Two Step Marketing

When it comes to marketing your products or services, there are two basic challenges:

1. How do you obtain new customers or clients? (By survey, this is the biggest concern for small businesses.)
2. How do you get your existing customers to come back for more? This is not given nearly the importance it deserves by small business owners.

The direct mail postcard, when used correctly, answers both of these challenges admirably.

Nike® hit a popular slogan when they coined the phrase, “Just Do It.™” But in direct mail, we use a slightly more effective expression, “Do It Right.” The difference between just doing it and doing it right is the difference between going through the motions and your sales going through the roof!

For example, the other day I received a postcard advertising computer monitors. It had teeny, tiny lettering slathered all over the front and a large portion of the back of the card. It was extremely hard to read, and what I could make out was very technical and jargon-y. As a result, I threw it away.

Several days later, I received a postcard with just 32 words on it. It quickly informed me that an auto detailer with a 4.8-star rating on Google (out of 200+ reviews) would be in my area every Saturday and Sunday offering full auto detailing for $50 for new customers who booked by calling his local phone number. How did I respond? I called. I asked about their openings, had my questions answered and booked a slot that Saturday for a full detail at 10 a.m.

What was the difference in my two responses? Why did one card go in the trash and another in the to-do pile? The auto detailing business used a time-tested, two-step selling process:

Step 1: Generate a lead. In the above example, getting me to call.

Step 2: Provide the requested information.

Step two was provided to me on the phone by someone on their team, who answered my questions and made me feel confident that the service would be as good or better as my current one.

Why Exactly Does Two-Step Marketing Work?

A process that involves two steps allows a person to get comfortable before plunking down their hard-earned cash. Think about it, and you’ll find most of life’s biggest moments come in two stages. Like getting married or having a child, there is usually a “warming up” period to smooth the transition into the next stage.

Likewise, postcard marketing has two steps: step one is generating a lead; step two is providing the requested information. It is much easier to create interest (a lead) than walk a person through an entire buying process (a sale) on the first contact.

First, you execute step one, using postcards to inexpensively promote and target prospects and customers to generate leads (inquiries about your products and services). Then initiate step two when the prospect calls in and provides the requested information. By doing this, you convert the prospect into a sale.

This two-step process also helps you create a list of people who were interested enough to contact you. You can then re-contact the ones who didn’t complete a sale when they first inquired, preferably until they do buy from you.

◆ IMPORTANT: Be sure to get the information you will need to re-contact the people who responded to your postcard offering. Repetitive follow-up with people who contact you will result in increased sales. Make it a company policy to follow up with those who contact you about your products and services.

The Most Effective Use of Postcards:

Generating Interest

The purpose of your postcard’s message is to generate a sufficient level of interest in the mind of your prospect. All you want to do is get them to contact you about your offer. It may seem like an extra, “padded” step, but remember: you are generating interest, not collecting their money. (Not yet, anyway). That is what the two-step marketing process is about: Generating interested prospects and customers who contact you for more information.

Two-step marketing can even be expanded to three- or four-step marketing. Nowadays, folks can (and often prefer to) do all their due diligence online. They don’t have to call you to get the information they now want from your postcard. So how do you generate that lead if they don’t call you? You’ve got to entice them to fill out a form on your website at the very least.

This is what happens these days:

1. They get your postcard.
2. They go online, check out your website, and decide instantly whether they like you or not. (You know you’ve done that — gone to a site and instantly said to yourself, “I like this site!” or, “I’m out of here.”) Regardless of how great your offer is, they could be gone in a flash. So now, step one is sending them someplace you know they’ll feel comfortable. Yes, your site has to be that ultimate destination — a site that feels familiar somehow and embraces their personal aesthetic while caressing their innate sense of wholeness. Okay... I’m being a little facetious here, but I think you get the point. In order for them to even progress to step two, they have to like your website. They have to feel good there. They have to feel comfortable hanging out there, because you want them to spend enough time there to feel comfortable to get to the next step...
3. If they make it through step one, you now have to have an offer so good that they are willing to either call you or fill out a form on your website. There is this odd behavior amongst us humanoids... We perceive the danger of filling out an online form to be far greater than it is in reality. Worst-case scenario, you’ll be contacted by a sales person — whhooooaaaa that’s scary!! So getting folks to fill out your form is no easy feat, hence you need a great offer to motivate them.

In this system, step one is all about enticing them enough with your postcard to get them to type in your URL or scan your QR code. Step two is about generating that lead, aka filling out your form OR — if they really get that warm fuzzy feeling at your site — picking up the phone and calling you.

Now, when crafting your message, there are three necessary points to include:

1. The biggest benefit of your product or service: In the auto detailing example, it was cost savings.
2. A good reason for them to act NOW: some kind of “special offer” or deadline.
3. A simple, easy way for them to respond: your phone number, your website or an email address — or all three.

When it comes to postcard marketing, writing a bad message (or the wrong message) can be just as bad as writing no message at all. Your message should be short and to the point. Short messages on postcards produce more leads. For example, after clearly outlining your product’s benefit, give a short call to action including something like this:

Call 1-800-628-1804 for Your Copy of Our Free Report.

If they call, you know they’re interested.

Offer ends 05-05-22.

Print a date three weeks from your mailing date to create some urgency.

Lots of people will respond to find out what they might not know. Don’t forget — they responded, which at least expresses some interest in the information you have created curiosity about. This method works and is sure to produce a large number of inquiries if sent to your proper market, which I’ll explain how to define later in the manual.

Another two-step idea that works brilliantly for us is to place a website or landing page on the postcard and send the recipients to the page for something FREE, but valuable (our best offer is simply free samples of our products). When they go to the website, there is a fill-in section to capture their contact information in exchange for the free samples. These leads, for us, are a bit colder than someone that calls us — but now we can “warm them up” with more promotion.

This process will generate a bunch of leads from people who are truly interested in your products and services.

Why?

Because two-step marketing is based on proven buying behavior! Think about yourself and the way you make a buying decision.