Jon Goldman (http://www.lumpymail.com) tried an experiment where he mailed watermelons to people. They reached their destination effectively, but Goldman acknowledges “The watermelon had an enormous impact but was outrageously expensive, too heavy, a huge hassle, unpredictable, not designed to include a ‘sales letter’ and not reproducible.” However, he also says he learned from the experiment how to devise strategics that are effective for others.
You are new to the market, and don’t have local relationships or a current network, or your “connections” are limited but you know you have the capacity to do the work effectively. Is there a way to break in relatively quickly and systematically?
The answer is yes, and the answer is generally an integrated marketing-to-sales strategy using some form of packaged direct mail (or courier) coupled with an effectively designed website and strategically placed outbound calls.
Thesee strategies require careful planning, a reasonable budget (but we’re talking a few thousand, not a few hundred thousand dollars), and the willingness to follow through. Also, you need to think beyond the campaign to the longer-range answer.
One example of this strategy is the successful campaign Society for Marketing Professinal Services (SMPS) member Scott Mickle described for a small architectural firm in Charlotte, NC, then with only three employees. The “Don’t Get Caught Behind the 8-Ball” campaign won a SMPS Marketing Communications Award for its success, I reported in “Marketing Metrics: Gaining a Powerful Competitive Edge” in the December issue of the SMPS Marketer.
“Lorentz Architecture sent 100 real 8-balls to representatives of general contractors and commercial developers in the greater Charlotte, NC area who were specifically involved in the election of design firms for design/build projects. The list included presidents, vice presidents, project managers, business developers, and owners.
“Mickle set up a simple Excel spreadsheet to track progress. First, the practice measured, through phone follow-ups, whether the initial marketing piece had been recognized and received. Then it tracked the commitments for appointments, actual meetings, opportunities to submit proposals and the return/result of the proposals, creating a wealth of information and validation. Within 60 days, for an actual materials cost of $1,200 for the 8-balls, face-to-face meetings had been arranged with 65 per cent of the list, with a nearly 95 per cent recall of the mailer. Five proposals were submitted, and three turned into projects with revenue of $50,000.”
In a conversation with me, Mickle says the 8-balls found their way into a permanent space in key decision-makers collections, but he noted that the 8-Ball campaign could only be a one-time success; follow-up strategies for the architects involved building and developing individual relationships, with gifts and recognition and much more individualized communication.
Note also that you need to have a disciplined approach to make this work. Just sending out the mailer, without the follow-up calls, I think would be an expensive process with limited return. As well, clearly your capacities must meet the demands of your market, and you need to effectively devise a manageable but reasonable list to start the process.
If you are wondering where or how to set up this sort of campaign, you probably can work with local designers or promotional service providers. Jon Goldman has built this type of campaign into his business, with the coined phrase “lumpy mail”. (Goldman is a great marketer, but I haven’t personally used his services.)
I would argue that to be successful, your direct mail or courier piece needs to be memorable, and this generally requires it to be of substantially higher cost/value than the conventional premium you might provide, but not so valuable that anyone might construe it as a bribe or inappropriate inducement. Your list also needs to be thoughtful, large enough to be meaningful, but not too large that you can’t effectively follow-through phone calls to set appointments. I would also argue that the connecting and calling should ideally be handled by firm principals rather than third-party telemarketers; in other words, you can’t pass the buck here without diminishing return and effectiveness. (Obviously, I am referencing this level of intensity for local business-to-business marketing in a relatively small market space, like an architect or sub-trade marketing to general contractors. If you have a larger area of interest, and can build this out while accepting a lower response/closing rate, you can delegate and/or automate the process more.)
You also will want to be sure you have an effective, well-designed website (It doesn’t need to be perfect, however, as I don’t think Goldman’s Lumpymail.com site will win any design awards, but he certainly has a viable business), a clear mission and most importantly, the willingness to measure and track your results and (once you’ve executed a reasonable, but not overly large sample, to test variations for better response.)
