7 Pointers on Sales Prospecting Through the Mail

Why your foot in the door should be an envelope.

Sales people spend a tremendous amount of time and effort prospecting. Going through phone books and industry directories, calling dozens of people, and refining their pitch – hoping that the person on the other end of the phone will warm up to them enough to agree to meet.

Direct mail can make that job a lot easier. Sending out a compelling letter and offer can change that cold call in to a warm or even hot lead. Also, mail can reach hundreds or even thousands of prospects at a time. If the mail piece has the right message, the right offer, and falls into the right hand – they may even be calling you!

Here are a few pointers to keep in mind.

1. Get Attention. Be professional, but don’t avoid using attention-getting headlines, graphics and offers.
2. Make an Offer. When you ask for a meeting, you are asking for one of the most valuable commodities a busy person has – time. Make sure you make a compelling value proposition and maybe even offer an incentive.
3. Over-deliver. Make sure you deliver everything you promise and then take it one step further. This will tell prospects you are not only reliable, but you can be counted on to deliver more than is expected.
4. Mail Often. In prospecting, persistence pays off – the same holds true for direct mail. Start a newsletter, create a series of informative mailings – prospects will begin to look forward to it. Eventually, when a prospect is in the market for what you sell, they will think of you first.
5. Get a Good Mailing List. Remember, your mailing can only be as good as your mailing list. Take time to develop a profile for your ideal prospect, then purchase a list based on that profile. Also, be sure your list is current and you have selected contacts at the appropriate level of authority to purchase your product.
6. Send “Thank-you” Notes. One of the most powerful prospecting tools is a thank-you note. Let prospects and customers know that you appreciate their time and their order. An additional benefit of a thank-you note is that you never know when one will lead to a referral.
7. Solicit Testimonials and Referrals. A perfect time to ask for a testimonial or a referral is when you send out your thank–you notes. The experience is fresh in the mind of your prospect or customer. If you did your job right – they will be more than happy to oblige.

Creating a Successful Mailing List

If you can find one great customer, you can find thousands.

At this very moment, there may be hundreds or even thousands of people or businesses who are ready to buy what you have to sell. You can advertise on television, radio or in the newspaper, but you will spend a lot of money reaching people who have no use for your product or service.

A good mailing list, on the other hand, lets you pinpoint just the kind of person or business that is most likely to buy from you. Then you can mail them relevant and important messages.

Here is how to select a list to meet your needs.

1. Identify your best customers. A mailing list works best when you mail to people who are like your best customers. Before purchasing a list, take a look at your existing customers. Look for customers who bought from you most recently, most often, and who spend the most money.


2. Understand your “model” customer. Now that you’ve identified your best customers, you need to find out what they have in common with each other. This may be as simple as they are all in approximately the same geographic area. If you sell to businesses, your best customers may all be from the same industry.


3. Find more “model” customers. Once you know the people you want to mail to, you can most likely find a mailing list to reach them. There are thousands of lists available.

Choosing the right mailing list is one of the most important factors in the success of any direct mail program. Taking time to select the right list for your business will pay for itself many times over. Let the experts at Professional Print & Mail help.

5 Quick Direct Mail Tips

When you're in the middle of producing a direct mail campaign, it’s easy to overlook some of the basic elements that are necessary for it to be successful. Keep these five quick tips close when preparing a direct mail campaign.

1. Select the Right List. The list is the single most important element in a direct mail campaign. A poorly designed mail piece sent to a good list can make money, but even the most brilliant mail sent to a bad list will most likely fail.
2. Update Your List. According to NCOALink, at least 15% of the average list becomes outdated every year.
3. Be Bold. Choose a clear, bold headline and a color that pops for your mail piece to stand out from the rest of the mail.
4. Have a Clear Call to Action. One of biggest mistakes is burying (or not including) a call to action. Tell your prospect exactly what you want him to do.
5. Be Consistent. Hit your prospects with different communications about the same product/service, or with different products with the same look or feel, or both. This sort of persistence reinforces your presence and adds credibility to your brand.

Direct mail catalogs help increase online sales.

