When we were in New York, I taught the main Direct Marketing course at New York University for 10 years and loved nothing more than interacting with the students, a lot of whom eventually interned at our agency.

Now that we’re in Hollywood, FL I haven’t had many opportunities to work with students, but we do have two great interns. One of them is a marketing student at Johnson & Wales University in North Miami and she and her professor invited me to her class to speak and help create a Direct Marketing project.

We came up with the JWU Challenge: develop the creative for a startup online company that sells jewelry – and it’s not just jewelry. Each piece symbolizes something significant.

The objective is to drive ready-to-buy traffic to the website. The students also have to make a promotional YouTube video that will showcase the jewelry and emphasize its symbolic meanings.

The students will receive a significant percentage of any sales they make.

They’ll present their ideas in 10 weeks and I will join the professor as judges. Can’t wait to see what creative ideas the kids come up with!

We want to see:

How many people they drive to the website to leave their email addresses for special offers and our newsletter?

Which people come to the site to visit, and what are they looking at most?

My Dad was a jewelry manufacturer in New York for many years on West 36th Street. I somehow think he’s looking down and enjoying this challenge…!

Remember planning? A lot of our clients (and even some not-yet clients) ask us for new creative ideas for their next year’s Grand Plan.

It’s nice that they think we’re so creative we can come up with brilliant ideas on the spot – sometimes we do – but often they turn a deaf ear to our best idea: look back. “You’ve had major successes in the past and what worked then will work now.”

We have to prod them a bit sometimes but eventually they remember programs that were gangbusters in, say, MDCCCCLXXXXVI, but they dropped them because the programs were “tired”. I doubt that prospects got tired of them but I know our clients did.

So maybe in 2010 you might:

• Revive a few older creative approaches that worked well. Maybe update the graphics, try a new offer. I’ve seen this work wonderfully well many times. It’s inexpensive, quick and, more often than not, very profitable.

• Make one program fantastic. One of our clients asked us to work on website, email program and newsletter all at once. We’re still hanging on to all of them waiting for photographs of staff, final product mix and a decision on a name for the their new social community. Had they asked us to focus on, say, the website, we’d have it done by now and could flow in all the missing details in a few hours. That’s what we did for our friends at the National Cleaners Association. Take a look here: NCA Website

• Take one area that your really enjoy in social media land, and focus on it. I’ve been very involved in Twitter for the last year: Check me out here: LoisGeller”s Twitter
I even have a Twitter Philosophy on following people: (twitterwatchdog) At first I tried to be on LinkedIn, Facebook, Plaxo, Ecademy, Hi5 and Twitter every day. Then Attention Deficit Disorder set in. I couldn’t learn about any of the communities until I actually spent time on them. Pick one, and focus.

• In 2010, consider going to quieter places. Everyone is running to Google. It’s competitive there, and very complicated these days. Maybe you might want to focus your efforts on another search engine where you can end up higher on the list. I know people who use Ask.com all the time.

• Consider unique, even weird, offers and use your own brand personality to articulate them in a human way. If everyone else is giving 10% off on first purchase, try a gift with purchase instead. Maybe that gift can become your trademark, like the lucky trolls I use here at the Lois Geller Marketing Group. For some reason, people love them.

• And consider under-promising and over-delivering on any of the services or products you offer. Nationally, 1-800-CONTACTS does that and I just can’t imagine ordering lenses anywhere else. Locally, Coit Cleaners does it nicely, too – surprise and delight! I always remember buying a Ford Explorer years ago. Two weeks later, they sent beautiful director’s chairs in a canvas bag.

Bought another Ford just a few months ago.

Happy 2010. Make it great.

Here’s 40 ideas that work! How do we know? We’ve tested them many times and every one of these ideas will help you boost response.

1. Know who you are! A unique brand personality makes you stand out, makes people like you, makes them want to do business with you.

2. Include some kind of letter. Even a fake “on-page” letter in a self-mailer or catalog. Packages with letters outperform letter-less mail 99% of the time. Even a boring, self-serving letter can be better than no letter. A well-written, 1 to 1 letter with some personality in it is better than anything. Get a pro to help you. It’s important.

3. Letter layout is almost as important as copy. Make it look inviting, easy to read. Use short sentences, short paragraphs, indents, double space between paragraphs, cross-heads, Johnson boxes, and a signature that looks like a human being wrote it. Not something like this: Marilyn Monroe

4. Make the signature any color you want, as long as it’s blue. It makes the letter look like it was signed by a real human being.

