Design Tips For Effective Postcards

Direct mail postcards are great especially when used as an advertising medium or tool. However, it is very crucial for you to design these postcards correctly to make them effective and reliable in the market. It is not effective to just pick a template out of your box. You must use a good strategy when it comes to the design and especially the templates for your postcards. This is to communicate well your sales message to encourage your target clients and customers to take action. Below are some tips and ideas that you can consider to have a great and effective postcard.

1. Make sure that your postcard is professional and presentable. Design is one of the most crucial aspect that you should always consider for you to have an effective postcard. Your postcard design must always look professional, not an amateur. Most people will just trash an amateur looking postcard. For you to do this, you can hire a good designer or search the internet for example designs and templates, which you can use if you want to create your own design.

2. Showcase your business products and its service benefits. Your post card should tell your prospects the main benefit of your products, and not just showcase them and their features. You can use reverse psychology. For instance, you touch on the pains and fears of your customers and present ways to remedy those emotions. You want to get the attention and especially the emotions of your clients, whether it is a positive emotion by just giving them images of how their lives will be better with the help of your business products and services, or a negative one without the aid of your products.

3. Show several views of your business products and services. If you are promoting your product, you must always make sure that all your clients and customers have an idea of what your products look like especially if you market through online shopping. If you can fit them, you must always show the different angles of your product at different sizes. Aside from that, you must also make sure that you put only accurate images, as if all your customers are shopping at department stores and supermarkets.

4. Finish with a call to action. You must always make sure that your business postcards should have an end message with a call to action that will encourage all your clients to order or purchase from you. You can consider putting discounts and freebies in your post card valid for a certain period of time. This is to encourage your prospects to act at once before the promo ends.

Although you can always create your own design, you can still ask the help of a professional graphic designer to do the design for you. He will ensure your post cards are designed professionally to help you achieve your end goal. Done well, your post card will ensure you get your marketing work done at the least possible time and money.

The bottom line is you design your post card effectively and you are sure to communicate well your message to your target customers. If you are able to do this well, the more likely you are to strengthen your customer base and increase your profit.

For comments and inquiries about the article visit: Direct Mail Postcards

Janice Jenkins is a writer for a marketing company in Chicago, IL. Mostly into marketing research, Janice started writing articles early 2007 to impart her knowledge to individuals new to the marketing industry. Article Source: http://EzineArticles.com/?expert=Janice_Jenkins

 

Dental Postcard Marketing: 10 Tips for New Mover Mailings

New movers have all sorts of tasks on their to-do list after unpacking their boxes, and looking for a new dentist is one of them, so they can be the very best candidates for dental postcard marketing. A dental postcard marketing campaign can serve as a welcome message to new members of the community as well as bring some new patients (or a whole family of new patients!) into your practice. Also, since new mover mailings are becoming a common practice, it's natural for the new residents to keep an eye on their mail for special offers that will save them money. Here are ten great tips that will grab the attention of the new members in your community and convert them into patients!

1. Use creative artwork or photos that implicate the recipients' new mover status. As mentioned above, new movers are on the lookout for these images!

2. Be sure that the text on your postcard says something to the effect of "Welcome to the Neighborhood!" This may seem corny to some, but to an individual new to a community, it can be extremely meaningful.

3. Include a special offer just for new patients. This helps to single out your audience and to let them know how appreciative you are of new business.

4. Use a coupon. Whatever your new mover offer is (a free service, a discounted product, etc.), coupons are effective because they insinuate that the bearer must bring the coupon to their visit in order to redeem it-this helps you track your return!

5. Include an expiration date. Expiration dates give recipients a call to action, creating a sense of importance. Effective expiration dates are typically 2 to 4 weeks from the mail date, but new movers are in transition, so an extension to as far as 6 weeks might be considered.

6. A complete online, automated postcard services are a quick "one-stop-shop" will typically include list rental, providing detailed new mover list options.

7. If you're composing a future marketing plan, consider your mailing date strategy. New movers are typically most prevalent in the summer, between school years ending and starting. Families are less likely to move around the holiday season.

8. If your dental practice is in an area where commuting is typical, include surrounding communities in your mailing list.

9. Order a minimum of 250 postcards. Currently, there is a post office wide discount when sending over 250 cards, and many postcard marketing services have implemented this minimum as a business rule to ensure all customers receive the discount.

10. Us your personal and/or business address as a "seed". This is an address included so you have a better idea when your dental postcard has been delivered to your new movers.

If you haven't yet executed a new mover campaign, now is a great time to try a new direct marketing tactic. A online postcard marketing service will even give you the opportunity to go as far in their websites as creating your mail piece and build a list, costing you nothing unless you decide to execute your campaign. Happy dental postcard marketing!

