It seems like the whole world is going digital. Most marketing discussions are now about SEO, PPC, Social Media Marketing, etc. With all of this emphasis on E-Business, it may seem like Brick and Mortar businesses are getting left behind. Traditional marketing methods such as fliers and radio ads are getting less and less effective and more and more expensive. So, the question remains, what are some new, innovative brick and mortar marketing ideas?

Direct Message Marketing

Advertising can be expensive. You’ve likely heard horror stories and even experienced spending a significant amount of money on a traditional marketing campaign without seeing a return on your investment. This is why the way we are marketing our businesses is changing. Instead of marketing to the masses, with direct marketing you can market to the people who are by far the most likely to bring you more business, your past customers.

I can hear the protests already, yes maybe TV and radio ads don’t give you a good direct return on investment, but they build brand awareness! I’m going to stop you right there. The best way to reach new customers is through your current customers. Telling the world that you have the best product or service out there isn’t going to do much for you these days. Having your customers tell their friends that you have the best product or service, however, is going to go miles in terms of acquiring new customers. If you focus your marketing strategy on creating loyal customers I can guarantee you will start seeing new customers.

Switching your marketing methods to a direct form of marketing will not only save you money on the marketing expense end but also has the power to bring in more business than traditional marketing ever could.

Direct Marketing Statistics

If you haven’t already been sold on the powers of direct marketing here are some facts.

1. It costs 5x’s more to acquire a new customer than it does to keep a current one. (Forester)
2. Reducing your customers defection rate by just 5% can increase your profitability by 25-125%. (DestinationCRM)
3. 80% of your company’s future revenue will come from 20% of your existing customers. (Gartner)
4. The probability of selling to an existing customer is 60-70% while the probability of selling to a new prospect is just 5-20%. (MarketingMetrics)
5. Returning customers spend on average 67% more than first-time customers. (Bain)
6. Disloyalty stunts company growth by 15-20%. (TheLoyaltyEffect)

I don’t know about you but those are some pretty compelling reasons to switch your focus to direct marketing.

How to Directly Market to Your Customers

I hope you are excited about direct marketing because it really has revolutionized brick and mortar businesses and kept them profitable in a world that is going more and more online. There are good ways to directly market to your customers, and there are bad ways. Let’s go over the easy cost and time-effective methods so you can start growing your business on autopilot.

Collect Your Customers Data

The first and most important step to start direct marketing to your customers is to collect your customers’ contact information. Without it, you have no network to send out your messages. Manual methods such as fish bowls of business cards are not going to get you where you need to be. There are conditions that need to be in place before you will start being able to gather your customers’ data.

1. You need to give your customers incentive

   . If there is one thing everyone hates, its spam. Because of this people are going to be wary to give you their contact information. This is why you need to give them an incentive that outweighs the fear of spam. Loyalty programs and promotions are great incentives. Put yourself in your customers shoes, what would entice you to give away your contact information?

Pro Tip: A promotion that can be redeemed instantly is by far more effective than promotions that can be redeemed at a later date. For example, sign up now and get $2 off your order, is a much better offer than getting $2 off your next visit.

2. You Need to Make It Easy.

   If it’s going to be a hassle to join your text and email lists it’s not going to be worth whatever you are offering. Pen and paper is a hassle. The simpler it is for your customer the better.

Get the Proper Data Collection Tools

In the past, to create a text or email list you had to first collect the data, then manually add it to a spreadsheet or email platform. Ain’t nobody got time for that. It’s the same rule of thumb for yourself as it is for your customers. Making the process of data collection easy and automatic for you is going to dramatically increase the effectiveness of your network building efforts. With modern technology you can start building your lists without any effort on your part, for a complete list of these tools please visit our How to Build Your Text and Email Lists post. These tools have been tried and tested, on average we see most of our customers double the size of their lists within the first 60 days.

 

Keep in Regular Contact with Your Customers

 Once you have your customers’ contact information, it is important to set up both automated and promotional messages.

Studies show that businesses who send their customers 2-3 communications per week see 3x’s more customer visits than businesses that don’t. This is huge! How would you like to triple your revenue?

What kind of messages should you be sending? With a 99% open rate texts are by far the most effective way to communicate with your customers. If you are worried about bugging your customers don’t be. As long as you stay in the 2-3 messages per week category we are seeing less than 3% of customers opting out.

 

How Much is This All Going to Cost?

You may be thinking to yourself, yes this all sounds great, but I don’t have an unlimited marketing budget, will this be doable for my business. Let’s do the math.

Say I own a boutique that sells women’s clothing. On average I’m seeing about 30 customers a day. After a month with my kiosk we did amazingly well, and ALL of our customers opted in for our text message marketing. 30 customers a day x 30 Days = 900 customers on my contact list. Say I’m having a slow day and need to drum up some business, I want to send out a blast to my customers with a promotion. With our basic no fee plan our texts run at $0.035 per text. This price goes down as you change packages.

How many customers out of those 900 need to come in for you to make your money back? 1, 2? What happens when you get 30 or 40? For $30 you are getting your message in front of 900 people. Not only that, but you are getting your message in front of the 900 people that are most likely to come into your store.

Would you like to learn how to start an effective text marketing campaign? Sign up for our free Text Marketing Online Course!

Get Your Direct Message Marketing Campaign Started

I hope you are feeling excited about direct marketing. If your “this is too good to be true” knee-jerk reaction has manifested itself, we’ve got a great offer for you. We are so confident that this marketing system will work for you we will let you try it for free for 30 days. No credit card needed. All we need is 20 minutes of your time to get your campaigns in place then you can just sit back and watch your customers come in.

LET’S GET STARTED

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