but pounce on them with an offer they cannot refuse.

Direct and digital marketing is a combination of words, pictures, and ideas. A great visual tool without compelling words often goes unnoticed. Great words without the ability to attract the consumer’s attention often doom those glorious words to oblivion. Great visual images without substantive words and ideas often diminish the result.

At times, your audience may not understand a visual. Many have heard of the Pareto Principle, but after seeing in use in a post or an article, it deserves a trip to Google to answer people’s questions.

Use another pause visual to slow or stop the reader to check it out. Make sure a post or solicitation opens in another company web page so the trip back for the visitor returns to the original location. Also, this is a clever way to explain the definition of a word or phrase.

Do you know your competitors, directly or indirectly? Find out before you read their product description after seeing their product in a photo or video. You may say, “Now, why didn’t I think of that?” Or, “this new product will kill us.”

Each example is important, but prospects and customers will overlook the best words and most monumental ideas unless something grabs their attention. Producing “grabbers” work well with about any communication channel today.

The grabber for direct mail is the design. It’s the proper mix of color, shape, size, illustrations, photos, and typography.

I know what you are thinking. If you said your digital and social media communications could use a design makeover, you are correct. Try it. You won’t be disappointed.

A good headline accentuated with a photo or art is “a double whammy.”

Bright colors and bold graphics set your work apart. Illustrations are easily editable to fit your brand and can even be more universal than photography. Let Vector illustrations help your next project wrap up a punch.

Focus on creating a “how-to” or “why” or a “number series” while adding value and/or supplying entertainment in the form of a photograph, vector art, or even a short video or GIF.

As we learned in Direct Mail 101, the how-to is powerful because it engages the prospect on a deeper psychological level. It’s self-centered and most of us pay more attention when we hear “how-to and whatever follows after it.”

Try using a catchy relevant headline in the email subject line and see your open rate increase. Go a step further and add visuals with copy.

How to Reach a Qualified Target Audience… and motivate them to seek you out!

Momentum is not only a powerful force; it can keep people in motion. Eventually, when focusing on a segment of your contacts, such as once-buying prospects, you will learn how to qualify them.

The copy and the photo are enough to draw the reader in to the post. The copy can appeal to a human emotion.

Ask a question in the headline.

“What marketing communication channel delivers over 700 million messages each day?”

Curiosity can draw many reasons to find an answer. A good copywriter will add more subtle information. Like, in…

Subhead. Hint. Something you do with marketing.

 The answer is 700 million of letters and parcels are delivered yearly by the United States Postal Service. When you decide to use the US Mail channel, it’s a good guess the contact will get what you sent.

Thinking of using direct mail?

When designing direct mail, many people tend to be overly concerned about the individual design elements in the piece. Such as:

• How does the headline look?
• Should we put a few bullet points here?
• How about some added color here?

Stop! Always try to look at your design. Stand back from your thoughts and look at it as you would a cool piece of art.

Imagine the blocks of text, the headlines, and various color blocks and photos as design elements – squares, circles, rectangles. Look at what stands out and what doesn’t.

Summary

If you want to learn more about this communication channel, direct mail, visit our Direct2customers.com and visit the Library of Marketing. There are a variety of sample writings. If you have a specific need send an email to Mdoc@direct2customers.com.

Thanks for reading and please share with others – except your competition! Your time is truly appreciated.

Learning and doing, marketing and selling ideas, is what you’ll find at Direct2Customers community.

It’s what we do. It’s what we love to do.

Thanks again for reading. Questions? Mdoc@direct2customers.com     800-251-3608 (USA only)