MaKenzie Birchell is a blogger, social media strategist, and the Marketing Coordinator for Splash, the online, automated postcard marketing service made for small businesses by Bluewater. Article Source: http://EzineArticles.com/?expert=MaKenzie_J_Birchell

 

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The Best Approaches For Marketing Using Postcards

The approach in terms of marketing with postcard printing is crucial to its success. As readers start understanding your color postcards, the premise of the message will determine if they will believe in you or if they will just treat the postcard printing as another one of those junk mails. In this article, I will teach you the best approaches for marketing with postcards so that they won't mistake yours for just junk. I have four approaches that you may want to use for your color postcards.

1. Giving what reader's want - The first and most basic approach is basically giving your postcard readers what they want. So for example, you are marketing to a younger crowd of teens or maybe young adults, then your postcard messages should always portray that "cool" and popular style that they can relate to. If your target is mostly a male audience, you might want to use the classic, toy, gadgets, adventure and beautiful women formula. If you are targeting women on the other hand you might want to display things that they want such as fashionable items, beautiful men and emotional comfort or security. As long as you display what your readers want in their life, you will have a high chance of really attracting them to your postcard printing.

2. Using an issue to your advantage - Now besides the usually wants and needs of your reader, you may also take advantage of a certain issue in your postcard approach. Political issues, social issues, or even just Hollywood or show business issues can easily be spun and turned into a more entertaining postcard design. You can play with a certain celebrity's antics and make a caricature of it in your own designs, or you might just want to provide cold hard information about an issue to people with just a touch of marketing on the side. This approach can really capture the attention of most readers, leading to an increased chance of succeeding with your postcard printing.

3. Entertaining readers - Entertainment is also a great approach to postcard printing. You can easily print various entertaining paper games to your postcards to add that little fun in them Moreover, you can also try printing very pretty and entertaining images in your color postcards than can engage readers to action. Adding a "find me" image or a puzzle of some sort should really be interesting. More readers would basically keep and stare at the entertaining postcard because of this. With that increased attention, it should be no question that this approach is very unique and effective. It is a good alternative when all other ideas don't really work out.

4. Impressing them overwhelmingly - Finally, the last approach is probably the simplest. By just pulling out all the stops and printing your postcards with the best materials and the best printing machines, your color postcards should look quite great and attractive once they arrive. With flawless looking full color postcards, you can just impress people overwhelmingly with your printing and would pay attention to anything in it.

Great! Those are the best approaches that you can use for your marketing postcards. Try them out now! Good Luck!

For comments and inquiries about the article visit Postcard Printing.

Charen Smith writes articles about Internet Marketing. She has an extensive knowledge and experience when it comes to business strategies, techniques and business solutions. Article Source: http://EzineArticles.com/?expert=Charen_Smith

 

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Postcard Marketing

5 Image Filters That Can Help Your Postcard Designs

Are your designs not quite finished yet for postcard printing? Sometimes, even with the use of postcard templates, your designs can be off or something might just be "missing". This happens sometimes, and for some designers, it can be hard to precisely determine what is wrong. If you are in such a slump, I have a few filter ideas for your designs in postcard printing that you might be interested in. Image filters provide a polishing or finishing off effect in a postcard design that makes it look quite complete. Here are five of the most effective that I have used in the past.

1. The Sepia tone - If you want to finish of your postcard designs with that antique yet warm feeling, the sepia tone is one of the best image filters you can use. Especially if you have a very emotional image to tie in with your postcard message, the sepia filters add that nostalgic, warm and personal essence into your designs. This makes your postcard images really powerful. Most people will immediately think your postcards are special just because of that sepia tone. Something that looks antique and personal is worth reading and keeping.

2. The classic black and white - Now, on the colder side of sepia is the classic black and white. While you might think full color postcard printing is THE ONLY kind of postcard printing around, the truth is, many people still use the classic black and white filter. Black and white adds that "classic" touch to images in postcards. This makes them look elegant, precious and worthy of keeping. Moreover, if your images have very contrasting values, the black and white filter will further enhance that effect, making this filter one of the best ones to use. So if you want to get that classic "timeless" look for your postcards, try to use the black and white filter. It is still worth using it in your designs today.

3. Color filters - Now of course, with the new software nowadays, you can actually use any kind of color filter to add colored effect to your designs. In software like Adobe Photoshop, you can actually add photo-filters to your color postcard design and then specify which color to use as the filter. So instead of a sepia tone in your postcard images, you can place any kind of color you want. A blue photo filter adds coolness to your designs, while yellow and orange filters add energy and heat. It is good to use this for your special postcards that need that splash of intense color to be noticed, just like advertising postcards.

