Local Marketing

Email this article Printer friendly page

Writing a Postcard, Landing Page, and Autoresponder Sequence for Local Marketing Dr. Ralph F. Wilson Wilson Internet Services Rocklin, California - Oct 5, 2002

Planning, preparing, and writing a postcard-autoresponder series for a local marketing project -- a combination of traditional and Internet strategies -- is hard work. In this article I'll outline the nuts and bolts of developing such a series, which was introduced in "Planning the Community Outreach Project," NetAssisted, July 20, 2002.

Note: This case study uses a church marketing project as its focus. Businesses, however, can learn much if they are humble enough to do so. Just as churches can learn from business applications if they are humble enough to do so. Don't get hung up on sacred and secular categories. Rather learn from the methods.

I'll be considering the various steps involved:

• Targeting and Demographics
• Specifying Purposes
• Parameters for Selecting Topics
• Laying Out the Postcard
• Deciding on a Printer and Mailing Service
• Writing the Autoresponder Sequence for Time Management
• Developing a Landing Page

I'll report on results from the mailing (which is going out this week) in the next article in the series.

Targeting and Demographics

The first step in the process was to study the demographics of the area to determine what are the felt needs of the people in our target community. For this, we obtained 2000 census data developed, updated, and analyzed by Percept (www.percept1.com), a demographic research firm that contracts with local, regional, and national church bodies. Similar kinds of information (lacking faith-based data) is available for US localities from ESRI Business Information Solutions (formerly CACI) as an Acorn Profile (www.esribis.com), Claritas Express as a PRIZM Cluster (cluster2.claritas.com/YAWYL), and others.

Percept's FirstView demographics helped us pinpoint clusters of lifestyle groups within the ZIP codes we were targeting. Then we drilled down into the profile of each of these groups to find areas of concern. For example, for ZIP 95677 (the eastern portion of Rocklin, California) we found four primary lifestyle groups, each named with Percept's proprietary lifestyle names which are defined more precisely in their manual:

Lifestyle Groups for ZIP 95677
Middle American Families (Suburban Mid-Life Families is the major segment)	44%
Affluent Families (Educated Mid-Life Families is the major segment)	42%
Young and Coming	7%
Rural Families	7%
Ethnic & Urban Diversity	<1%
Total	100%

Then we studied Percept's manual for detailed descriptions of community issues and primary concerns. Concerns included time for recreation and leisure, long-term financial security, neighborhood gangs, social injustice, aging parent care, parenting skills, good schools, childcare, divorce recovery, marriage enrichment, and finding life direction. (We don't have a neighborhood gang problem, which shows that these concerns are aggregated nationally rather than specific for our locality.) We studied these concerns very carefully, looking for clues that would help us get handles on topics for our postcard/sermon/autoresponder campaign.

Specifying Purposes

Next we determined the objectives of our campaign:

1. Let people know where we are, since the church is set back from the road and not too visible.
2. Obtain e-mail addresses of interested persons in our target area.
3. Encourage people to visit our church
4. Build a relationship with families not ready to visit yet, provide helpful and inspirational information relevant to their needs, and, eventually, get them to church.

We would like our campaign to bring lots of unchurched people through our doors on our target Sundays. But the reality is that many are not ready to change their Sunday morning routine. So we'll work at building a relationship via e-mail, beginning with an autoresponder.

Parameters for Selecting Topics

As we sought topics for the initial postcard series, we had three concerns:

1. Do not focus on families with school age children, since we're not geared up to grow as fast there. Though we'll attract families with children just because of the make-up of the target community, we don't want to select for families with children, so topics need to be neutral as to children in a family.
2. Select for people with a spiritual interest. We don't want to attract just anyone, but those who have some kind of spiritual interest, who are open to learning in a church setting.
3. Find topics that touch a great number of people.

This is what we came up with:

Mailing Date	Target Sunday	Topic
Monday, Sep 30	Sunday, Oct 6	"Lord, help me get my time back" -- Practical time management for spiritual seekers
Monday, Oct 21	Sunday, Oct 27	"How to Move Past Loss and Grief"
Monday, Nov 11	Sunday, Nov 17	"Tell Me How to Dream Again"

Deciding on a Printer and Mailing Service

We researched professional postcard services (such as Modern Postcard, www.modernpostcard.com) to produce a glossy, color postcard. But our goal at this point is a nice looking card at a very low cost. Cost comparisons for a carrier route saturation mailing (including printing, labels, bundling, and postage costs using a commercial mailing service) are about 45� per piece for glossy postcards vs. 27� per piece for the local printer and mailing service we chose.