5. A lot of people read the P.S. before they get into the letter. It’s a great place for your single best point.

6. Urge them to respond now! Do it several times. Give them a reason why “now” is important.

7. All that white space in your letter margins is costing money. Use some of it for handwritten margin notes to make compelling points stand out. Looks more human, too.

8. Don’t let headlines just sit there. Pump them up with action words, solid promises, real benefits. Make them tantalizing. Get people curious. Usually we’ll write 20 headlines for every one we actually use.

9. Your outer envelope has only one job: to get opened by someone in the mood for what you have to say inside. Want to try a blank OE so they might think it’s from a friend? Not a good idea, because as soon as they get inside and realize it’s advertising, they’ll think you tried to fool them. Try really outrageous things on your OE. Big, interesting graphics, intriguing headlines, genuine promises, all work.

10. Test different OE creative. It’s not expensive and you might find that one OE kicks the pants off the rest.

11. Put your return address on the back flap of the envelope.

12. Turn your OE into a kind of brochure.

13. Put your offer prominently on the outer envelope, especially if it’s short, and a great offer! This really works with “glamour” products like jewelry, clothing and furniture.

14. Try putting an involvement device of some kind on your OE.

15. They won’t give you as much response as a traditional package, but postcards are a quick and easy way to test the relative merits of new lists, offers, personality.

16. Keep tweaking until your offer is irresistible. Remember it’s got to be unique, something they can’t get any other way. It’s your whole proposition, the combination of price, premium, membership, privileges, terms, future benefits, etc.

17. Restate your offer several times in your package: on the OE, in your letter and brochure and certainly on your response form.

18. FREE is still the best offer! In direct mail. For some reason it doesn’t work on the Subject line in an email.

19. A lot of people spend more time poring over creative than they do investigating lists. Creative is important, sure, but lists are twice as important. Get more list brokers working on your business and make sure you test new lists all the time.

20. Your best list is your current customer file. Your second best list is probably past customers. They’re your greatest direct marketing assets. Use them! But make sure the files are clean and up-to-date.

If you have any direct marketing questions, email Loisgeller@loisgellermarketinggroup.com

Continued…

20. Your best list is your current customer file. Your second best list is probably past customers. They’re your greatest direct marketing assets. Use them! But make sure the files are clean and up-to-date.

21. Direct response lists are always your best bet for outside lists. Someone who’s bought something through the mail is more likely to buy from you … especially if they’re recent buyers.

22. Have you ever tried a compiled list? Of course. Have you ever tried slanting the creative to the compiled list? Probably not. Names on most compiled lists have one thing in common (lawyers, accountants, soccer Moms, etc.). Whatever that one thing is, try reflecting it in your creative.

23. Use a great list broker. Ask for references, and describe your goals, package and target market. These are bright, dedicated people who want to do a great job so you’ll use them again and again.

24. Try to make your direct mail look and sound like it was touched by a human being. Customers and prospects tend to respond better when they feel like they are interacting with a real person.

25. Make sure all of your communications have the same brand personality.

26. Put the offer on your OE- especially if it’s short and a GREAT offer!

27. Try putting a special coupon on your OE.

28. Add a lift note (a.k.a. publisher’s letter). It’s another voice that adds credibility and focuses on the offer.

29. Test a live stamp on your OE. This makes the envelope look like a human being has touched it.

30. Invest in design! If you need a brochure, it should look great! A well designed brochure is almost always worth the extra cost.

31. Try a brochure CD.

32. Narrow your focus. One offer is plenty for a brochure. Think about using a catalog for more than one product or service.

33. Show people in your brochures and catalogs. Show them using your product. Your customers will be able to see how the product or service works and/or its actual size. Besides, people look at people before anything else.

34. Don’t forget to have the basic four: product description, price, offer and a guarantee, in your direct mail package.

35. Testimonials work! They add credibility to your products. Real names, real people. Show their photos if you can.

36. Features, advantages, benefits, benefits, benefits.

37. Guarantee is key! Make sure you have a great one- and this helps build trust between your brand and your customers.

38. Always use serif fonts on printed materials (fonts with feet). They are the easiest fonts to read.

39. Avoid hard-to-read text. Customers can ignore vital information simply if they can’t read it. The easiest to read is black face on a white background.

40. Put your contact information on more than just the order form. Don’t lose a sale because your customer/prospect lost your number, address or URL.

If you have any direct marketing questions, email Loisgeller@loisgellermarketinggroup.com