Direct Mail may not be the newest trend, but it works.

May 10, 2012
Categories: Promoting Your Gym

My favorite children’s book growing up was by Shel Silverstein – The Giving Tree. If you have never read this book, well in many ways you are dead to me. But you have a chance to redeem yourself, and you can do it quickly. Go to Amazon right now and buy it. Have it shipped overnight, and you can read it from beginning to end in about 7 minutes. There are a lot of great lessons in The Giving Tree, and one of them is something that can help your business grow…

Trees are amazing things. There are so many things we can build using trees. For example, wooden forks, wooden cars, and wooden computers. And paper. And paper can be used for direct mail pieces. Which can be used to GET more members. I know…my logic is dizzying.

Even more dizzying is the fact that a technology guy (Happy Hossein) still believes in old fashioned marketing tools. Talk to most facility owners, and most would say print is dead. We should be spending all our dollars on email, and social media, and giving away BBQ’s for the member that refers the most members. Absolutely you should spend money on that stuff, but a good direct mail campaign is like the match that lights the fire. (Wood, kindling, trees – see where I’m going here folks?).

A great direct mail piece, with a strong call to action, can drive three things: 1) a phone call, 2) a website visit or 3) a phone/website/mobile visit. Now we know there’s someone on the other end of the phone (somebody BETTER be picking up in 3 rings with an inviting tone and a script that drives action.). As long as there’s someone on the other end of the website (i.e. a member webportal for free trials, signups, or the offer that continues the DM offer – like myClub), or on the other end of the mobile site, then you’ve driven action.

So why is everybody down on direct mailers? I would argue it’s because it’s never been done properly. More often than not, it’s an afterthought, and not part of a larger marketing strategy. Part of the problem historically has been that you can’t track the success. But if you take a little time, and some money, you can address this problem pretty easily. (Remember what we talked about in the paragraph above?) Next week in our continuing free webinar series “The Business of Our Business”, we are going to take a close look at how you can create a successful direct marketing campaign. Take 20 minutes out of your day to see what and how the best brands are STILL using direct mail marketing. Like the Giving Tree, it may not be brand new, but it’s still fresh and meaningful.