3 Postcard Pitfalls to Avoid

Postcards may be an inexpensive way to market your business, but no matter how affordable postcards are, there's no excuse for sending out a careless campaign. Put some thought and planning into postcard campaigns to improve your bottom line and improve and future marketing efforts. Avoid these three common postcard pitfalls to achieve postcard marketing success. Pitfall No. 1: No A | B testing If you are sending to a list of at least 2,500 names then come up with two sets of postcard creative: the “A “postcard design and the “B” postcard design. Vary one thing between the two designs, such as wording of the offer, the imagery or the size or colors of the postcard. Keeping the variation down to one element will help make the test more scientific. Send these two variations to each half of your list. (With larger lists you can test a third or fourth variation, too). Keep track of which list segments received which creative and what kind of response each postcard variation received. This will tell you which variation worked better in the mail and the next time you send out a postcard you can use that baseline test to come up with more targeted postcard creative. Pitfall No. 2: Design in the live area Nothing looks more unprofessional than a promotional postcard with design or copy obscured by a USPS barcode, sticker or stamp. There are specific guidelines (link here) to designing postcards with live areas that should be left blank for use by the Postal Service. Don't waste wonderful postcard creative by having it covered up with a sticker or stamp. Pitfall No. 3: So what? I'll call this pitfall T.L.I., for Too Little Information. Since postcards have such limited real estate marketers and designers may accidentally omit the most important information. It's like when you send out a party invitation and forget to include the start time! Create a checklist of necessary items for the postcard, including an logo, company name, tagline, offer, response channel(s), URL, deadline or date, telephone number and return address.