Marketing is Every Piece of Paper
As a follow-on to my recent post, Do You Need a Brochure? (Some great discussion, thanks! Feel free to keep adding ideas over there)… Every piece of paper - or any type of communique to anyone - is a marketing opportunity! This includes (in no particular order):
1. Invoices (And, I’m not talking jamming the envelope full of more stuff.)
2. Proposals (Well, duh, but you’d be surprised how dull many of these critical documents really are - talking feeds and speeds for example when the prospective customer really needs to know how you will help him or her keep his/her job.)
3. Statements of Work
4. Renewal Letters (and emails)
5. Automated acknowledgment emails
6. Registration Renewal Reminders (Thanks for telling me my domain registration needs to be renewed, but what have you been doing lately that I might want to know about?)
7. Contracts (Sure, you’ve got ‘em, but maybe a little reminder of why they’re signing with you in the first place. People want to feel good about their choices.)
8. Estimates. (And, don’t send from “info@yourserviceprovider.com” I don’t know Mr. info.)
9. Fax Cover Sheets
10. Applications
11. The error messages on your web site (”404″ - who’s “404?” What does it mean?” Huh?)
What else? And got any ideas of what type of things should be said? Discuss.
Read More: Mary Ellen Merrigan on those ubiquitous tri-fold brochures (I admit, I usually hate the things.)
Mark Cahill on The Business Card as Brochure
Do You Have a Boring Business Card? (Um, I think I do; I’ll get back to you on that.) from Tall Poppy via Mark Cahill’s post above. Great ideas that will make you smile - and could you bear to throw any of the examples away? Hmmmm…
Please leave your thoughts on this! It may take a bit for your view to show up since I hate making people type in little letters (I can’t read most of them myself) - so I moderate all comments. Feel free to disagree - debate is healthy, but do act like a grown-up. And, I’ve blacklisted the worst obscenities, including the “f” word, as part of the troll wall.
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Tags: marketing communications, brochures, web marketing, marketing troubleshooting
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June 12th, 2007 at 7:58 am
Nice list, MS. I have to add to your #8 (I don’t know info@ etc. ) Boo to those who use addresses at aol.com or msn, yahoo and the rest, rather than advertising for their own domain.
And, one more thing. Is your contact information on every piece of paper? I just downloaded an article “Ten Tips for Marketing to Women” that did not have a company name, address or phone number. The sad truth is that I have no idea which web site I got the piece from. Now there’s a waste for the business.
June 12th, 2007 at 1:29 pm
Thanks for the link! The hardest part was limiting myself to those few business card examples. There are some excellent designs around, and now I look at my dull little card in a whole new light.
You have a great site here. Thank you for heloing me find it.
June 12th, 2007 at 1:36 pm
Yes, I’m thinking of burning mine…;-)
June 13th, 2007 at 7:54 am
[…] Mary Schmidt posted “Marketing is Every Piece of Paper“ yesterday in a follow up to the piece she wrote the other day about brochures that prompted my “Business Card as Brochure” post. As always, she’s right on target… Every piece of paper – or any type of communique to anyone – is a marketing opportunity! […]
June 13th, 2007 at 12:26 pm
Thanks, Mary Ellen - yep, everything that goes out should have contact info on it, including a web site. And, you can buy domains with email accounts for about 7 bucks over at GoDaddy - so there’s no excuse for using msn, aol, etc. When I (and many others) see those in emails, I think “Oh, they’re just getting started. Wonder if they’ll last?” and/or “Hmmm…is this a real business or a hobby?”
June 13th, 2007 at 4:51 pm
[…] Courtesy of a link via Mary Schmidt, Mary Ellen Merrigan over at the ProfitMeister blog highlights how the ubiquitous 3-fold brochure is changing, mostly as a result of Web1.0 websites. […]
June 15th, 2007 at 5:41 pm
Mary - Thanks for the list. It’s a great way to look at things and remind ourselves that, even if it’s something as simple as making sure that you’ve got a good strong tag line and use it consistently, you’re marketing. Like a lot of marketing pros, I’m the “shoemaker’s children.” For starters, I have way out of date and completely boring and useless business cards. No excuse in this day and age of instant and cheap production!