However, postcards are so cost-effective they can be a high-frequency sales building weapon. Because they are 6 times more likely to be read than a direct mail letter, they are also a high-impact weapon.

Best of all, postcards have a high recall by recipients for three reasons:

• The use of color or a picture provides a visual that is easily remembered
• Postcards are intimate by nature and are much more personal
• They are quickly noticed in the mass of daily mail

The power of postcard marketing starts with message repeatability.

One side of the card is your “billboard”. Ideally you want to print a headline that screams value – the single most important benefit you want to communicate to your customer. Adding a photo and some color with the headline is also important.

The other side can contain a message specific to an individual mailing. And you can also add a handwritten message, signature, and address to personalize your mailing. And every time you mail a postcard, your prospect sees your value statement.

A scheduled campaign is the next step. Mail one every two weeks for two months. Or mail one a month for six months. Establish a frequency that fits your product and your offer and stick with it. You’ll be top-of-mind in your prospects eyes for very little money. Postcards work well in tandem with other marketing weapons like e-mail or text messaging. In fact, it’s shown that combining direct mail with email can improve marketing results by 27% or more.

What makes postcards most powerful is when you add personalization.

With the advent of variable print technology, you can create postcards using your customers name in creative ways that are sure to capture your customer’s attention. You can have their name written on a beach, on a billboard, in a newspaper headline, on a pizza box or on football jerseys promoting a big game day promotion. Studies show that adding personalization to your postcard mailers will increase response rates by up to 40% vs. generic mass mailings.

And personalization doesn’t have to end with your customer’s name. If you have a customer loyalty program or POS system that captures customer data such as their last purchase date, most active purchase day or most popular menu item, you can incorporate that information into your postcard mailings too.

The more personalized you can make the postcard, the more effective it will be. Not only will the response rates be higher but the people who respond will spend more money. According to research by the Direct Marketing Association, consumers who respond to personalized direct mail will have a 24% higher average ticket.

So remember, to deliver an effective postcard marketing campaign be sure to:

• Personalize
• State your value
• Repeat it
• Repeat it again
• Keep doing it

Key Design Elements for an Effective Direct Response Mailing

Before submitting your mailing, review this list to see if you are covering these important elements. They are designed to maximize your return on investment.

1. Keep it simple
Generally you should only have one major communication point. It is OK to include one or two sub points. Generally speaking, a 12 year old child should be able to understand your message.

2. Call to action
The biggest complaint from those new to direct response mailings is that it wasn’t effective. Your biggest focus of the mailing should be to communicate your goal. For a restaurant it’s to logon to a website for online ordering or visit the store.

If possible, give your potential customers more than one option. Make your call to action simple, clear and in a place they can’t miss it. (Often it is towards the bottom of your communication and is rather large in size.)

All offers should have an expiration date and could include words such as “Hurry, Offer Ends Soon”, or “Limited Time Offer”. If you are using standard (bulk) postage, the suggested expiration date is about two months after the mailing is delivered to the post office.

3. Measurability
It’s critical that you include a mechanism to measure the responses from your mailing. Direct response mailings offers great accountability compared to mass marketing vehicles. These mechanisms could include: coupon codes, a special toll free number, a special web page that you can track, a code on a reply card, or simply asking everyone who visits “how did you hear about us”. (The last one is subject to human error, so try to use another method if possible.)

4. Personalization
Studies have shown that personalization, such as simply including “Dear John” to your mailing can raise response rates from 30 -80%. To really get your biggest bang for your buck, work with a creative team that can develop a communication where the personalization is integrated into the creative, not used as simply
an afterthought.

Best of all, with new digital printing capabilities, you can often utilize personalization at a lower cost than doing non-personalized mailings through a traditional printer!

5. Use of Color
Generally people pay much more attention to color and response rates usually go up from 40 – 300 %. Digital printers offer very affordable rates on full color without minimums.

6. Violators
A “Violator” is something that brakes through one’s thoughts, something that stands out in your mailing to gain attention. On a post card, place a colorful start burst on the address side, in case they see this first. On an envelope, place a message under your return address. Example wording: “Save $10, see reverse side”,
“Learn How to Protect Your Home, details inside”.

7. Return Address.
The post office requires this for third class mailing, however, it is strongly suggested that it be included on every piece of mail. It gives the customer confidence that you’re a legitimate business and that they could find you if needed. Also, although they are not supposed to, there have been reports that the postal service has delayed mailings without return addresses. So why take the chance?

8. Company Background
You might not have a lot of space to do this, so it can be as simple as a tag line. Include something that will give the customer confidence in your business. This could be placed close to your logo. Examples: “Serving Anytown since 1950″ or “Voted Best Italian Food In Anytown”.

9. Specifications
Be sure your document meets the Post Offices and your printers specifications BEFORE you give it to the printer. It is not uncommon to pay for printing, only to have it rejected by the post office! Good mail houses will check this out for you. Be sure that all images are at least 300 DPI.

10. Spell Check. Date Check
Always be sure to check for spelling. If you are using text boxes, it might contain all the words and letters, but sometimes they are cut off, so please proof carefully. If you are having an event, or a deadline, be sure to consider how long it will take to arrive to the recipient.

If time is not critical, standard (bulk) postage is a great way to save money, but be aware that the post office makes no guarantees about delivery, so it could take almost a month to be delivered. Generally Standard Mail takes about 7-21 days to deliver, but longer when the post office is busy, such as in December.

Most experts agree that one of the most important parts of mailing is not anything mentioned in this article, it is the address list. Even if you have the best designed piece in the world, if you don’t send it to the right people, you won’t have a solid response