Now that the piece has gotten enough attention to be opened (the biggest hurdle of direct mail, where a 1% to 3% response rate is considered average) it is time to turn to sales letter copy. Each peice of direct mail should have one single purpose. I don’t care what that is, you decide. Just be sure you aren’t trying to get your prospect to do more than one thing.

Typically, your first step in direct-mail would be to design a campaign. What? A campaign? Is this some sort of Crusade or something? YES! Exactly. You’re wasting your money if you only send one mailing. Or even if you send multiple mailings which aren’t consistent.

For example, the guy selling roasted pecans with a sign that says “Free Samples.” Not only did he have a sign that said “Free Samples”, but he waited to make eye contact with you and said “Why don’t you try one – they’re free.”

I’ll bet there are a lot of things you do in your business which your customers would like to know about. Don’t assume everyone knows what you know about your business.

How many of your current customers have been referred to you by another happy customer? How many new customers can you depend on getting from word of mouth each month? Don’t know? Well, it’s okay. That just makes you normal.