National Clothesline

This month, I’m revisiting a subject I touched on three years ago in an article entitled “Think inside the box, for a change.” Actually, the article ran in the March, 2004 issue, but I’ve had so many phone calls on the subject since then… especially during the past three months, that I’ve decided to take a second look.

Instead of waiting for sales to come to them, more and more cleaners are taking it to the streets … offering pick up and delivery service to a higher class of prospect. And why not? Sell

them and you’ll gain customers capable of giving you bigger orders more frequently.

In addition, these folks tend to be more loyal than normal retail customers so the extra effort pays significant rewards.

Arguably, the most effective way to sell buyers on home service is through face-to-face contact, but this raises three problems. First, a good salesperson is not easy to find and second, even if you have one, they often never meet the homeowner.

A third issue is that more and more communities are restricting entrance to authorized deliveries only. These are “gated communities” and solicitors are not welcome. So how does an enterprising drycleaner penetrate the gate?

While traveling in the Orient some years ago, my friend, John, walked into a shop and spotted a beautiful hand-carved jade chess set. It was expensive, but exactly what he was looking for, so he bought a dozen.

Upon returning to the States, he sent one of the chess sets to a company president but before wrapping the gift, he removed one of the two kings.

A handwritten note explained that the hand-carved jade chess set was free, but not completely intact. The final line of the note read, “If you want to collect your missing king, make an appointment with me.”

The idea paid off. John got his appointment, the president got his king and a great idea was born.

John sells consulting services to key businesses and sometimes it’s very difficult to get in the door.

During the next year, he sent the remaining chess sets out to select individuals from a list of target businesses. He always used the same approach. He would hold back the king when sending the set to a man and he would hold back the queen for an appointment with a female executive.

His success rate at booking appointments was an astounding 100 percent! Every missing king and queen was ransomed.

If you stop and think about it, the corporate office is the ultimate gated community and unless you ’re extremely clever, you may never get past a good gatekeeper, who carefully screens every phone call and scrutinizes each piece of mail.

Sometimes it pays to think “inside” the box. If you want to make an impact and be certain your mail gets opened, make the package a 3-D mailer — something with dimension.

I’ve been on Ted’s mailing list for years. Ted is a marketing guru in Florida. We met while we were attending a seminar together and ever since then I have enjoyed his continuous stream of very cleverly packaged direct mail offers. I say, “enjoyed,” because it’s both entertaining and instructive to see how he gets his message across.

He mails often and almost always uses 3-D packages. The packages are big, colorful, awkward and sometimes lumpy. You can ’t ignore lumpy mail. You just have to find out what’s making it lumpy.

Over the years, Ted has sent me tubes of every size, boxes, sheets of cardboard, plastic bags, tin cans, brightly colored metallic paper envelopes, see-through plastic bags and once, he even sent me a pitch in a paper lunch bag.

Dimensional mail is, without a doubt, the most expensive type of direct marketing you can do. It ’s generally used in business-to-business applications such as a $1,200 jade chess set used to secure a $30,000 consulting job. But 3-D can also be used by anyone who wants a great return and is not afraid to spend the money.

There are only a few ways to gain access to the gated community. One option is through telemarketing, however, in recent years tough restrictions have been placed on companies that solicit by phone.

Another means of contact is through direct mail. Everyone has a mailbox and it’s not against the law to send a sales pitch on a postcard or in an envelope.

But even though direct mail is an excellent medium, it sometimes requires a repeated effort to break down resistance, gain recognition and establish trust with the prospect. If you ’re eager to see quicker results, perhaps it’s time you took direct mail to a higher level.

Just recently, the owner of my letter shop led me into a back room at his facility. There were six 8-foot tables and at least 30 women involved in a special mailing. It consisted of a short pitch, a response card, a small toy truck and a colorful cardboard box. The guy sells lift trucks and this is, by far, the best way he ’s ever found to get his message directly to the decision maker.

After visiting my mail shop, I decided it was time to do a 3-D project of my own. I routinely mail a minimum of 5,000 postcards every month and I ’ve done this for over two years, but last month I went “lumpy” and mailed out 200 boxes.

Each box was hand addressed in ink with the full name and job title of the recipient (I did my homework). I used real, colorful postage stamps (it shows the effort — no indicia and no metering). Oh, and I did not show my company name on the return address (curiosity gets people into the box).

Actually. instead of making the mailing lumpy, I made it rattle by leaving out any filler or cushioning. This little trick not only made for good sound effects but it also saved me a lot of money.

The project is only two weeks old and the expiration date is still another two weeks away, but already I ’ve received 63 orders and my very expensive mailing has long since paid for itself.

Can you penetrate the gated community? Of course you can! Just think of a gated and fenced community as the city of Troy. Now, what sort of Trojan horse can you put together? Think … then send in that carefully crafted gift package and wait for the gates to open!