Tired, old marketing

Are you sending out the same marketing material you were, say, 2 or 3 years ago?  How many times do you think current, past & potential customers have seen that material already and what kind of assumptions do you think they are making about it?

In a recession, brand new marketing materials, leaflets, brochures, posters etc. may be beyond the reach of the small business owner. So instead of a complete overhaul simply revamp your existing materials.

I’m not talking about changing your brand, as your brand is very important, but maybe just a new lease of life to those old promotions and leaflets.

Think changing colours, updating images, revamping the covers, new exciting promotions.

Flirt with new formats.  How else could you present your ‘wares’?  Familiarity is good, but it also breeds contempt.

Work on those sales letters bring them up to date and try some new copywriting ideas. This is quick and easy and you can do it yourself so cost-free as well!

Don’t let people bin your promotions with the other junk mail, liven them up and get noticed again.

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What does your marketing material say about you?

My company recently did its yearly leaflet drop. This costs a fair amount of money especially over the 9 areas which it operates. The costs include design and print of the leaflets, delivery of the leaflets to the distributors and then the distribution to 127,000 homes (that’s just one area).

Now when I saw the leaflets I was less than impressed. It was bigger than A5 and on very cheap paper making it very floppy and it tended to rip quite easily. I won’t go into the actual design and text at this time – but believe me it should have been much better.

A couple of weeks after the leaflets had gone out I was at a networking breakfast and was approached by a gentleman that does design and print work such as leaflets, business cards etc. He hadn’t received one of our floppy leaflets, but, one of his friends had, and his friend had passed it to him saying ‘’these people need your help’’. Embarrassed was not the word! The gentleman then produced his business card and asked if I could pass it one to head office and he would be happy to help them on their next leaflet run.

This made me think just how many other people picked up that leaflet off their door mat and either consciously or unconsciously recognised the poor, cheap quality. Has this now affected whether or not people buy from us? Do the local community now see us as cheap or unprofessional?

I’m not sure if I’m in a position to answer those questions but what I can tell is our branch received only a 0.01% response from the leaflet drop.

My advice is to produce marketing material that is suitable for your business and your business’s needs. If you’re trying to get people to spend thousands of pounds with you then don’t skimp on the marketing materials – show that your company has value. Likewise, if you are maybe only trying to get new customers to spend just a small amount each, then don’t go over board and bankrupt yourself by getting luxury silk leaflets.

And always get a second opinion – you may love your design but you are biased, so please get an honest opinion and see it as a positive way of improving your marketing.

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