When you are planning on sending a direct mail pieces out to your target audience, make sure you include measurement components into your marketing strategy to track direct mail pieces.  That way, you can see which marketing methods are the most effective! Use Google Analytics to Benchmark Direct Traffic Prior to sending out the direct mail piece, monitor and record the Direct Traffic that Google Analytics reports on your corporate website. Then, monitor those numbers as the direct mailer starts to land in recipients’ mailboxes. While this is not going to tell you exactly how many people hit the website because they saw your URL on the mail piece, this approach may help you to gauge if the needle moved at all. Yes, it may sound simple and less than scientific… but it’s something that should and can be done by anyone. Use Unique or Personalized URLs on the Direct Mail Piece Rather than printing your corporate website URL on the direct mail piece, use a custom or unique personalized URLs that will only be promoted to the people receiving the direct mailer. That URL may simply serve as a redirect to the corporate website once it’s entered. Or maybe it points to a landing page that is embedded into one of your site’s pages. This activity should help to serve as a good indicator if the mail piece made an impact. Ask People! This approach is often simple to execute and can result in solid data… but it’s often overlooked. In the contact forms that are provided on your website, add a question that asks people how they heard about you. Also, train and encourage sales reps to ask new prospects that request more information if they received the mailer and then record it. Moving Forward on Targeted Direct Mail Campaigns Of course, direct mail’s impact isn’t necessarily measured only within the few days it arrives at the recipient’s house.  People may store and return to that mailer at a later date — perhaps even weeks later. To see how well your targeted direct mail campaigns do, keep an eye on website traffic over the long-term to see if the impact of the mailer is still being felt. Here are a few more tips for Measuring the Results of Your Direct Mail Marketing Campaign. Any questions? Get in touch with Advertisers Printing, a St. Louis Printing Company today! 

Taking the leap towards a mobile website is a big step. Maximize your investment by including these three essentials components into your new mobile site. Keep Your Branding Consistent Your mobile site is another medium that your company can use to engage with potential customers. Keep the same branding and color scheme that your existing website has. This helps with recall and recognition, two critical components of any advertising or marketing strategy.  Visitors will also know right away that they are on the site they’re looking for- yours! Calls To Action Much like your desktop website, you want your mobile site to inspire some action from viewers. A mobile site offers the opportunity for commerce and immediate data collection. Give viewers the ability to sign up for newsletters or other initiatives. One great feature is “click to call”.  Display your phone number on your site, and one click dials the number. Now that is instant gratification. Navigation Ease A smartphone screen isn’t excessively large, and a lot of us need glasses to read their phones (ahem).  So don’t defeat the purpose of a mobile-optimized website by squeezing tiny text onto a page and adding small buttons and links. Eliminate the need for scrolling and zooming.  Also, think about the type of content you are adding to your mobile website.  Everything should be simplified.  If your website has 3-5 paragraphs on a page, you may want to cut that down to just a few sentences. If you have questions about building a mobile website, contact Advertisers Printing, a St. Louis Printing company today!

There are plenty of examples where marketers have put QR Codes on their materials simply because they could. But there also have been a great number of QR Code applications that truly provide value to a customer or prospect, and in return, to the company as well. Here are three ways that companies could incorporate QR Codes into their fulfillment process: Printed QR Codes that Point to How-To Guides and Instructions Thus, one way that companies could reach the emerging mobile audience is to place printed QR Codes on packages and boxes of the material that they sell and ship. These QR Codes could point to mobile websites and/or videos that provide step-by-step instructions and online videos that demonstrate how their items should be properly assembled. Quick Response Codes that Lead to Mobile Surveys and Forms Social networks have made it easier than ever for people to tell the world if they are happy or not with a company or product. Companies could seek to acquire that information directly as well by putting quick response codes on their packages that lead to mobile website surveys. These surveys could seek to ask the most important questions that a customer may want to answer — “Are they satisfied? Do they need help? What could be done better?” This feedback could be provided while the company and its products are absolutely fresh in the customer’s mind… right through their mobile phone. QR Code on Product Packaging Makes it Easy to Order Additional Materials When someone needs to order a replacement part or to reorder an entire unit, companies would certainly want to make that an easy process. This could be done by including a QR Code on product packaging that leads to a mobile website. The website could either contain a Form that allows a user to request the item or a response from a sales rep; or it could even include an option for placing an order directly from the phone. Think of QR Codes as not just an interactive marketing tool, but a mobile customer service representative.  These 2D codes can offer extra assistance, gather feedback, and help give your customers more of what they want! Any questions about how your company can best use QR Codes in marketing? Get in touch with Advertisers Printing, a St. Louis Printing Company today!

It’s probably only sustainable if people access it, read it and refer to it. This can certainly beg another question as to where blogging first came from. Surprisingly it has a local St Louis connection. A fellow named Brad L. Graham, a theater publicist for the Repertory Theatre of St Louis is occasionally credited with coining the term “Blogosphere”. The “blog” part comes from a shortened variation of the word “web log”, which was used to describe the various websites and when more people communicated in this vernacular, the description was shortened to simply “blog”. Sphere was added as a descriptive tagline to identify the blog world as a blogosphere. Pyra Labs, the developer of the “Blogger” product has used the term “blog” as both a noun and a verb as in a “blog” or “to blog”. It is estimated that over a third of all Internet users have read blogs on one occasion or another. As of early 2011 there were over 156 million public blogs in existence and the medium can have far reaching effects both socially and politically. Well Advertisers Connects would like to take this opportunity to formally introduce you to our own “blog” offering a range of discussions involving the interaction between our fine color printing space, how we encourage connections betIt’s probably only sustainable if people access it, read it and refer to it. This can certainly beg another question as to where blogging first came from. Surprisingly it has a local St Louis connection. A fellow named Brad L. Graham, a theater publicist for the Repertory Theatre of St Louis is occasionally credited with coining the term “Blogosphere”. The “blog” part comes from a shortened variation of the word “web log”, which was used to describe the various websites and when more people communicated in this vernacular, the description was shortened to simply “blog”. Sphere was added as a descriptive tagline to identify the blog world as a blogosphere. Pyra Labs, the developer of the “Blogger” product has used the term “blog” as both a noun and a verb as in a “blog” or “to blog”. It is estimated that over a third of all Internet users have read blogs on one occasion or another. As of early 2011 there were over 156 million public blogs in existence and the medium can have far reaching effects both socially and politically. Well Advertisers Connects would like to take this opportunity to formally introduce you to our own “blog” offering a range of discussions involving the interaction between our fine color printing space, how we encourage connections between you and your customers and how all of that relates to our environment. We’ve made some serious commitments of time, education and investment capital focusing on sustainability as it relates to our plant, people and processes. We’ve taken a leadership role as environmental stewards within our industry peer group because we do not believe the paper and printing industry has done the best job at addressing the issue. Therefore it is our hope that this blog space can act as a clearinghouse to disseminate much of the information regarding the area of sustainability within our print community. We are looking forward to sharing this space with you and we hope to hear from you as well as we begin this exciting new journey as Advertisers Connects and producing your products in the most sustainable way. What you think about this subject does matter, so be sure to let us know. Thanks for reading. @John Greeney – Because there is NO PLANet B www.advertisersconnects.com