The “Big 3″ of Small Business Marketing: Business Cards, Postcards, & Brochures
You probably have thought about marketing for your small business at some point recently. As you know, every small business needs a marketing plan to generate leads and create business. But without an in-depth marketing plan already laid or the time and effort to write one, what can you do right now that will help advance your business and generate more profit for you? The answer: the “Big 3″ of marketing media–business cards, postcards, and brochures.
Before we talk about the “Big 3,” you need to have an idea for what your marketing campaign really is/does. While this post is more about the actual print materials, I have two free ebooks available that go a bit more into marketing and ideas–
Building Viral (downloaded 1766 times)
Ideas That Don't Suck (downloaded 2532 times)
Business Cards
Business cards are usually one of the first things a new business owner or entrepreneur views as a start-up necessity. After all, when talking to prospects, we want to be able to hand them our information in a tidy, professional way that solidifies our business in their eyes as a legitimate enterprise. But have you thought about your business card from a marketing standpoint?
Traditionally, business cards are found in a 2″ x 3.5″ size on a 12, 14, or 16 pt. stock and can be many different colors and finishes. Some design firms can even print cards on clear plastic or vellum paper, and with options like rounded corners, high, low, or medium gloss or raised ink and spot UV, there are literally countless options to make your card stand out. From a marketing perspective, you need that card to stand out!
Most professional firms (law practices, doctors, real-estate, etc.) will opt for a standard size matte finish card on 12 or 14 pt. stock with simple black text on the front and no back. There’s no reason to stray from the beaten path if you’re in one of these professions–chances are if you hand someone your card, it’s because you already have their business. Either way, there’s not much to your USP (Unique Selling Proposition) that you’ll need/want to reinforce on your card.
If you don’t fall into one of the “certified professional” fields and can actually benefit from a bit of smart marketing, don’t forget about the available real estate on the back of the business card. I like the way a simple design on the front (I’m minimalistic) couples with some marketing, services, additional contact info, etc. on the back. Here’s a look at my company’s business card:
Notice how the front only displays my company’s logo and name, and the back includes a few of our services and contact information. There’s no reason I needed to include everything here, because I didn’t want it to look too cluttered. Keep these considerations in mind as you begin designing yours.
Finally, business cards are dirt cheap. Don’t worry about changing up a design element or reprinting for the sake of changing some contact info–it’ll better serve you to buy new cards now rather than white-out and rewrite everything yourself! If there is any time to go all out and get the best quality possible, it’s on business cards. My company can print 100 cards for around $35, and in most industries your business card can be your meal ticket.
Postcards
The next step up in your marketing grab bag should be postcards. Commonly found in a 4″ x 6″ size, postcards are used in direct mail campaigns, handouts, and places of business as coupons and such. Also dirt cheap, they provide your prospects with another reminder about your great company, and can delve a bit deeper into specific product lines. I like to use postcards as a marketing tactic to help my prospects remember me when they decide to purchase print or web media, so I created the “Take Your Message to A Higher Level” campaign. The postcards were printed on full color glossy UV/Aqueous coated 14 pt. stock, and can be found on my company’s site here.
Brochures
Brochures should be seen as the Holy Grail of your marketing goody bag, as the final player in your first contact marketing, or as a final product “sales sheet” for your prospects. Small businesses often misuse brochures, incorporating bad design and crappy copy with useless images and too many descriptions of their products’ features and not benefits.
Instead, use your well-designed (if you need design, let me know–we are great at it!) brochure to go into a little more depth on your product or product line than business cards and postcards are able to do, but let the design–not the copy–speak for the quality of the product. You can hand me a crappily-designed brochure that has glorious copy all over it and a sleek, simple, to-the-point sexy brochure with less verbiage on it and guess which one I’ll pick?
The power of the “Big 3″ isn’t in what each individual media channel can do but what they can do as a whole–use your business card to make an introduction, the postcard to entice them, and the brochure to tell them how much it’s going to cost. They’ll still ask questions–and that’s good–they’re still buying from a person, not a piece of paper! Use the Big 3 to guide your sale and keep the process flowing, and to leave them with something tangible whether or not they buy right away.
Any questions?
Related posts:
experience