If you have read some of our other articles, one common theme that you will notice is that we recommend using a variety of different direct mail pieces as part of your auto repair shops comprehensive direct mail strategy.
That said, one piece that I always recommend including into your plan is a Jumbo 8.5″ × 10.5″ postcard. It is many times overlooked by its smaller highly effective younger partner the 5.5″ × 10.5″ postcard.
There are several reasons we recommend a Jumbo 8.5″ × 10.5″ postcard:
Legibility
Many times, auto shop owners want to include more content than a smaller size postcard can handle while remaining legible.
The quickest way to kill a direct mail campaign is to make it hard to read or make it confusing with too much poorly written ad copy.
Therefore, it’s critical your direct mail marketing be legible to the masses. In many cases this means you must remove content or increase the size of your direct mail piece.
Rarely is cutting strategic and necessary ad copy from your direct mail marketing, due to size constraints, the right idea. This is where the Jumbo 8.5″ × 10.5″ postcard is the perfect solution. The larger size card not only allows for more content it gives you the extra spaced needed to increase the size of your ad copy to ensure maximum readability.
The takeaway here, no matter what you choose legibility is king…
Stick Out More in the Mailbox
The larger 8.5″ × 10.5″ postcard will stick out from other envelopes and smaller 4″ × 6″ size postcard style mailers.
Remember the success of your direct mail campaign is based on all aspects being executed properly including, your design, your mailing area and list, your strategy, your CTA and most certainly visibility is critical piece.
After all, if your mailer doesn’t grab your prospects attention, it may immediately be overlooked, as is the case many times with small 4″ × 6″ cards as they fall behind a larger piece of mail.
A Jumbo 8.5″ × 10.5″ or comparable size postcard will help ensure that your prospects won’t miss your advertisement in their mailboxes.
Here is an example of three direct mail pieces I received last week, with the addition of a Jumbo 8.5″ × 10.5″ postcard behind them to give you a better perspective of the size of your card plays regarding visibility. Take note the 4.25″ × 6″ Postcard that has just about zero visibility as it is stuck behind a larger envelope mailer. Yes, your prospects are going to see the smaller card, but they certainly do stick out and grab your attention.
Keep Your Marketing Fresh
If you keep sending your prospects the same direct mail marketing advertisement repeatedly, your marketing risks the chance of getting stale and diminishing its potential impact.
This is the problem many times with shared mail that comes in an envelope or shared mail that comes all jumbled together with things inserted into other things, inserted in to even more things. It’s typically the same ads repeatedly in the same medium and in my case, I toss it out every time for this very reason.
As a matter of fact, we are asked repeatedly by clients if we can stop their mail from being delivered the same day that this jumbled up inserted shared mail does.
This certainly isn’t the outcome we are looking to achieve for your auto repair shop.
Who Should Not Use Jumbo Postcards?
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Specialty Shops That Want to Target A direct Mail Campaign to Owners of Specific Vehicles
For these shops, I typically do not recommend this larger 8.5″ × 10.5″ postcard because it mails at a much higher postage rate to the tune of about 10+ cents more per piece due to this type of targeted list mailer based on its size as compared to the postage rate on a smaller 5.5″ × 10.5″ postcard for example.
If the 5.5″ × 10.5″ postcard isn’t large enough for the content you want to promote, I recommend you consider a 10.5″ × 17″ brochure.
The reason being is that a 10.5″ × 17″ Brochure’s finished size after being folded Is 5.75″ × 10.5″ which still gives you increased visibility in the mailbox. Furthermore, when unfolded it gives you 2x the amount of marketing space than the 8.5″ × 10.5″ postcard, making a brochure a great solution.
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General & Specialty Shops That Want to Deploy a Targeted Direct Mail Campaign to Their Database of Customers
This type of targeted mailing has the same increased cost in postage for the larger size 8.5″ × 10.5″ postcard, exactly like it does for targeted vehicle list mailings.
In the case of a database mailer the 5.5″ × 10.5″ size card is usually sufficient. However, our plastic postcard mailers are the number one choice for targeted database mailers and all three of our sizes mail at the lower postage rate.
For samples of our Jumbo Postcard, as well as over 14 other high impact direct mail marketing pieces, give us a call today.