8 Ways to Design Successful Postcards
Learn how to effectively deploy postcards in your direct mail arsenal
February 2009 By Britt BrouseThe letter package promises a whole entourage of elements buffering an offer, while the bare-bones approach of a postcard arguably loses the touchy-feely, hold-your-hand sell of a letter package.
“I was against postcard use except for very retail- oriented transactions like notifying somebody of a dollars-off or percentage-off sale, or trying to drive traffic to a retail location like a coffee shop, but that really kind of changed last year when the postal costs hit us really hard and the costs went up,” commented Steve Penn, CEO and executive creative director of Minneapolis-based Penn Garritano Direct Response Marketing. Penn and many other marketers are now considering using the postcard in their arsenals to fight against rising production and postage costs—and help bottom lines hit hard by tough economic times. While testing a postcard format, marketers may be surprised by its many benefits.
The Case for Postcards
Aside from the obvious cost benefits, postcards offer several marketing advantages. Postcard formats can be effective touches at any point in a campaign, as stand-alone efforts or part of a series of touches, according to Brent Foreman, president of Group 3 Marketing, a Wayzata, Minnesota–based relationship marketing company. Keith Goodman, vice president of corporate solutions with Modern Postcard, a Carlsbad, California–based printing and mailing company, agreed that there are no rules limiting the use of postcards to specific touchpoints. “There [are] always going to be multiple touches in any type of marketing campaign. If [done] the right way, a postcard can be used for any of the steps. We have customers [who] use postcards for three or four steps of a marketing campaign very successfully and close a lot of business because of it,” he said.
Another advantage of the postcard is its 100 percent open rate. “It’s very easy to get somebody to open and read it because it’s already opened,” Goodman explained. He referenced the fast pace of baby boomers and generation-Xers’ media consumption and said the postcard is a concise way of delivering information to overloaded prospects.
The postcard also is effective in driving prospects online or to a telephone number. “You’re not so much trying to necessarily sell your product or service on a direct mail piece; you are trying to capture enough information [so] somebody will call, visit a store, go to a website and make that next step [so] a transaction will take place. You can get a very clear, concise message that’s there on the desktop or the kitchen table—and that next step is made,” Goodman described.
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