As a marketer one of your first priorities is to engage your audience. In order to engage them, you must reach them on a personal, emotional level. For example, we all remember commercials that are awe-inspiring – the Super Bowl Budweiser commercials, commercials about soldiers coming home from war, commercials with pets or babies – we remember those commercials because they tugged on our heartstrings and caused an emotional reaction.
One of the greatest ways you can do the same with your audience is by taking advantage of current events and holidays, which likely have already captured your audience’s attention. Some of the most recent examples of leverage-able holidays and events include the Super Bowl, the winter Olympics in Sochi, and Valentine’s Day. Planning your marketing calendar around these events will increase your audience engagement and hence increase your success.
Here are a few examples of how our customers have used upcoming national holidays and events to market their businesses:
March Madness – Michael is the owner of a sporting goods store and one of our regular customers. He has achieved great success by taking advantage of sporting events to market his store. This year he designed a 5 x 8 postcard to advertise his “Monday Madness” sale – every Monday in March. Michael used his existing mailing list to send the postcards to all of his customers. In order to participate in the sale customers had to present the postcard to get a punch card. For every $10 customers spent in the store on Mondays in March they received a hole-punch. If they got 10 punches or more they were entered into a raffle and received $20 off their next purchase. Out of the 620 postcards Michael sent out, 250 were redeemed.
St. Patty’s Day: March 17, 2014 – St. Patrick’s Day has become a great day for people to join together, drink green beer, and honor Irish heritage. Connor is a local restaurant owner and each year he holds a St. Patty’s Day celebration. He uses direct mail as a means to advertise the party and invite guests. Using Click2Mail, Connor easily designed a 6.5 x 9 Every Door Direct Mail (EDDM) mailers and sent it to every resident within 10 miles of his restaurant. The postcard was an eye-catching, bright green color with a four-leaf-clover, his logo, and big words that read “A Wee Bit ‘O Celebration.” On the postcard he included all of the activities he had planned, as well as food and beverage deals. The mailers and the party were a huge hit!
Easter: April 20, 2014 – Easter may seem far away but if you’re going to use direct mail, now is the perfect time to start designing your mailer. Melissa owns an organization and storage store. She uses Click2Mail to send mailers out for almost every holiday, and Easter is no exception. Using a mailing list from Click2Mail in addition to her in-house list, Melissa sent a flyer self-mailer that read “Hop on Over for our Big Easter Sale!” When customers presented the postcard they received an additional 10% off their entire purchase. Melissa used the self-mailers to measure her success and found that 15% of the mailers that she sent out were used in the store.
These are just a few upcoming holidays and events that you can take advantage of in direct mail marketing. For more creative ideas or to get started on your next holiday mailer, visit us at Click2Mail.com!
