Postcard Opinions Please

[jdpetrov]

I'm putting together a 6.5"x9" postcard for distribution through the USPS Every Door Direct Mail program.

I'd appreciate first-impressions feedback as well as any improvements you think I could make to have a decent-enough response rate. I NEED a 0.8% response rate, which is less than all the "industry average" crap I read about.

 

[Slaters Kustum Machines]

I like it, simple yet full of information.

 

[Parkwaytech]

I like it a lot, and, as a side note, I'm glad you raised your rate! Now I'll have to steal this flyer design

Just a few things. You will be removing the watermark from the photo, right? Also, I didn't see your logo. You will want to include that somewhere. You might want to change the "broken laptop parts" to "broken laptop" or something similar. I'm also not sure about the "no money up front." It just seems confusing for me. I know they don't pay until you fix, but I can see someone thinking they might be able to pay 15 days from now or something. In my opinion, it isn't as compelling as your other things.

You'll have to let us know how it goes. I've been thinking of doing this. We just did a Money Mailer, and I've got another ad coming out in one of the shoppers. I am curious about this new program from USPS. How many households are you getting this delivered to?

 

[jdpetrov]

I like it a lot, and, as a side note, I'm glad you raised your rate! Now I'll have to steal this flyer design

Just a few things. You will be removing the watermark from the photo, right? Also, I didn't see your logo. You will want to include that somewhere. You might want to change the "broken laptop parts" to "broken laptop" or something similar. I'm also not sure about the "no money up front." It just seems confusing for me. I know they don't pay until you fix, but I can see someone thinking they might be able to pay 15 days from now or something. In my opinion, it isn't as compelling as your other things.

You'll have to let us know how it goes. I've been thinking of doing this. We just did a Money Mailer, and I've got another ad coming out in one of the shoppers. I am curious about this new program from USPS. How many households are you getting this delivered to?

I don't have that great of a logo right now, and with all I wanted to say with this postcard my logo took up too much white space. I figure just having my name in plain text will be good enough for now.

I like removing "parts" and just going with broken laptop. The "no money up front" I put in there because GS usually makes you whip your credit card before they even begin to fail at fixing your computer. I want the customer to know that they don't have to pay until it's been fixed, but now that I think about it from the angle you brought up I see how a customer could go "Hey, I don't have to pay you for another month". I'll remove that.

I will be purchasing the image from istockphoto.com before sending it to the printers. I'm using gotprint.com and ordering 1,000 on 14pt UV gloss cardstock. Full color both sides. Total bill from their pricing page puts me at $127 including shipping. I've selected an EDDM route of approx. 735. Around 500 are residential addresses and the rest are businesses. This route hits the main business corridor in my geographic market, but many are too small to afford monthly MSP pricing.

My EDDM mailing price is $107, so for $234 I can hit 500 residential and 200-ish businesses. Factoring in the coupon discount and a rough estimate for gas cost I need 6 billable hours of computer repair, or 3-6 recipients to call for repair. If I can't get THAT piddly amount of business from this, then I give up.

The coupon expiration date will be aimed to expire 30 days from the date of delivery to the post office, but it takes about 7-14 days to get them printed and shipped to me so that 30-day window might be off by a couple days. I like my coupon idea because the expiration date encourages the response rate, plus the "one for you, one for a friend" idea has the potential to double my reach without any increased printing or mailing costs.

I've picked out the perfect computer office space to rent but at $1,800 a month plus utilities I'm going to need a miracle response rate to afford it. Wish me luck!

 

[madmark]

When we first opened our shop we mailed out 500 postcards to the local area we were in. They offered a free check-up etc or 20 off 1st hour of labor. We had one person come in because of the mailing and just had some lady the other day who held on to one for 2 years. Other than that it was a complete waste of money and time for 2 responses out of 500. Of ocurse your mileage may vary.

 

[Parkwaytech]

Direct mailing really depends on the offer and so many other variables. We have done mailings in the past that didn't bring in anything. On the other hand, we had one mailing to just 100 businesses that brought in two managed services agreements, and one of those is now our largest. For what it is worth, postcards did terrible for us! The only thing that worked was a sales letter and, for residential, a glossy flyer.

The list really determines what you get, and I agree that it doesn't always work. Joshua seems to be doing the right thing by making the offer time sensitive, havi a clear call to action, and having catching (at least in my opinion) headlines.

We got our first call on our Money Mailer on the first date it was delivered. I'll see what else comes in over the next few weeks. What really determines success too is whether you get them when they are having problems. So much of our business is dependent on getting that mailer in their hands at the right time.

 

[nesrinamb]

1) i like your postcards
2) statistically speaking direct mailing on average has a response rate between 2-4%

I was going to do the same thing with the US postal service but i will likely be targeting only the businesses in the area not the residential customers. It should be a total of 600 businesses so if my expected 2%-4% pans out its something like 12-24 possible new clients. Im not very sure about it though since the pricing is very high.

 

[jdpetrov]

1) i like your postcards
2) statistically speaking direct mailing on average has a response rate between 2-4%

I was going to do the same thing with the US postal service but i will likely be targeting only the businesses in the area not the residential customers. It should be a total of 600 businesses so if my expected 2%-4% pans out its something like 12-24 possible new clients. Im not very sure about it though since the pricing is very high.

I like using the EDDM tool when I search by location and use map view. I can see each mail route highlighted on the map so I know exactly what neighborhood/business corridor my postcards will be delivered to.

If I get a good enough response rate to at least make my money back I have another route picked out that targets about 600 addresses that represent some of the wealthiest addresses in town.

I'm praying to do good enough with the EDDM tool that I can snowball my efforts. Take my 700-ish mailing, send to different routes for 1,500. Then use THAT money to send to 3,000 and eventually be able to do 5,000. I can use the EDDM tool to do 5,000 per day and hopefully be able to put a postcard into the hands of all 32,000 people in my geographic market.

 

[jdpetrov]

What really determines success too is whether you get them when they are having problems. So much of our business is dependent on getting that mailer in their hands at the right time.

This is my main concern with my response rate. I can have the best USP in the nation, and have a great coupon to sweeten the deal, and just come out being the best of the best of the best, sir, with honors, but if their computers are working fine in their eyes then they won't respond.

As I stated earlier, my goal is to get enough of a response rate where I can eventually have a postcard at all 32,000 address in my geographic market. That way even if they don't respond right away, hopefully they've kept the postcard and have my number for when things DO go wrong.

 

[sapper]

Well done. Clean, simple, usefull.

 

[CTL]

I'm putting together a 6.5"x9" postcard for distribution through the USPS Every Door Direct Mail program.

I'd appreciate first-impressions feedback as well as any improvements you think I could make to have a decent-enough response rate. I NEED a 0.8% response rate, which is less than all the "industry average" crap I read about.

How did this work out for you?