Everywhere Small Business

So I have laid out proven principles for generating consistent results with direct mail. And I have talked about the importance of marketing integration (e.g. using different marketing strategies to generate leads and turn them into sales). And if you’re thinking that all this just sounds like a bit too much to handle, especially for a small business owner without a dedicated marketing professional on staff...Well, you’re right! It should!

There is a lot to handle — too many hats for just one head, if you will.

Enter Everywhere Small Business®

Everywhere Small Business® is the groundbreaking, industry- shaking product. Basically, instead of just ordering a direct mail campaign (design, printing, mailing, etc.), you can now get a completely integrated campaign that includes:

• Postcard Design
• Mailing List Acquisition
• Printing
• Addressing & Mailing Services
• Mail Tracking
• Automatic Online Follow-up
• Phone Response Tracking

Imagine this: You’re super excited about your new postcard campaign, because you have the perfect design and a mailing list that targets only the highest quality prospects. You are itching to know when they will actually reach mailboxes. So you log into your Everywhere Small Business® (aka ESB) account and easily find out the exact date the cards will be delivered. Simple!

Now imagine this: one of your ideal prospects gets your card and goes to your website for more information. Yes! But then they leave your site without filling out a contact form or calling you. Noooo!

But have faith — they’re actually not lost, because ESB kicks in and starts to show follow-up banner ads to the prospects who bail on your site without interacting. And I’m talking about banner ads on MILLIONS of websites worldwide, from CNN.com to HGTV.com. Eventually, the prospect clicks one of the ads to return to your site and complete the purchase. YAHTZEE!

Noooow, imagine this: You are swamped with new business, but you don’t know how much is attributable to the postcards. What to do? It’s easy actually. You just log into your ESB account and get a full report on how many calls you received from the mailing AND how many online prospects your campaign is still following!

I know I sound excited — because I am! At the time of writing this, we’ve seen results from thousands of clients and their ROI is so much better than with direct mail alone. I’ve got a case study for you to review at the end of this chapter.

Let’s break down how Everywhere Small Business® helps you maximize response with minimal effort:

Step 1: Direct Mail Acts as Your Lead Generator

Direct mail postcards are a proven lead generator for small businesses. They are effective because of all the reasons outlined in the previous chapters of this book (i.e. targeted mailing lists, no envelope to open, reach large audiences, etc.). And you are using them already, so no need to belabor the point here.

Step 2: Mail Tracking Keeps You Prepared to Succeed

Now, when your postcards get mailed, it benefits you to know when they will reach your prospects, because as your cards begin to generate responses, you need to be ready to handle those responses. Of course, you ideally want to prepare to handle the influx in the most cost-efficient manner possible — and that’s where mail tracking comes in. Mail tracking allows you to make the necessary preparations at the right time (i.e. when your prospects have received your card in their mailbox.) This way you don’t waste money on extra staff or other preparations if the cards are held up in the mail.

Step 3: Your ESB Campaign Follows Up with Online, Facebook & Instagram ads.

If a prospect calls in to your business or fills out a form on your website, you know how to follow up (or you will once you read the follow-up chapter of this book!). But what if the prospect goes to your website and DOESN’T leave contact info? We’ve all done it, right? You are interested in a business, you go to their site, mosey around a bit and then leave. It happens a lot.

But when your prospects do it, how are you supposed to follow up with them? Everywhere Small Business® includes a tool that lets you track every prospect AND automatically show them targeted ads on millions of websites, plus on Facebook and Instagram, once they leave (if they don’t convert from a visitor to a lead, of course). All you have to do is include a small portion of code on your website and design your ads (and we can do all that).

The process happens automatically from there.

Of course, you still don’t have their name and email address, but it’s the next best thing. The prospect will be exposed to your message by seeing your ad literally hundreds or even thousands of times, eventually getting them to click back through to your website or call you.

This creates brand awareness and credibility for you, and gives you the same tools the gigantic companies use. I’m sure you’ve noticed this when you visit a big site and then leave — their ads are everywhere! Well, that will be YOUR company with Everywhere Small Business®.

Step 4: Call Tracking Helps You Improve with Each New Campaign

ESB lets you see how effective your campaign is at creating callers. If you have a product or service that requires the prospect to actually speak with someone at your company in order to become a customer, you definitely want to ensure the postcard and the follow-up ads get people to actually pick up that phone and call. ESB lets you track exactly how many people are calling in using a call tracking feature that gathers data from your phone responses.

A unique phone number is used to route calls to your office, but it also counts how many responses come in from each campaign. The software even records your phone calls, so you can evaluate your reception and sales tactics. This data allows you to experiment with different designs, messages, and offers to find which combination gets the best response.

When all is said and done: if you are a business owner who doesn’t have the time or staff to effectively set up, monitor, and tweak a complete marketing campaign, ESB can save you a ton of time, hassle, and money. It is not my intention to proselytize in this book (you can definitely purchase all of these services separately and handle them yourself). But my mission is to make marketing easier on you — not more complex.

Case Study

Kathleen Mullaney, DDS, FAGD

Kathleen Mullaney, DDS, FAGD Marketing Postcard

Length of Time Mailing Postcards:

Dr. Mullaney has been mailing 12,000 postcards every month since 2019 with ESB, taking only two months off from mailings at the very beginning of the Covid-19 mandatory shutdowns for dentists.

Problem Trying to Solve:

Dr. Mullaney saw a big drop in her new patient numbers around 2009, and while another marketing agency initially helped boost those numbers, things had started to decline again. She knew her marketing approach needed another revamp. She attended our bi-annual Small Business Owners Growth Summit and came away with several big ideas to jump-start her marketing and her business.

ROI:

Following their first year of mailings with PostcardMania, they brought in over $145,000 from new patients responding to her postcards, and, as of the beginning of 2021, Dr. Mullaney directly attributes 26 new patients to her postcard campaign.

As a high-end boutique practice that is fee-for-service (meaning they don’t accept any type of insurance), Dr. Mullaney calls this “wildfire kind of good.” The lifetime value of each of her patients is $8,500 to $9,500, which puts her return somewhere between $221,000 on the low end and $247,000 on the higher end of that spectrum. At the time I spoke with her, she had spent $39,261.30 on her campaign, which puts her ROI around 462% to 529%.

Now let’s talk about how to budget for your marketing.
(Hint: There is a worksheet that makes it super simple.)