North Star featured in Enterprising Women

February 5, 2009

Build a Bolder, Better Business by Thinking Small

By April Williams

 

In today’s technological world, it is harder than ever to cut through the clutter to create visibility and top-of-mind awareness for a business.

 

As business owners we tend to want to think of that “big idea” - the one that will allow us to remove all the noise in the world - the noise that muffles our message. However, in reality it is the little things – thinking on a much smaller scale – that will get us noticed in the long run.

 

Today, consumers receive more than 3,000 marketing messages a day, and a trip to the shopping mall raises that number to more than 10,000 messages per day. The answer to being heard above all of this noise is to think small.

 

Change the Way We Think

A few years back, my team conducted a survey that asked business people if they ever throw away a piece of mail without opening it. Not surprisingly, 99.7% said yes and I challenge you to think about if you do the same.

 

Why do we do it? Either we don’t recognize the company, it is not relevant to our life, or the mail piece is too lengthy to read. Why then, when it comes time to send out our own marketing pieces, do we send blanket messages to masses of people we don’t know? Often, we are unsure if the offer is even of interest to our audience, and we include multiple messages that are undigestable together.

 

It is no wonder the industry’s direct mail response rate averages between 1% and 3% (according to PostCardSmart.com).

 

Smaller Messages Work

The most important aspect to any customer outreach campaign is to focus first on the target audience, which is often the customer or prospect. Consider the size of the message and what the call to action is, and be as small and specific as possible.

 

Give your team time to develop a clear message and a direct call to action. The direct mail piece should speak to each customer; this often will mean tailoring the message and segmenting the audience into a few mailings. By specifying and tailoring the message, the audience will know instantly if there is interest and then act on that interest.

 

Frequent Contact Builds Relationships

It is 7 times more costly to get a new customer than to keep an existing one. Sending short messages frequently is a great way to stay top-of-mind with existing customers, especially since 30% of consumers renewed a relationship with a business after a period of time because of something they received in the mail, according to DMNews 2007 Direct Mail Survey.

 

Recent studies have shown that sending a postcard is a far more effective communication tool than a letter. A postcard can be glanced at quickly, saved for future reference or tossed in one fell swoop. A letter must be opened, read, digested and sorted or filed. The extra steps and effort required to open a letter significantly reduce the chances that it will be opened – especially if the recipient does not recognize the company name or logo on the envelope.

 

The Key to a Better Business

The key to building a better business is to think small and communicate more often with less information. Doing so provides just enough information to entice customers or prospects to begin (or rekindle) a dialogue with you.

 

Consumers are overwhelmed with lives that are chock full of family, work, technology, recreational activities, and more. Help them to choose you, and remember while it may seem counterintuitive, in this technological age if you want to grow big, you need to think small.

 

April Williams is the president and visionary of North Star Marketing, a RI-based full service marketing and public relations firm. Williams has 15+ years of marketing expertise and speaks from tried and true marketing communications experience. You can reach her by email at april@fortheloveofmarketing.com.

 

 

How April Williams Went Small

At North Star Marketing, we developed the World’s Smallest Newsletter (WSN) to stay in front of prospects. The WSN is exactly what it sounds like - a small newsletter on a 4X6 postcard.

 

Over 90% of our business comes from this tool. Why? Because it can be read in less than two minutes. When people are able to learn quickly and make a decision instantly if they need your services it benefits your company. Some of our prospects receive the WSN for 4-5 years before calling us - but, they admit they were always thinking about us.

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