Using EDDM to send coupons to your (potential) consumers

Posted on 17th February, by Quan Luu in On Our Mind. Comments Off

EDDM is a great tool that’s been continuing to rise in popularity over the past few years. Thanks to the United States Postal Service offering a new method of distribution, businesses are now able to send postcards to select parts of the city without the need for a mailing route. The cost of postage for Every Door Direct Mail is far below standard postage rates, so that makes it even better for the thrifty entrepreneur.

When designing your postcard, you’re going to want to keep a couple things in mind.

What is your desired result so that you can gauge the effectiveness of your campaign? Perhaps the most common intent of postcard campaigns is to advertise a set of products or services. If that’s the route you’d like to go, dedicate one side to the advertisement, and the other side to your business information. Ideally, your logo will go on both sides, but is not a requirement. For the side with the advertisement, it can be useful to make a couple different sections for each individual product inside a dotted line perimeter. Essentially, you’ll be making a few coupons on your print.

If you do decide to go with EDDM, it’s important to know EDDM guidelines to ensure your prints are in the acceptable format. Make sure you include the EDDM indicia, along with a box that says “postal customer” or “residential customer”. The guidelines vary slightly depending on the USPS office type, so be sure to check the link above. (In case it’s not clickable, use this https://www.usps.com/business/pdf/quick-reference-guide.pdf)

A good strategy to gauge effectiveness is to state in the coupon “mention this postcard to receive the special”. You can also request them to bring the postcard in to your storefront. The point is to know how many people are using your offers.

Make sure the postcard isn’t too busy, or else people will be overloaded with information and your message can get lost. Simplicity usually works the best.