7 Reasons Why A Hard Copy Newsletter Boosts Sales!
The value of the humble hard copy customer newsletter is often misunderstood and not given the attention it deserves as a very powerful way of growing your business and PR.
Time and time again it shows up as a key success factor in successful businesses. One reason hardcopy newsletters are so successful is a customer perceives the newsletter as a publication not advertising. This means it tends to actually gets read and your promotional message gets through.
Your newsletter will help to…
1. Build and strengthens customer relationships – it is a real easy way of talking to your customers, keeping in contact, building trust, building personality and to build a tribe of loyal customers.
2. Strengthen branding and name retention - by keeping your name in front of your customers in what is otherwise a very competitive and cluttered market place.
3. Educate – customers about what you do and the services you offer. Never assume your customer knows all your services. The newsletter is a great way to trigger sales in different areas; educate about new products; and provide updates.
4. Position you as the expert - in your field as the “go to” person to seek advice and services from
5. Demonstrate success – you can use the newsletter to communicate customer successes in using your product; list testimonials; thank customers for referrals and at the same time educate customers in how to give you referrals
6. Cost effectively talk to prospects – the newsletter can be sent to target customer lists, given away as part of your promotional material package when talking to prospective customers and used to build your database. This is a very cheap promotional tool.
7. Promote products and services – this includes your services but also can be used to promote the services of a customer or non core services. Sometimes this maybe done on an affiliate basis; as a way of getting others to pay for your newsletter in return for the promotion or as a way of saying thanks.
What Is Best? A Hard Copy Newsletter Or An Online Email Newsletter?
There is absolutely no question a hard copy newsletter delivered by mail will significantly improve customer retention and activity. With email open rates as low as 30% and falling; the effectiveness and actual readership of your newsletter is significantly higher when delivered by mail. Also the hard copy version tends to sit around and/or be passed around the office more often. This means it has a longer shelf life than an email that is received and deleted.
The recommended strategy would be to combine both – have a monthly hard copy newsletter with a campaign of regular email messages and offers spread through the month.
Marketing guru Dan Kennedy of Glazer Kennedy (www.dankennedy.com ) was recently quoted as saying “Anyone not including a printed newsletter in the mix of material and service provided to their customers is foolish. And an online substitute is a poor substitute”.
A $93,000 Lesson From A Car Wash!
A $93,000 Lesson from a Car Wash!By Alistair Gray aka Doctor Profit
This morning I was driving down Parramatta Road, just returning from the Post Office when I noticed this large sign “Car Wash $10” in bright red letters. Woah! I pulled in. My lovely white Accord was looking like it had been on the speedway track without the dents; but with the mud splashes and the good old bird droppings. It was desperate for some loving care!
I waited until the attendant came over and immediately I was offered a wash and a vac for $20. I told him I was in a hurry and just wanted the $10 shine! That was fine so he wrote out a ticket and I was told to take it into the cafe to pay.
It was interesting he didn’t even ask me for the deluxe shine at about $35 but he just assumed I would want the cheap option right away. He was probably right, but little did he know normally that is exactly what I would normally buy; but today I was in a rush.
So I go into the cafe and the lady owner was there. I paid my $10. She stamped my docket and then pushed in front of me a Loyalty Card – “Wash your car 5 times and the 6th time we give you a Super Wash Free”! I took the card, grabbed the paper and sat down.
Interesting, there was about 6 others waiting for their cars, it was a cold morning and not one of them was drinking a cup of coffee or tea. When I was standing there paying the $10, I was half expecting her to ask; “Would you like a coffee with that?” You don’t make much money employing staff and doing car washes at $10.
But no there was silence! A missed opportunity! All she had to say was, “Would you like a coffee with that?” And I would have been like a “lamb to the slaughter” – easy meat!
So later, I asked her “Why didn’t you ask me and the others for a cup of coffee?”
“Oh, I thought you would be offended!” She answered.
I quickly explained to her most of her customers would have expected you to ask. They won’t make your job easy by offering to buy. As it says in the Bible “Ask and you will receive”. If you don’t ask, how can you get? The reality is most will probably say yes. I then pointed out to her it was her job to make sales and money. If she only sold a coffee to 50% of her customers at $3.20 that would be about 10 coffees an hour; or say $256 a day; or an extra $1792 a week; and that is without even selling some cakes, lollies or even making sales to passengers.
Amazingly, that simple change would equate to more than a conservative $93,000 a year.
It is amazing how many businesses are leaking profits!
