3:30 PM
Lanee' Blunt
Direct mail can be used to
follow up on your first sales letter.
The follow-up marketing letter is used to keep your business name in
front of your customers.
There was no reply from your
sales letter campaign, should you stop there, or should you throw away your mailing
list? There are far better ways to deal
with this than getting another mailing list. A single letter may not be enough
to convince certain prospects to call you from your direct mail. It may take more than one letter to convince
prospects to call you. Follow-up letters
are great at building a reputation. Copy
the big corporations and send out a follow-up marketing letter.
A Well Qualified Mailing List
You have the right mailing
list for your business, have sent sales letters to prospects on this list, but received
no reply. You must deal with the same
mailing list because it is qualified for your business. The prospects may need
more information about your small business before deciding to buy from you or
call you, so one letter may not be enough for certain prospects. Even if you
don’t hear from the prospect they may still be interested in your product or
service.
The Follow-up Letters should be in a Series
What will be your time frame
before sending the next letter; this is something that you will have to give
some thought too. A series can consist
of letters and brochures that you will send to the prospects. “The follow-up
campaign usually consists of a series of letters or printed stuffers designed
to obtain business through a variety of effective appeals,” according to
Carroll Nolan and Roman Warmke’s book, Marketing
Sales Promotion and Advertising, (South-Western, 1965). People will read
long copy if it is information on a product or service they are interested in
purchasing. Give enough information in the letter.
If You Don’t Hear From the Prospect
If you have sent your sales
letter, and still there was no response from the prospect. Send a polite letter,
it should be different from the first one, and restate your selling points. Let
the prospect know that your service is beneficial.
Pre-plan the Follow-up
The follow-up program will
work like automation if it is planned, for example: After sending a sales
letter then mail a brochure. A contact
program will remind you of the pieces of direct mail you need to send and the
correct dates to send them. Keep on schedule and send the letters as soon as
possible.
You should stick to your
schedule of once a month, or once every other month, or once every four
months.
Reference:
Carroll Nolan and Roman
Warmke; Marketing Sales Promotion and Advertising; South-Western
Posted in: Direct mail
