When unpacking
a recent grocery delivery, I found two 6-packs of diet soda that I hadn't
ordered. From past experience, I knew that the company wouldn't send someone
back to retrieve it.
I don't drink
diet soda, so I decided to offer it to my neighbors. I live on an upper
floor, and I didn't want to go all the way down the stairs to leave it
in the entryway. I wrote out a sign and put the soda outside my door.
After I walked back inside, I realized that I had (unconsciously) written
a miniature direct marketing ad:
FREE
DIET COKE
Delivered by Mistake
Help Yourself!
It had the
three key elements of a direct mail piece:
1) there
was an offer
2) it contained
selling points/benefits , and
3) it included
a call to action.
The offer
includes what you're selling and how much it costs (in this case, free
soda).
The selling
points/benefits explain your product's advantages and how it helps people
who buy it. In this case, the benefits are that it's a brand name product,
it's diet, and it's being given away due to an error (reassuring people
it's not defective).
The call
to action tells your prospects what you want them to do in order to
take advantage of your offer (help yourself, call now, mail this card,
etc.)
Oh, and
for the record, the soda was gone by the next morning (not bad, considering
my "list" of other tenants was only 5 people).
About the Author
Jodi Kaplan, founder of KaplanCopy, fixes "broken" marketing. If your marketing is costing more money than it's making and people leave your Web site without buying, your marketing is broken. For more tips, and a free 25-page marketing guide, go to KaplanCopy Free Marketing Guide.
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