Increase Sales with Postcards

Make it easy for customers to buy your product or service, and your advertising dollars will stretch further. Marketing postcards can increase response to your sales message or subscriptions to your newsletter. As annoying as we may find those multiple reply cards that fall out of our magazines, publishers will tell you that the response they generate far outweighs the nuisance factor. Even on a small scale, reply cards work wonders. The first time I used postcard-sized subscription cards for my former magazine, The INK Spot, both new subscriptions and renewals increased noticeably in just a couple of months.

Whether as reply cards, newsletters, or announcements, postcards have multiple advantages over other means of contacting customers. Their size makes them less expensive to produce and mail. Recipients are more likely to read a postcard than an unsolicited letter in an envelope. Postcards are more convenient to fill out and return than clip-out order forms, coupons, or other response devices..

Integrate postcards into your marketing plan in one or more of these ways: As subscription or renewal postcards for newsletters, magazines, and other periodicals. Order forms for almost any type of product. Postcard Newsletters (newscards). Survey forms. Coupons. Mini-news releases or announcements.

Increase the effectiveness of your marketing postcards with one or more of these techniques: Prepaid return postage. Pre-addressed return address on card or a pre-addressed envelope. Color. Neon-bright paper, pre-printed paper, or photo-postcards attract attention. Plenty of room to fill in names and addresses, and easy-to-read large type. Check-boxes that allow the recipient to quickly fill out order forms or surveys. Incentives such as free gifts or drawings for prizes to entice recipients to return surveys or other types of reply cards. Include your mailing address, phone number, or other alternate contact information on the postcard. Repeat any special marketing message that is found in accompanying marketing materials. Calls to action. Always tell the recipient what to do with the postcard — "Fill it out & drop it in the mail" may seem obvious, but say it anyway. It works.

This article originally published in The INK Spot magazine.

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