Alistair Gray aka Doctor Profit is the Co Author of Profits for Life and is a Restaurant Marketing Specialist; Small Business Marketing Consultant; Direct Response Copy Writer; Marketing Coach and Australian Distributor of an Automated Marketing and Rewards Program for Restaurants and Small Business. Alistair and the team at Kwik Kopy Silverwater are available to help with the writing of articles and production of your own newsletter.
Phone: 1300 654 252 Email: alistair@creatingsuccess.com.au Web: www.creatingsuccess.com.au
Growing Your Profits - Getting Back to Basics!
I was writing this for someone and then I thought this could be of value to my readers and may even include it later in one of my newsletters.
There are 3 major ways to increase the income in your business
· Get more customers
· Increase the average spend per customer
· Increase the frequency of purchase
If you can improve each of these by 30% you will achieve a 119% increase in your income.
Added to that you can boost income by increasing prices.
Getting Focus -
Now take a piece of paper and divide it into 3 columns and head each column with one of the 3 ways mentioned above.
Now list down under each heading all the ways you can think of to achieve each goal. Ideally don’t stop till you have 20 ideas under each heading (don’t prejudge the idea, just write it down)
Now under each heading pick the best 3 ideas – ones that will give you the fastest and most profitable results.
Now you have a list of 9 things you can do immediately to make a difference to your business.
Now of the 9 pick 1 or 2 to implement immediately. Don’t try and do more.
Focus on implementation well. Focus on embedding the particular strategy as part of your permanent system.
Once it is embedded and working, move to the next most profitable idea and so on.
Become system focused. Constantly be thinking about how can I systemise what I am doing. Document. Automate. It is the system that will make you money.
Measure everything. Make numbers your friend. It will pay you handsomely. Set numbers based goals. Monitor, Review and adjust weekly.
This in itself will drive a performance improvement. What you measure gets improved just by measuring & adjusting.
Focus on building your database – this is the gold. Every contact/ phone enquiry get an email address & mobile number, to put into your database. Start building one step at a time.
Communicate regularly with your customers.
Establish a system so once a week/ fortnight on say a Thursday without fail a message goes out to your customers. Don’t stop. Just consistently communicate. This will pay big dividends. Yes it may seem boring but watch what happens over time.
Use different media – email, post cards, sms, direct mail, fax, voice broadcast, telephone.
Every message doesn’t have to be an offer – tell them about a product, service or simply why they should do business with you.
Don’t make the mistake of thinking that Facebook or Twitter will do this for you – it won’t. It is only a small part of your communications strategy.
Finally, make sure you make doing business with you fun!
If I can help please let me know.
Alistair
5 Tips to Choose a Sales and Marketing Consultant
“The 5 Must - Know Tips for Successfully Choosing a Sales and Marketing Consultant”
Tip No 1: Does your consultant undertake a front end diagnostic or marketing audit?
If your consultant does not suggest a front end marketing audit I recommend you keep looking for the right consultant.
How can anyone suggest making improvements in your business without sitting down to understand the existing processes, what is working, what can be improved and what should be cut out?
Without doing a “full medical” on your business how can a consultant customise a program that focuses on the needs of the business?
The “medical” is critical in quickly identifying areas where “quick wins” can be achieved and business profitability improved.
Tip No 2: What sort of support tools and processes does the consultant have to ensure he can deliver on the promises made?
To give you the best opportunity of improving your own marketing skills with the resultant increase in sales and profits, you need to be able to access a range of training and support tools.
Here is a quick check list of questions to ask to ensure the adequate tools and resources are available...
- What is the availability of the consultant?
- Is telephone and email support available?
- What sorts of manuals are provided?
- Are there any audio CDs or DVDs provided?
- Are you able to request additional coaching blocks?
- What sort of processes do you follow?
Tip No 3: What sort of training and experience does your consultant have?
Practical experience is always a good indicator as to whether a consultant can help you. Have they been there and done it themselves? What sort of clients have they had? Have they undergone any formal training? What sort of support do they receive? Are all good questions to ask?
Tip No 4: Does your consultant or coach offer you a performance guarantee?
The most important thing of in working with a customer is working hard to help the customer get the best results possible. Beware of any consultant who is not prepared to stand behind the services they offer with a solid performance guarantee.
Tip No 5: What sort of continuous learning does your consultant undertake to ensure they are up to date with the latest marketing ideas, trends and opportunities?
The business environment is in a state of rapid change and flux. Any consultant you are working with must be continually keeping up to date with the latest market trends, opportunities and marketing techniques.
You should enquire what courses and seminars have they been attending, what reading are they doing, what papers have they written and are they part of a mentor group.
