These days hardly anyone escapes receiving reams of junk mail every day. If you're like me, you throw many pieces of mail into the round file without even opening the envelope. But there is one kind of promotional mail you almost can't avoid glancing at: the glossy color postcard. 

Franklin

Realtors send postcards with entrancing photos of mansions they recently sold (or are hoping to sell). Restaurants send postcards with enticing photos of food. Entertainment events are often promoted with postcards portraying attractive performers or actors. And I even receive a monthly postcard from a gardener showing off his latest landscaping assignment.

Economy and convenience

The fact that postcards are read more often than letters and other materials inside of envelopes would be reason enough to prefer to send postcards. But an equally important reason is cost. Today digital color printing gives you full-color printed materials for a fraction of the cost of color materials that once had to be printed on four-color offset presses. An 8 1/2"x 11" sheet printed with color on both sides can cost as little as 60 cents each. Printing with color on one side and black and white on the other side is even cheaper. Cutting four postcards out of the sheet can reduce the per card cost to about 15 cents in quantity.

Additional economy is provided by the post office which currently charges only 23 cents per postcard. Given this printing cost and this postal rate, postcards are by far the most cost effective of all promotional mailing methods.

A full arsenal of postcard missiles

While postcards alone are no substitute for live visits, phone calls, or personalized letters, they can be a shop's most powerful means of connecting and staying in touch with customers, prospective customers, agents, DRP decision-makers, dealerships, fleet and commercial prospects, business exchange prospects and more. The following is a brief summary of possible card types:

• Estimate Follow-up cards 1, 2 & 3

• Thank-you cards 1 & 2

• CSI card

• Prior customer card

• Referral reward card

• Referral source info card to agents, DRP contacts, and dealerships

• Commercial fleet biz card

• Announcement card for events

• Neighborhood discount & coupon card for seniors, students, parents, stores, etc.

Estimate follow-up cards

One shop owner I called on had three postcards he sent out after doing an estimate. The first one thanked the prospect for coming in. If that didn't bring in the customer, the second card offered a special discount and free rental car for both the prospect and anyone he or she might refer. With still no result, the third card offered everything possible: free pick-up and delivery, complete detail inside and out, and even some extra mechanical services. This shop owner told me this post card system had kept his shop filled to capacity for years. He never had to do any other advertising or promotion.

His marketing philosophy is consistent with a view of marketing experts who say that the cost of bringing a new customer to any place of business is so high these days, that every business owner should do everything possible to retain any prospect who sets foot in the door! This shop owner followed that advice perfectly with his escalating postcard offers.

Standard thank you cards

Most estimating systems and management systems come with built-in thank you letters - the impersonal kinds of letters you might receive from your bank or insurance agent. You can tell at a glance they're computer-generated. Nevertheless, they're better than no thank you letter at all. But one shop owner I know of took a more real, more effective and more artistic approach to sending a thank-you. He put before-and-after photos with the thank-you letter. You can be sure no customer would quickly forget that thank you!

This was in the days before digital color postcards. Today it would be a simple matter to put the before photo on the front side of a postcard, and the after photo on the other side. Not only would your customer not forget that repair, but he or she would probably keep that postcard for years.