We ended up with a postcard 3.67" x 8.5" on Exact Offset Opaque #65 cover stock, peach color with Pantone violet ink. We laid out the postcard 3-up on an 8.5" x11" sheet using Microsoft Publisher 2000 with photos and a map developed in Adobe Photoshop. Then we e-mailed the MS Publisher file to our printer who transferred it directly onto a plate.

 

Postcard Marketing Resources The best material I've found on postcard marketing is a brand new e-book -- Martha J. Retallick, Postcard Marketing Secrets (2002, $49.95) -- which the author accurately calls a "hype-free introduction to postcard marketing" (www.postcardmarketingsecrets.com). Even if you don't buy the e-book, take her free 3-day postcard marketing e-mail course. A more expensive option is Alex Mandossian's Marketing with Postcards ($247 plus shipping, Heritage House Publishing, www.marketingwithpostcards.com). Microsoft has a section on using MS Publisher for "Postcard Promotions" with examples of layouts (www.microsoft.com/office/publisher/evaluation/postcards).

 

Tips for Writing the Autoresponder Sequence

My approach to writing the autoresponder series "Seven Practical Ways to Reclaim Your Time" was to outline it as a short article on time management with eight sections. The introduction is sent out immediately upon signing up. Here's my outline:

0. Introduction
1. Prioritizing: Figuring Out What's Important to You
2. Setting Goals to Help You Achieve Your Overall Mission
3. Tasks: Organizing Your Unfinished Business into Tasks
4. Calendaring: Making Your Calendar Work for You, Not Against You
5. Learning to Say No without Guilt
6. Learning to Compromise, Budget, and Be Flexible
7. Measuring Success with Time Management

My first attempt was overkill, with 600 to 700 words per segment. A better length is under 500 words each -- just enough to offer some meat without overfeeding. It has to be short enough that the recipient feels he or she can read it in a few minutes. You are welcome to subscribe to the sequence to see how this works. In the example list I've set up for NetAssisted readers, you'll receive the same sequence as those from the church neighborhood, but no follow-up messages inviting you to our services.

Resources on Writing Autoresponder Scripts I found a few resources for writing autoresponders, but none are what I would call excellent. Al Bredenberg, "How to Write an Autoresponder Message that Gets Results" (EmailResults.com, 1996, www.emailresults.com/articles/autoresponder01.html). Discusses single, not sequential autoresponder writing. Yanik Silver's "Autoresponder Magic" Yanik Silver, Autoresponder Magic (2000, Surefire Marketing, $17). I can give you the e-book free, which creates a viral marketing expansion for the author, who makes his money by means of various affiliate programs sprinkled liberally throughout the book. The book contains a few tips on writing autoresponders. But the bulk of this 519-page e-book is comprised of successful autoresponder scripts from marketing greats such as Ken Evoy, Yanik Silver, Delcan Dunn, Jim Daniels, Terry Dean, and others. Most of these are of the "great hype" variety. But in this e-book you can view the wide variety of uses for sequential autoresponders.

Developing a Landing Page

The sign-up webpage should be seen as a landing page -- that is, a specific webpage designed to induce the person to sign-up, complete a transaction, etc. On the landing page for this "time management" campaign, I used the same clock graphic that appears on the postcard in order to show continuity between the postcard and the website sign-up page. On the webpage I explain a bit more about time management and re-introduce the e-mail series.

How to Develop a Landing Page

There's also an invitation to attend the target Sunday service that includes a sermon on reclaiming your time. You'll find full information on developing a landing page in my e-book Developing a Landing Page that Closes the Sale (www.wilsonweb.com/ebooks/landing.htm).

Though you can have people sign up for an autoresponder series by just having them send an e-mail, I think getting them to sign up on a webpage is a better idea. This way you can collect a bit more information -- and permission. The weakness of autoresponder marketing is lack of permission followed by bombarding people with unwanted e-mails now and into the future. Here's the permission line from this campaign:

"Please subscribe me to the e-mail series 'Seven Practical Ways to Reclaim Your Time,' and let me know about occasional upcoming events at the church. We respect the privacy of our visitors and never sell, rent, or loan our lists."

I ask for only three pieces of information:

• First name
• E-mail address
• Elementary school that serves your neighborhood

I've learned that the more information you ask for, the fewer people will sign up. So I only asked for what we need. The first name helps personalize the autoresponder messages, and build a more personal relationship with the recipients, while allowing them to retain their privacy. The e-mail address, of course, enables us to send the series at all. I didn't ask for ZIP code, since we want to market on a neighborhood not city basis. Rocklin's communities are not clearly differentiated by area, but most people will know the name of the elementary school that serves their neighborhood. In a drop-down menu I've listed all the elementary schools in the area, though most in our target group will be from just a single elementary school. Later we hope to invite interested people in various neighborhoods to parties and small groups meeting in members' homes.

The data collected on the landing page sign-up form transfers directly to the autoresponder database.