What Most “Lead Gen” Gets Wrong: The 4-Step Fix

You want more leads coming in. You need better-quality new customers. Have you ever thought that advertising is like flushing money down the toilet?

Most small- to medium-sized businesses feel frustration and disappointment about their advertising results—or lack of results.

If this sounds like you, read on.

The two basic things you need to get results are:

1. A way to target exactly who you want as a new customer.
2. An affordable way to reach your ideal prospective customers that is reliable and bypasses your competitors.

So what is it?

What do you, every single one of your current customers, and every potential new customer have in common? You have a mailbox, and you receive mail every day. You get it. You see it. You touch it.

Used correctly, direct mail gives you a huge advantage over your competition for three reasons:

1. You can target exactly who you want as a customer. No “hope and pray” that someone will see your ad and click.
2. You can put your message directly in their hands. It gets seen. No spam filters. No screen swipes. Just your message in their mailbox and in their hands.
3. There’s less competition in the mailbox. Online, you’re buried in a sea of competitors.

You may be reading this and thinking, “I tried direct mail a few years ago and it didn’t work.” Fair point.

But the digital ads you’re running and the SEO you’re paying for every month—are they working the way you want?

There are only four reasons why direct mail doesn’t get a response. Only four. And they’re easy to identify and simple to fix.

1. The mailing list was bad.

Either the list was old, the audience was incorrect, or the quality was poor.

Old list. Wrong demographics. Wrong area.

Unlike most other marketing, you can get a mailing list that targets exactly who you want—age, area, lifestyle, income, and more.

2. The mailer design or content was bad.

Wrong message. Too much information. No clear call to action. No offer.

Too many opinions about what “should” or “should not” be on the postcard.

The biggest challenge we face when working with clients is that they show the design to their office manager, brother, spouse—everyone—and everyone has an opinion about what the postcard should say.

The problem is that everyone they show the design to has an opinion, but those opinions are just that—opinions based on zero knowledge, experience, or data.

The ad ends up looking “good” according to everyone asked, but it doesn’t appeal to the only person who matters: the prospective customer.

The result? No results.

The mailer fails, and money gets wasted because decisions were based on opinions instead of best practices proven over thousands of direct mail campaigns.

3. Lack of consistency.

Rome wasn’t built in a day, and sending a mailer one or two times probably isn’t going to bury you in new customers. It takes time to gain traction, and it requires repetition.

This is true for every type of advertising—not just direct mail.

Here’s what happens 99% of the time: Someone sees your postcard and becomes interested. They set it aside to call later, or they go to your website to research your company and read reviews.

The problem is that once that prospect goes online, they get tagged as having buying intent, and they immediately start seeing ads from your competitors. You lose the lead your mailer generated.

You may have noticed that you’re getting website traffic but few—if any—calls from that traffic.

4. No follow-up after they leave your website.

Sure, you can run digital remarketing ads, but again, your ad is lost in a sea of competition online.

The solution is offline retargeting using Visitor Match & Mail. This is an offline remarketing platform we developed to solve this problem for our clients.

Basically, the service mails a follow-up postcard based on the page someone visited on your website. It matches their interest with a message and special offer related to what they were looking at.

Visitor Match & Mail makes sense because people visiting your website must be in the market—or soon will be—for what your company sells.

There is no other reason to be on your website. So why not put a message with a special offer directly into the hands of someone who is already a hotter prospect? Visitor Match & Mail provides offline follow-up with little to no competition in the mailbox.

It’s inexpensive. And it works. Visitor Match & Mail is the missing part of your marketing—and it’s vital if you want bigger returns from your advertising.