Marketing With Postcards (written July, 1989)

If your marketing activity doesn’t include postcards, you’re overlooking a highly effective and very low cost sales tool. Here are many reasons postcards should be part of your marketing program……

#1. Postcards Work For Any Business – Postcards can produce all kinds of sales activity for all types of businesses. For example, they can produce floor traffic for retail stores or sales leads for direct marketers or just about any other type of sales activity a business wants.

#2. Designing Postcards Is Simple And Uncomplicated – Designing an effective postcard is not complicated. It can be as simple as printing your best small ad on a 4×6 card and sending it to a list of potential prospects. Postcards usually work best when the message is brief and the postcard looks at first glance like a message from a friend.

#3. Printing Postcards Is Easy And Inexpensive – You can have a printer print them for about a nickel a piece.

#4. There’s A Special Low Postage Rate For Postcards – You can send any quantity of postcards by First Class Mail in the US for only 9 cents each. The only requirement is that your postcards must be at least 3½x5 inches but no larger than 4¼x6 inches.

#5. Postcards Nearly Always Get Read – Because postcards are delivered “ready to read,” almost everybody will read it – even people who usually throw out other types of direct mail without opening it.

#6. Postcards Produce Fast Results – Because postcards are simple and easy to use, they produce results fast. You can mail postcards within a few days of deciding to use them and you’ll start getting sales activity 2 or 3 days later.

#7. Postcards Are Effective For Generating Website Traffic – One of the most effective postcard formats simply lists a few benefits of a product or service on the card and tells the reader to where they can get more information. This makes them ideal for generating traffic to a website.

#8. Postcards Multiply Themselves – Postcards are like small billboards. They are easy to handle. They often get saved by recipients or passed on to others, thus providing additional exposure of your advertising message.

#9. Markets Can Be Precisely Targeted With Postcards – You can accurately target your best markets by sending postcards only to mailing lists of prospects likely to be interested in what you’re offering and to who also have a history of acting on offers that interest them.

#10. Postcard Marketing Results Are Easy To Measure – Postcards normally generate over 90 percent of their total response within 7 to 10 days. This enables you to quickly and accurately evaluate the results of a postcard campaign.

#11. Postcards Put You In Control Of Your Sales Activity – You can quickly boost (or reduce) your sales activity anytime you want by simply regulating the number of postcards you mail and how often you mail them.

#12. Postcards Conceal Your Marketing From Competitors – Most advertising uses mass media where your competitors hear or see what you are doing and then copy it. Postcard marketing is personal. Only you and your prospects are aware of what you are doing.

Postcards may be one of the best kept secrets of modern marketing. They’re highly effective, very low cost, simple to use and best of all, they work for any business. You’re overlooking a profitable marketing tool if you don’t use them.

The author of this article is Larry Costello, President of All-American Print & Mail, 2200 Wilson Blvd #102-57, Arlington, VA 22201.