Minnesota Printing and Direct Mail Experts
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Highlight Printing, Minneapolis, MN: Marketing Tips and Tricks: Printing is More Effective Than Ever!
Highlight Printing, a local printer near downtown Mpls, offers these tips and tricks for marketing:
Question: How can you use your marketing dollars and efforts most effectively?
Answer: The most successful marketing campaigns dovetail a well-branded, clearly-messaged, on-line marketing effort, advertising campaign and a similarly branded and messaged, printed campaign.
Just like everything else in life, it is all about balance. And right now there is a huge opportunity for you because marketing is out of balance. With so much emphasis placed on internet marketing, other forms of marketing are being neglected…which gives you a greater chance to get noticed. These are some ideas to round out your printed marketing communications:
- Direct Mail: Have you gone to your mailbox at work or at home to see how much less mail there is these days? A great way to get noticed, simply because of the lack of competition. And what better way to steer people to your website than through direct mail? BTW — did you know that Google recently did a big direct mail campaign about how to better use “Ad Words”? Yes, that’s right…Google. And yes, that’s right…about an internet product. In their research, they determined that print was a better way to communicate with their customers and that it rounded out the information available on their website or that they had previously communicated via email. One other thing…people still prefer to read a piece that has been printed on paper rahter than verbiage on a screen.
- Hand-outs: One of the advantages to brochures, sell-sheets, fliers, etc., is that they are tactile…people actually hold them in their hand, which gives you the opportunity to do something that will engage them. It is more personal than the internet or other traditional means of advertising. Plus, hopefully they hang on to it for future reference, unlike the web where you have an average of 8 seconds to make an impression before they move on to the next site. If your prospects are businesses, an effective way to create information that they will hang on to is still a folder that they can slip into their drawer…ooo, then follow up with additional info periodically as a way to stay useful and top-of-mind with your prospects.
- Leave behinds: This is a tool we use all the time: We create as many useful, attractive, promotional pieces as we can think of, with the hopes that folks will leave one of the items that they find particularly useful on their desk to stay top-of-mind…wouldn’t want them to have to look up our phone number, would we?! Some of the items we use are: notepads, post-its, magnets, coasters
- Take-aways: Just like a hand-outs and leave-behinds, but more suited for trade shows. One trick we advise is that if you print a sell sheet for a trade show, print it slightly over-sized (9×12??) and print it on card-stock. That way if someone is walking around filling a bag full of info, when they reach in to pull out that info it will be your piece that hits their hand first.
If you’d like to brain-storm about your identity, branding, and/or marketing efforts, we would love to do so. There is not much we find more satisfying than working with businesses on the verge of blasting out into the marketplace.
BONUS: NO CHARGE FOR THIS CONSULTATION!
The author, Lisa Bickford, president of Highlight Printing, is a veteran of the printing industry and a lover of all things printed. Since 1984 she has worked her way up through many areas of the industry before acquiring Highlight Printing in 1996 with her husband Don, who has also been in printing since the early 80’s. The things she continues to find most satisfying are the wonderful business relationships that have developed with clients, vendors, & co-workers, and the energy that is created from challenge resolution. You can email her directly at lisab@highlightprinting.com
This Printing Blog was launched in November, 2008, as a vehicle to share ideas, information, and innovationsTo see other topics within this blog, click HERE.
Highlight Printing, Minneapolis, MN: Small Business…Using Direct Mail And “Leave Behinds” To Increase Sales
Highlight Printing, a local printer near downtown Minneapolis, has tips on “touching” your prospects 7 times:
It has been said that in business-to-business sales, a salesperson will not have success with a prospect until he “touch” the prospect 7 times. Depending on the industry, generally that does not mean actually meeting with them 7 times. In fact, it often means you have to touch them 7 times before you even get the meeting!
So, how can you do that? How can an eager salesperson, whose time-frame is always a little different than the prospect’s, get their message in front of the prospect 7 times while appearing un-rushed, helpful, and courteous? (How often have you heard a prospect say, “Call me in a month”? That month seems like an eternity to the sales person while often feeling like just yesterday to the prospect!) It is not an exact science, but we have found succes with the following system:
Direct Mail:
- The first touch: Using a mailing for the first touch is quite effective – particularly if your prospects have never heard of your company. This is your chance to grab their attention in some way – a dynamic “look” or “brand” they will remember, or a very strong message, or special offer. This is a great way to efficiently use your time and resources. Get a good, clean list and only mail to the number of prospects that your sales team can actually follow up with. If you have the data to personalize or tailor the mailing in some way, all the better. Put the list in an excel spreadsheet and track your “touches”.
