With more Americans turning to direct mail coupons and advertisements for their everyday needs, many businesses have also turned to direct mail as a viable source for creatively increasing their revenue. This advertising and marketing format is quickly becoming more favorable. Just as your insurance clients are confident in your quality insurance products and services, you can be sure the most important investment worth making is a successful direct mail advertising plan for growing your business.
There are many different ways for you to utilize a direct mail advertising campaign. Direct mail devices can illustrate the full range of products and services that you offer. Regardless of your size, services offered, or scope of your staff, direct mail can be the most efficient way to promote your insurance products and help attract new customers. In order to make your future direct mail marketing campaign more successful, Steve Zuckerman, president of Clipper Magazine, suggests that you keep in mind the following key strategies.
Portray a strong image
Remember that today's consumers are very visually oriented. People are drawn to advertisements with colorful photographs and logos that are supported by strong headlines with clear messages. It's good to be clever, yet when you get so cute that they do not easily know what you are offering, they may completely miss your message. You must be able to stop customers in their tracks with strong visual presentations.
Use quality photographs, logos, and colorful illustrations
For added effectiveness, try to maintain a consistent visual image for your insurance business throughout all of your advertising campaigns. If you have any interior photographs of the office where you would meet with clients, use them. Your prospects will read all of the small details once they are energized by your consistently beautiful photographs, logos, colors, and headlines.
Use full color
A picture is still worth 1,000 words. Whenever possible, avoid most black-and-white marketing options. Look for professional full-color printing capabilities. Today, you can affordably market your services and products in full color to ensure the best possible redemption. Research has shown that full-color advertising options can actually increase redemption rates by 30 to 60 percent.
"Free" always works great
Nothing beats "free," and it can surely help to persuade your current clients to try new services as well as to get new insurance prospects to try you for the first time. Consider offering a free consultation for potential new clients, or perhaps a free calendar with any presentation.
Check co-op fund options
Many insurance companies offer you cooperative advertising funds by using their name and logos. Be sure to explore these opportunities to stretch your advertising dollars.
Use care with disclaimers
Try to avoid excessive disclaimers and rules for what is not included in these varied offers. Try to keep your special offers simple with words such as, "Offer expires 01/01/09." Use expiration dates of no more than 60 to 90 days out to keep your offers timely.
Inflate your profits by introducing services and accounts
Special new offers and promotions can be featured seasonally in conjunction with upcoming holidays and events. While it is best to promote your strongest services, it is still very important to promote those unique products that most people do not know you offer. Most customers prefer convenience and one-stop shopping alternatives. So, if you offer something extra special, unique, or distinctively different, take advantage of the opportunity to promote that.
Calculate affordable solutions
Look at various direct mail marketing and advertising opportunities available to you. You can create solo direct mail letters, newsletters, free-standing inserts, postcards, and brochures. Visit your local Yellow Pages or the Internet to find direct mail resources near you. With direct mail, you can specifically target neighborhood homes surrounding your business. It is best to target homes within 3 to 10 miles of your business office. At approximately 3 to 4 cents per home, cooperative direct mail marketing is extremely affordable, as opposed to solo direct mail campaigns, which usually cost between 50 cents to $1 per home.
As you investigate the price of a solo direct mail campaign or cooperative direct mail, you may discover the financial and creative benefits of nationally respected direct mail resources such as Clipper Magazine, Savvy Shopper, Mint, Valpak, Money Mailer, and others that are available in your local community. With magazine-format direct mail, you can easily and affordably target specific 50,000-home areas surrounding your insurance agency.
If you are strictly going to use the solo direct mail route, it is a good idea to send oversized colorful direct mail postcards, full-sheet fliers, and free-standing inserts whenever possible. The postage is less expensive than standard mail and, unlike envelopes, they don't have to be opened in order for the potential client to immediately see your offer. Use a high-quality paper stock for your postcards and fliers. They are more durable and more appealing to the recipient. For solo direct mail, you will need to write the copy, create the artwork, determine your targeted markets, and hire a local direct mail house to facilitate the mailing.
Invest in a direct mail resource
For most businesses, it may be most cost-effective to use resources that offer several services that do it all for you. Direct mail program resources should offer you complimentary marketing consultations, artwork, and the use of professional photographs, mailing lists, printing, and postage. Plus, their marketing consultants can share examples of other successful banking and investment advertisers from around the United States. You will be able to review a small library of photographs, offers, and special promotions that really work. If needed, they can supply testimonials and telephone numbers from others in similar businesses to yours, so you can also call them for advice. Ask to see samples of mailing devices containing examples of similar businesses like yours. Many of these same direct mail advertising resources also offer special programs targeted to new area homeowners, which you should explore.
No matter what direct mail resource you go with, explore annual agreements with direct mail programs throughout the year to ensure consistency, maximize results, and reduce your costs. Regarding solo direct mail, many local direct mail houses will help you create, print, mail, and facilitate the entire piece. If you give them your customer mailing list or tell them the ZIP codes or neighborhoods you want to target, they can easily facilitate solo direct mail campaigns for you.
Set realistic expectations
Direct mail really works, especially with repetition of very strong offers. Like any form of advertising and marketing, however, it usually takes a long-term investment. Visit with your consultant to set realistic expectations so you are not disappointed. Coupons are trackable. If you want to determine their effectiveness, plan to ask every new client and prospect how they heard about you. You will also need to measure your total sales volume each week or month, especially on the services that you are promoting with your direct mail efforts.
Marie Finnegan is a marketing associate at Marketing Solutions. She can be reached at 703-359-6000 or mktgsols@mktgsols.com.
