Direct mail

jreedpw

jreedpw

New member
I am just starting my new business this coming spring. I am also a laboratory technician on a full time basis. Just in case anything ever happens to my full time job I am going to need to fall back on something so I might as well get started now.

After doing many searches and reading hundreds of threads and posts I am going to try the direct mail approach. I am working on a letter now. I think I am going to send the letter introducing myself and the services I provide with a business card. I am considering getting 100 stamps and a box of envelopes and targeting 100 houses in some of the better off neighborhoods. I will take a drive and record addresses of dirty drives, houses and roofs once the snow melts from the storm that went through. I'll have less than $75 in it with stamps, envelopes, gas and my time printing the letters. If I get 3 or 4 jobs I'll have my foot in the door in these neighborhoods. For those who use this approach, do you include a seperate flyer too so you have some color included? What do you do with the return address label? Does it have your actual address on it? That part makes me a little nervice .

Well, what do you think?

Thanks

Jim Reed
JR Pressure Washing
Lima, Ohio
 
Hi Jim, good luck with your business. I used to work for Sprint in Northeastern Indiana and would occaionally work in Lima. A 3-4% return might be a little too much to expect from direct mail. I believe a 1% return is considered a good return for direct mail.
 
I disagree with the low return rates you are being told. 1/2 percent is about what I'd expect if you were blind mailing a bunch of houses but you are specifically targeting houses you KNOW need your pressure washing service so I think that your percent is not so far off. That said, given all the work you are doing you might do better knocking on the door unless the city laws don't allow solicitation. If they don't then take photos of the properties you are mailing to and include the photo. Note on each one what you can improve and make each letter personal. Make the return address your name and address not a company name. That way they will definitely open it. With a photo of their house in the letter they will definitely read it. Make sure you are careful on how you phrase the letter so you don't make people mad you are photographing their house. That could be a gotcha if you are not careful. Let them know you are establishing yourself in the neighborhood and will give them a great deal as a result.

Tony
Pro Long Roof Care
 
^ I'd disregard everything that guy said.

You're not going to get a very good return on 100 cards. Even if the rate of return was 3-4% chances of landing that 3-4% on just 100 cards, no matter how targeted, is very slim. Those return rates are based on thousands and thousands of postcards going out. Not 100. That would be a horrible sample.

Target an area and over run them with advertising. Door fliers, rock fliers, mailers, etc...
 
When you do a postcard mailer, do you re-mail to the same addresses several times and, I so, how is the response on the second or third mailings?
 
bonefish said:
When you do a postcard mailer, do you re-mail to the same addresses several times and, I so, how is the response on the second or third mailings?
Click to expand...
Yes, the response is a little better each time. EDDM (direct mail postcards) Is for Branding, getting your name out there and in the minds of potential customers. If you are sending them to get work, you are barking up the wrong tree. Unless you send them at the exact right time with the exact right message, then maybe it is a good way to go for getting work right now. I used to send them when the HOA would send letters out. The minute I found out I had the postcards ready to go. People are lazy and procrastinate. So you have like a 3 week window.
 
I would agree 1%. Thats where I live.
 
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