Direct mail absence does not make the
heart grow fonder: it makes the brain forgetful. No matter how wonderful your product,
service, or cause or how gorgeous your mail piece, sometimes the main factor
influencing a customer's decision to respond is one that's completely out of
your control: timing. And if you don't reach your customers at the right time,
they'll find someone else.
Whether you're selling a product,
soliciting membership or donations, or offering a service, you can't expect a
customer to think of you first if they've responded only once to one of your
direct mail promotions and haven't heard much from you since, especially when
they're being hit-up by your competitors in the mail, online, on their mobile
devices, and in public ads or professional publications on a regular basis.
And you can't expect them to be loyal to
you if you haven't taken the time to follow-up with them: to send a letter
thanking them for their business and offering a discount on a future purchase,
to mail a brochure with items of similar interest, to notify them of updates or
changes to their existing service.
So how often should you mail your
customers? It depends on what you're offering and who you're offering it to.
You wouldn't mail multiple lawn-service offers to customers in December. Most
homeowners aren't thinking about keeping their lawns green when they're covered
in snow. But you could send a service renewal notice two, three, four, even six
times after the new year, when people generally stop enjoying winter and start
looking forward to spring.
Likewise, you could send a renewal notice
multiple times before a subscription or membership expires, expressing with
increasing urgency in each mailing the need to renew by a specified date,
especially if the promotion has a successful track record.
No matter how often you mail your
customers, make sure you mail them regularly. One day soon, they'll thank you
for it.
No comments:
Post a Comment