Tell me would you like to:
- Stop your mailings going straight in the bin?
- Build trust with your target audience?
- Increase the number of people that buy from your leaflets or marketing literature?
Well now you can. Here's how…
Over the next few days I'll be sharing some incredibly simple secrets to making your marketing material more effective. Start implementing them and you'll quickly find that your response rates seriously start to increase. Good luck and do let me know how you get on!
Grab Attention
The first stage is simply to reduce the number of mailings that go straight into the bin. Or number of people that sail on past at an exhibition. Let's start by thinking about an exhibition. You've spent a lot of money on your stand and are keen to speak to as many people as possible. What's the best way to do that? Hitting them with 50 bullet points (believe me, it happens) or reams of text isn't relevant at this point (or any come to that). What's crucial is that you get people to stop in their tracks. Some people use actors dressed up as cartoon characters, some people give away sweets, or have a competition, or stop people with a big statement.
However you choose to stop people at an exhibition, there's no getting round the fact that you have less than three seconds to get your reader to sit up and listen, or you’ve lost them. And this applies whether you're getting people to stop at an exhibition, stay on your website, read your sales letter or respond to a piece of direct mail.
Getting people to take notice of you is a simple process, but one that we often get wrong because we think from our perspective and not the perspective of our reader.
Start by being realistic and realising that you can't be all things to all people. Define your target audience and try to think about how they think. What is it about your business that is of interest to them? Brainstorm if you can and get down as many ideas as possible. Here are some tried and tested ways you can get people to stop and listen. Once you've read through them it's probably helpful to try out as many headlines as possible using these different focuses (the italicised text are some examples I've tried out for my business).
Self interest: what’s in it for me? Hit them with a benefit straight away. "You could save up to 77% on full colour print"
Something new/ in the news "NEW! Recycled business cards from £69"
Information:that’s interesting, I didn’t know that. "Do you realise that the average business gets just a 2% response on direct mail. Our clients get an average of 7%. Here's how…"
Curiosity: what on earth is that? Fun, creative mailings work really well here. A strange shape, interesting paper stock, funny image or texture – anything to get people to stop and explore
Problem/ need – "at last a solution" (be careful here to hit them with the benefits straight away). "Could your marketing could be making more money?"
Do you realise that in the majority of these headlines the focus is on 'you' the reader? In fact, "you" features very heavily. The more you can talk about the reader, the more attention you'll grab and the better relationship you'll build with your target market. So go for it, start rewriting your headlines and see your response rates increase.
Have a great week.
Fiona
ps. Would you like to increase the response rates of your direct mail? Why not take a look at our Marvellous Monthly Marketing Workshops which are designed specifically to help you improve your marketing.
