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B2B Direct Mail Lists: Ask These Questions Before Renting.
If the most important part of any business-to-business direct
mail package is the list, how can you be sure that you have a
good list before you drop your money (and your reputation) in
the mailbox? Answer: Ask the right questions before you...
Direct Mail
Direct Mail The web is a most versatile and often misused medium for direct marketing. In this email, I will share tips and techniques to make the web a major advertising tool for your sales and marketing efforts. Do you have a website? A Web...
Direct Mail Marketing: Is It Your Choice?
Direct mail marketing is a system of marketing that is directed at specific people. In direct marketing, the advertisement is directed to a specific individual. This is unlike marketing that is open ended such as a billboard or a television...
How To Write Direct Mail That Really, Really Works!
So, you have something you want to sell. It may be a product, a service, or a cause. It could be a membership, a subscription, or a motor car. It might be paper, health products or the idea that the humane society or the Alzheimer’s association...
Increase Direct Mail Response Rates (And Revenue) By Segmenting Your List.
If you want to increase revenue using direct mail, you have two
options: sell more to the customers you have, or find new
customers and sell to them. The tricky part is knowing how to do
that.
I recommend that you start by segmenting...
Postcard direct mail marketing tips and ideas
Postcards are perhaps the least expensive way of reaching a large number of people with your sales message. Although they have their drawbacks, they are cost-effective at attracting new customers. But only if you follow some simple rules that...
Read This, Sell More: Direct Mail Marketing Is About Benefits, Not Features
Your customer wants a cleaner kitchen, not a kitchen cleaner.
Your customers are interested in benefits, not features. So sell benefits in your sales letters.
The difference between a feature and a benefit comes down to this: A feature is what...
Real Estate Marketing -- How to Measure Your Direct Mail Success
Article:
Eugene Schwartz, author of Breakthrough Advertising, said it
best: "There are no answers in direct mail except test answers.
You don't know whether something will work until you test it.
And you cannot predict test results based on past...
Smart Alternatives to Direct Mail
From LAND OF ODDS
We at Land of Odds get many questions about what glue to use with rhinestones and other beading and jewelry-making projects. We're craftspersons and silversmiths, and we have a shop where we sell rhinestones, beads,...
Test Marketing--How to Increase Your Direct Mail Marketing Response by Using the Internet to Test
I've discovered a really fantastic way to discover what works best in direct marketing, BEFORE doing traditional direct marketing. Use these internet tools to find what works best, then apply what you've learned to your traditional direct marketing,...
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Hook Your Direct Mail Sales Letter Readers With Good Transition Sentences
Anglers in Maine catch trout using dry flies with barbless hooks. Unless they keep tension on the line all the way to the net, they lose the trout. Your sales letters must do the same. But how?
One secret to keeping busy business readers hooked is to use irresistible transition sentences. Transition sentences come at the end of one paragraph and the beginning of the next. Good transition sentences leave your readers hanging in a number of ways.
One of them is to tell your reader that a number of things are coming up, forcing your reader to transition to the next paragraph to learn what some of those things are. If you’ve ever listened to a person with a pronounced stutter, you know how hard it is to wait while that person completes a thought. Your prospects are the same. If you almost complete a thought at the end of one paragraph, they will begin reading the paragraph that follows to complete your thought. But that’s not all.
Another way to keep your reader hooked throughout your copy is to end one paragraph with “that’s not all” or a similar phrase. Or to start your next paragraph with the word “another.” Each device shows the prospect that you have not finished, that the prospect has more to learn. And so the prospect keeps reading. And yes, there are some other hooks you might want to try.
You can start a paragraph with the word “you,” the one word that prospects and customers never tire of seeing in print.
Or you could try another proven tactic.
And that is starting a paragraph with the word “and.” Read the Gospel of Mark in the Bible sometime. It’s one of my favourite books. You’ll find the narrative almost impossible to stop reading, it’s so exciting. That’s because the writer begins so many of his sentences with “and” that you are compelled to continue reading to discover what comes next. (I won’t give away how the book ends. Read it and find out.) But there’s another device that’s just as powerful as the word “and.” Do you know what it is?
It’s the question mark. Put one at the end of one paragraph, with the answer at the beginning of the next paragraph, and you’ll keep your readers headed towards your net.
So here’s the one thing you need to remember. You’ve figured out by now that the secret to effective transition sentences is to keep your prospective buyer in a state of suspended satisfaction, one where they must keep reading your letter to the end before they feel gratified. And there’s only one sure way of doing that.
© 2005 Sharpe Copy Inc. You may reprint this article online and in print provided the links remain live and the content remains unaltered (including the "About the author" message).
About the Author
Alan Sharpe is a business-to-business direct mail copywriter. Sign up for free weekly tips like this at www.sharpecopy.com.
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