABC’s Secret Millionaire. He is an incredibly accomplished speaker, with thousands of presentations under his belt. He has used a 6-page speaker brochure for years and we based our brochure on his. Our direct mail piece includes over a dozen testimonials from past speaking clients, a long list of possible speaking topics for small business groups, plenty of photos of us on various stages, quotes, information about all of our business books and all of the different ways to contact us.
If you need a speaker for a business group – we would love to join you on stage. Give us a call at 800-705-4265 and we well mail you our marketing speaking brochure. Heck, you can text me at 818-731-4265 and ask for our marketing speaking brochure and we will mail it to you. We are now set up to speak in person or virtually to your small business organization and because of our virtual access, we can speak on very short notice, as we did for an organization that lost a speaker at the last moment and had kept our brochure.

This is one page of a mailer we use to fill the last 10 seats in our rooms. It offers you a free ticket to our Small Business Breakthrough Bootcamp. We add a second sheet that has business building information that will help the recipient regardless if they decide to attend our event. Our goal is to give good information so that when they think they need a business coaching team, they think about Yuloff Creative Marketing Solutions.

For some help with your direct mail, call us at (800)705-4265 or go to www.FreeMarketingConsultation.com and join us for your free 30-minute success call. Most small business owners like you who take advantage of this call report back that they received a $10,000 boost in sales or savings in the marketing tactics that they use.