Direct Mail 7
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How do I get testimonials?
Satisfied customers will often write or call you and tell you how great they think your product or service is. These people, if asked, often don't mind letting you include their comments about your product or service in your sales literature. You should get a signed statement from them indicating you have their permission to use their comments in your sales literature.
Can I make up testimonials?
No, That is a violation of truth-in-advertising laws.
Can I rent my mailing list to other companies?
Renting mailing lists for traditional mail is a good source of extra income for many companies; however, you will usually need to have at least 5,000 to 10,000 names for your list to be rentable. The information also must be current and accurate. If your information is much more than 6 or 9 months old, it may have too many address or name changes (for business contacts) to be useful to others.
Do I need a bulk mail permit from the post office to send out mailings?
Mail permits let you take discounts on large mailings if these meet certain post office specifications. These specifications include the number of pieces mailed at one time, the uniformity of the pieces mailed, the destination of the mail, and the method of sorting, bundling, and depositing the mail at the post office. Since you have to pay a one-time permit fee plus an additional annual fee for each class of mail for which you want discount rates, you will need to be mailing at least several thousand pieces of mail each year in batches of at least 200 to make getting a permit worthwhile, (At this writing the one-time fee and the annual fee are each $150. If you are going to use a letter shop to prepare your mailings, they should be able to send out your mailings using their permit.
Should I use first-class or third-class mail?
That depends partly on your budget, partly on how soon you need the mail to arrive, and partly on whether you want your mail to look like a letter rather than an ad so that it will get opened. If you are mailing a piece that must reach everyone on the list by a certain date, and that date is a week or two away, or if you want your mailing to look like a regular letter, use first-class mail. Sending the mailing third class immediately alerts recipients that it is not a personal letter. In addition, third class gets sent only after all other mail goes out. If a post office is particularly busy, as it is during certain times of the year, third-class mail sits on the side until someone has time to get to it. That means it can sometimes take more than two weeks for third-class mail to reach its destination. A brochure urging readers to visit your trade show booth isn't going to do any good if your customers get it a week and a half after the trade show is over.
How can I make my mailing stand out among all the other junk mail people get?
One way to make your letter stand out is to use real stamps on it rather than using a meter. Using a lot of small denomination stamps instead of one first-class mail stamp may make it stand out, too. Still another way to make your mail stand out and get people to open it is to put a message on the outside of the envelope telling people that the contents will benefit them or save them money. And of course, you could send a colorful, over-sized postcard to get attention.
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