Phone Call:
- I recommend that the second “touch” be a phone call…this will help to confirm that you are mailing to the correct contact and on a rare occassion, you may get that all important appointment with your prospect. Generally, however, the phone call will result in the “brush-off”: “Call me next month”, or “Send me some more info”, or maybe you just keep getting voice-mail.
Sending Info (the 3rd touch):
- If on the 2nd touch the prospect said: “Call me next month”: Do as he or she asks, but don’t miss the opportunity to jot him a note in the mean-time, thanking him for his time and noting that you are looking forward to talking with him again next month. Mail your note…don’t email it. Using the mail instead of email is so much more impactful these days, and it gives you the opportunity to include a brochure for his leisurely review. (A really creative person might find a way to make the note something the prospect wants to hold on to…something he will keep on his desk or pin on the wall for that month.)
- If on the 2nd touch the prospect said: “Send me some more info”: Again…do as he or she asks, but mail the info, don’t email it. Email is so easily deleted and forgotten. Send a brochure and/or some succes stories or examples of your work. If you were able to get any info about what he has particular interest in, try to tailor your response to that. However, don’t reveal everything in your bag of tricks…you still have 4 more touches.
- If on the 2nd touch all you got was voice mail: First off, you should only have left 1 or 2 messages at the most. On the last message you should mention that you are going to pop some info in the mail and will check back after a week or so, but also add “My contact info, if you should need it is 123.456.7890 or you can reach me at our website at blahblah.com”.
The fourth and fifth touches:
- These are the one that you have to go by “feel” – always working towards getting the appointment. Is there some expertise you can offer? A special offer? A free evaluation? A free sample? Email…phone…mail…stopping by…do whatever you think this prospect will respond best to.
The sixth touch is hopefully the appointment:
- When you do finally get that apoointment, make sure to be ready to show your very best side. Do your research and be ready to answer questions. This is the time that you ask for the order or the opportunity to estimate an upcoming project. Always have a “leave behind” for him. Shoot for something he can use everyday - White Papers if you have ‘em (positioning yourself as an expert AND helpful). And, we have found that people love Post-It notes…they’re a helpful, not hoaky, way to keep your logo and company name in front of the prospect. And who knows which VP of such-and-such might see you name on his desk?
The 7th touch is the Thank You:
- Again, hand-written and sincere. You might consider an immediate email after the meeting, addressing some of the discussion or follow-up that is to happen, but that should not be at the exclusion of the thank you note.
If you’d like to share your thoughts or success stories, or if you’d like help developing your own “7-touch sales plan”, please contact us! You can either add a comment to this blog, call us @ 612.522.7600, or contact us through our website @ www.highlightprinting.com
The author, Lisa Bickford, president of Highlight Printing, is a veteran of the printing industry. Since 1984 she has worked her way up through many areas of the industry before acquiring Highlight Printing in 1996 with her husband Don, who has also been in printing since the early 80’s. The things she continues to find most satisfying are the wonderful business relationships that have developed with clients, vendors, & co-workers, and the energy that is created from challenge resolution. You can email her directly at lisab@highlightprinting.com
This Printing Blog was launched in November, 2008, as a vehicle to share ideas, information, and innovationsTo see other topics within this blog, click HERE.
Highlight Printing, Minneapolis, MN: To “Direct Mail” or Not to “Direct Mail”…THAT Is The Question
MARKETING SUCCESS STORY #1:
Highlight Printing, a local printer near downtown Minneapolis, has these thoughts about direct mail marketing in these crazy economic times:
DO IT!
Wm. P. Wrigley’s success story during challenging economic times (that run parallel to our own present day challenges), are inspiring and educational. His innovations, energy, and refusal to give up are what kept propelling him forward even in what appeared to be “the worst of times”.
Here is his story: Mr. Wrigley came to Chicago in 1891 to start a remote sales office for his father’s Pennsylvania soap company. He was a very successful salesman and eventually switched from soap to baking powder and then to the product he is most known for today – chewing gum.
