Category:BusinessPaper Title:direct marketingText:Mail Order has prospered for decades and it still continues to prosper evenduring the Internet revolution. You still receive sales letters in the mail.
Youstill see ads through magazines you are reading. If you will open your eyes youwill see that the “Death” of mail order has been greatly exaggerated. It is still alive and well on planet earth. Mail order has withstood the test oftime.
Although, everything isn’t profitable to sell by mail. You will see manypeople online who are trying to sell products that could have never made itthrough a mail order approach. The sales letter is too poor and the conceptbehind the product just won’t fly. Many of them are trying to sell products,which can be picked up at any local store. These types of web sites would neverhave stood a chance if they tried mail order.
The expenses that went along withit would absolutely destroy their business – the postage, the ad costs, thefulfillment, the order lines, etc. The reason they have never realized that theyhave picked such a hard product to sell is the fact that they have nevercompared it to a mail order approach. Through the Internet and the freeadvertising available online, they are able to make money from even the mostdifficult products and the worst sales letters. Even though they are making somesales through free advertising online, what they don’t realize is that theirtime could be used much more productively by selling the “right”product to the “right” market. Companies could be making 10 to100times as much money by putting forth the exact same amount of effort if they hadapplied a few mail order ideas to their Internet business.
How does a mail orderbusiness choose the right product? The first test they put it through is that itmust not be available reliably locally. It shouldn’t be something people can rundown to the store and pick up. It should be something unique or something thatcan presented in a unique way (if it is available locally). The second test theyput it through is that it must be easy to target the best potential prospectsand buyers.
People do not start mail order businesses and try to sell toeveryone. The product needs to be something that appeals to a specific nichemarket. Successful mail order and direct mail businesses target their market like asharp shooter. Mail order initiativeswould not work if your going through thephone book and trying to send a letter to everyone listed. You must seek mailinglist managers who can help them find specific lists of people who:Have Money.
Bought a Similar Product by mail. Spent The Same Amount or More. Did all of the above recently. Mail order goes after buyers of similar products.
In other words, mostsuccessful mail order companies or initiatives don’t create a product and try tofind people to buy it. They find people who want to buy something. Then, theycreate something to sell them. Most Internet marketers have the processbackwards.
Creating a product and then trying to find people to buy it is thehard way. Use a Proven Sales Process:Too many people have jumped on the Internet bandwagon and have led us tobelieve that anything goes online. People have been selling products andservices by mail for decades now, and every single one of them has something toteach you about creating a successful sales process. Some will teach you what todo. Some will teach you what not to do.
The same rules, which have applied to mail order advertising, apply toInternet advertising. For example:1. Mail order advertisers have told us for years, “The more you tell,the more you sell. ” Yet, Internet advertisers have tried to tell usdifferently.
They have said people won’t read long copy online. They have saidpeople are too educated to be convinced by a sales letter. They have said thatyou don’t even want to use a sales letter on your site. Guess what? THEY arewrong. The mail order advertisers had it right. .
. after decades of testing theirhypothesis again and again. People will read long copy. People just won’t readboring copy. If your sales letter educates the customer and tells them more thanthe competition, then you will make sales online. Good effective ad copy stillworks today just as it always has.
2. Mail order advertisers have told us to use a headline on every salesletter. Yet, Internet “experts” have forgotten to tell us to useheadlines on all of our web pages. No mail order marketer would even considersending out a letter without a headline.
So, why would you even consider havinga single web page without a headline? Mail order advertisers have also taught usan easy method of increasing our response rates by an immediate 27%. All youhave to do is put quotation marks around your headline and your response ratewill immediately go up, because people believe the quotation marks show that youare saying something extremely important. 3. Mail order advertisers have told us to write our sales letters like we arewriting them to our best friends. Internet “experts” have told us topresent a more professional appearance.
Sales letters, which have been proven towork time and time again, are those, which are written, in a friendly tone. Theyuse underlining to emphasize key points, shorts words, short sentences, and apersonal signature in blue coloring at the bottom. This same process of writingwinning sales letters still works online. You don’t want your visitors to thinkof you as a big corporation. You want them to get to know you personally and tobond with you.
Then, once they know you, they will buy from you. Keep Detailed Records Of Everything. A successful mail order business is always testing everything that they do. Nothing is set in stone until it has been proven in the marketplace. They trackhow much they spend for ads, how many people respond, and how many of theresponders actually purchase their products or services.
Every new ad will betracked in the exact same way. If they don’t keep the records and haven’t donetheir math, they won’t be in business for long. Just because much of Internetadvertising is currently free does not give you any excuse for not tracking evenmore specifically. Develop a Control and Keep Testing It. When you hear mail order advertisers talk, they always speak of a controlpiece.
This is a scientific word, which refers to the sales piece, which hasalready been proven to sell. The goal of every mail order business is tocontinually test this control document and try to outsell it with another piece. Then, once they find a piece, which has been proven to outsell the first one,they will replace it as the new control. Then, the process of competitionbetween the pieces begins again. Do you have a control web site for yourproduct? Have you tested a web site again and again to prove whether it iseffective at selling your products or services? If not, then as soon as you arefinished reading this manual the first time, start testing your piece. Once youhave a site that is making sales, then it is time to create a mirror page whereyou make some minor changes such as a new headline, a different picture, adifferent price, etc.
Then, test that new page in the same type of medium as the first page. Compare the results. Then, test some other sites. You should never be completelyfinished in testing your selling process. There is almost always a way to makeit sell a little bit better. Think about the difference in profits if you findout that a certain product sells better with a $10 higher price.
What if yousell twice as many by dropping the price 10%? The marketers who are usuallytalked about as “Genius” are not any such thing. They are just peoplewho have tested every possible method until they eliminated everything thatdidn’t work. All they are left with is the BEST way to sell their products orservices.Business