Even though the role of catalogs has undergone a change in recent years, they are hardly a thing of the past. Research has shown that catalog recipients account for 22% of website traffic and 37% of e-commerce dollars.

The Key Catalog/Multichannel Issues Survey, conducted by Vovici EFM late last year revealed that 96% of respondents agreed that their printed catalog generates online sales, and more than 60% said it influences half or more of those sales. A majority of the respondents saw a 20% – 50% increase in online sales immediately following a catalog mailing.

Another study conducted by comScore showed that direct mail and catalog recipients are more likely to make an online purchase than shoppers who do not receive them. Not only are they more likely to make a purchase, but they typically buy more items and spend more money. Direct mail and catalogs not only influence shoppers to go visit a site, but they also discourage comparison shopping.

Even though the role of catalogs has changed a bit, catalogs and other direct mailings are an effective way to increase online sales. Make sure you mail regularly to keep your brand top of mind. Contact your Sales Rep at Professional Print & Mail to learn more about using direct mail to drive web traffic.

Should I Mail it?

There are many ways to promote your products or services. Research consistently proves that one of the best ways to get your message into the hands of your audience is to mail it. With direct mail, your message reaches your customers’ home or office in a non-intrusive way where they are free to browse it at their leisure.

So how do we get these printed products where they need to go?

Start with a database of names and addresses. Professional Print & Mail can work with your database, or we can help you buy a list that will best reach your target audience. We then run this data through “cleanser” software that will validate and certify the addresses to make sure that the piece will be going to a real address with a real recipient. We also update the list by performing a “move update”, which brings your data current with change of address notices that have been submitted to the US Postal System.

To get the best possible postage rates, we sort the addresses and take advantage of mail “automation” by adding a bar code to the mail piece. The less work the post office has to do, the less expensive your mailing becomes.

Once the data is perfected, we run the printed mail piece through our high-speed addressing machine, which utilizes the latest in inkjet technology to print addresses, bar codes, and endorsements onto it. The mail pieces are then correctly bundled, labeled, and entered into the mail stream.

The direct mail experts at Professional Print & Mail will work with you, from start to finish, to make sure that your direct mail projects meet your marketing objectives as well as minimize your costs by complying with the countless and ever-changing postal regulations.

Tracking Response…The Easy Way!

It’s easy to play direct mail response detective…

Like every business, you want to make the most of the money you spend on advertising. That means you need to know what’s working for you and what’s not.

By using a keycode to identify not only your mailing piece (letter, flyer, postcard) but also the recipient (customer list, rented list, past buyers), you can track response.

Playing direct mail detective requires you and your staff to question inbound sales calls, inquiries, and orders. You simply ask, “Would you give me the number that appears in the lower left-hand corner… or just above the name?” See how this can help you identify what is driving your responses?

In order to be a good detective, you must ask the question and you must keep track of the answers. That will lead you into reinvesting your direct mail dollars in those messages that work the best!Another effective way to track response to your direct mail campaign is to add an online response vehicle such as a pURL (personalized URL) or QR Code (quick response) that directs the recipient to a unique landing page. The advantage to using these types of response options is that tracking is immediate and automatic – notification comes to you instantly via email without having to ask any questions or wait for the recipient to call you. To learn more about adding an online response vehicle to your next direct mail campaign, contact the direct mail experts at Professional Print & Mail.

5 Ways to Utilize QR Codes in Direct Marketing

1. The journey to your message or offer just got shorter. With QR Codes, prospects no longer have to write down or type a lengthy URL – all they need to do is point their camera and scan – your message is literally in their hands.
2. Response tracking. Like pURLs (personalized URLs), QR Codes are great for tracking a host of valuable information, such as identifying what offers are working and who is responding. These are particularly helpful when testing.
3. Reach new customers. The WOW factor of QR Codes can create a high pass-along rate with existing recipients.
4. Say more with less. Keep your direct mail message short and sweet. QR Codes can point the recipient to additional information on a website.
5. Immediate conversion. Direct recipients to a URL that has a special offer, a coupon, or a survey, instantly.