But here’s where the story gets good and he starts to show his marketing genius: in the early 1900’s a group of gum companies formed a ”trust” that Mr. Wrigley refused to be a part of. Shortly after that, in 1907 there was a financial panic that resulted in a drawn out recessionary crisis (sound familiar?). During that recession, while the “Gum Trust” was reeling from the difficulties of running a business in such challenging times (again…sound familiar?), and as such were afraid to spend dollars on marketing, he simply out-smarted and out-marketed them. He ran ad campaigns concurrently with new dealer promotions. It was that simple…his motto was “Tell ‘em quick and tell ‘em often” (does the word “branding” come to mind?). I read one article that said he sent gum to every household in America that had a phone, on the theory that if they could afford a phone they could afford gum. I read another article that said he sent 2 pieces of gum to every 2-year old in America – what 2 year old wouldn’t keep asking for gum after trying it once?! The result: His market grew from the midwest region to nationwide within weeks and sales jumped from $170,000 to more than $3,000,000! This single move was what propelled Wrigley Gum Company to the number one spot where is has stayed (again, partially through creative advertising), until today.
The words to live by? A “down” market is the perfect time to increase market share. Those are the words we at Highlight Printing are living by this year and what we are advising our customers and friends who own business to do. Wanna grow along with us? We would love to have you as good, strong company with us on the other end of this! Contact us @ 612.522.7600 or through the website @ www.highlightprinting.com, or mail me directly @ lisab@highlightprinting.com if you’d like to talk some more.
The author, Lisa Bickford, president of Highlight Printing, is a veteran of the printing industry. Since 1984 she has worked her way up through many areas of the industry before acquiring Highlight Printing in 1996 with her husband Don, who has also been in printing since the early 80’s. The things she continues to find most satisfying are the wonderful business relationships that have developed with clients, vendors, & co-workers, and the energy that is created from challenge resolution. You can email her directly at lisab@highlightprinting.com
This Printing Blog was launched in November, 2008, as a vehicle to share ideas, information, and innovationsTo see other topics within this blog, click HERE.
Highlight Printing, Minneapolis, MN: Successful Marketing Through Combining Web And Print Efforts
Highlight Printing, a local printer near downtown Minneapolis, MN, excited by 200% – 300% increase in response rate when using a combination of web and print marketing:
This is going to be a short blog because I am trying to convince my friend Michelle Schindler from ExactJobBoss Software to guest blog with the details of her successes. (JobBoss is an industry leader that offers complete manufacturing software that puts total shop control in the manufacturers fingertips. Their web address is: http://www.exactamerica.com/jobboss/
Here is a summary of the conversation I had with Michelle at lunch yesterday: Email blasts alone typically have a 10-15% response rate. But, WHEN COMBINED WITH A DIRECT MAIL DROP, IT JUMPS TO 30-35%!
I am so excited by these results! We have long been convinced that the dove-tailing of web and print is the difference between a good response rate and a great response rate. In fact, we have been so convinced of this that we spent the last 6 months of 2008 planning our marketing strategy (using a combo of web and print) for 2009 so we were ready to launch at the first of the year. And guess what? We are already seeing success. (We have the advantage of a GREAT seo guy – Robert Swedeen from Internet Business SEO, and I just happen to know a very creative and awesome printer. 
) Here is Robert’s web address: http://www.internet-business-seo.com/
If you’d like to share your thoughts or our success stories, or if you’d like help developing your own “dove-tailed” marketing plan, please contact us! You can either add a comment to the bottom of this blog, call us @ 612.522.7600, or contact us through our website @ www.highlightprinting.com
The author, Lisa Bickford, president of Highlight Printing, is a veteran of the printing industry. Since 1984 she has worked her way up through many areas of the industry before acquiring Highlight Printing in 1996 with her husband Don, who has also been in printing since the early 80’s. The things she continues to find most satisfying are the wonderful business relationships that have developed with clients, vendors, & co-workers, and the energy that is created from challenge resolution. You can email her directly at lisab@highlightprinting.com
This Printing Blog was launched in November, 2008, as a vehicle to share ideas, information, and innovationsTo see other topics within this blog, click HERE.