4. Texture filters - Another great classic filter (or group of filters actually) to use for postcard designs are the texture filters. These texture filters basically let you add texture elements to your design to make them look like they are made from some kind of specific material. For example, you can add satin, canvass, stone, marble, wood, metal and other texture filters to your postcard design to make it look like your image was printed on to those materials. These are great to use in postcards, especially when you are trying for a very creative effect with different materials.

5. Film Grain filter - Finally, one of my favourites is the film grain filter. This filter is just a simple effect filter that adds film grains unto your design. It makes your images look like they are from older films or posters for that slightly grunge or worn out effect. This is great for personal postcards that you want to touch up for a cooler worn out effect. So try this filter out, it is really great!

So why don't you add that little something in your postcard designs with the use of those filters above. Just test them out and see what works. Trust me, these filters should be able to add that interesting finish touch that really looks quite professional. Good Luck!

Michelle Abreu has been writing articles online for about 2 years now in a printing company. You can also check out this website for more information about postcard printing and on how to make the right design for your postcard templates. Article Source: http://EzineArticles.com/?expert=Michelle_Abreu

 

Postcard Layout Tricks

A postcard can be a very effective means of advertising or communicating with people if done correctly. You have limited space to get your message across so here are some tips to keep in mind to achieve best results.

You can add only a minimal amount of information on the side you address to the recipient. Therefore, in order to emphasize to the recipient who the card is from, it is best to utilize strong graphics, rather than text.

Postcards can range in size but the average is 4"x6". In order to best communicate your message, a strong headline is advisable along with graphics or images.

You simply do not have the room to include much in the way of text so don't plan to "tell a story". Instead make use of the space to send clear headlines, using effective graphics.

Also consider colored paper stock. Depending on the graphics or photos you plan to use, colored paper stock can add impact and readability to your postcard.

Focus on the mailing list. Make certain that the people you plan to send the postcards to will have an interest in them. Try to cater the message and design directly to your audience.

The goal is to make the postcard look like it is coming from a friend rather than an impersonal company. This will tend to get better results. Your audience will most likely read the postcards rather than throw them away as junk mail. Consider using handwriting style fonts and other personal touches.

Perhaps the side which contains their address can be structured to look more like a personal postcard.

Avoid making a sales pitch. You simply don't have enough space to tell everything you want to say about your product, service, or message. Focus on one major objective for the postcard and make certain it properly communicates that message.

And finally, get to the point quickly. Not only are you limited in the amount of space available but people will only spend a short amount of time reading the postcard. Make sure your message is very clear and to the point. A strong call to action will make your postcards much more effective.

The postcard layout will determine the overall success of how well you communicate your message. For all of your Detroit postcard needs, visit Detroit Print Shop in Detroit, Michigan. Article Source: http://EzineArticles.com/?expert=Adam_Canfield

 

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Ziplining: Nicaragua-Adventure Travel. Travel Video Postcard

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Dentists Increase Patient Base With Acquisition Postcard Marketing

Looking to acquire some new patients? Dental postcard marketing is a great, cost effective way to let all those potential patients out there know that you're ready to welcome them into your practice! Today we'll discuss how complete postcard marketing services make it easy to execute a great campaign by condensing the creating, list targeting, and mailing processes in just a few simple steps that work perfectly for busy dental practices. After all, if you were a marketing whiz, you probably wouldn't have gone into the dental business!

Create:
Designing your card can often be the hardest part for some, but luckily there are many available templates online that you can select, and add your details from there! Some practices want a more personal touch, and will upload images so they can include photos of their own office. It's also recommended that you be strategic about the words you're incorporating in your card. For acquisition mailings, it's best to include a compelling offer that entices potential patients to give you a call. And, to be sure they can give you a call, don't forget to include your contact information. Another great tip is to highlight a feature that sets you apart from other dentists in your area. Do you specialize in pediatric dentistry? Do you have payment plans for those without insurance? Let your cards spread the news!

Target:
Choosing your recipients is really up to you, and the best strategy varies for each practice-good thing you have several options! Dental practices typically choose Resident/Occupant or New Mover lists, and you can build your details from there. If your practice is in a residential area, perhaps you'll want to use a radius surrounding the address. If your practice is in a smaller community and you want to blast the whole area, you'll choose your targets by zip code. Complete postcard marketing websites like Splash even allow you to narrow down your list by age, home values, and income levels, so take your pick!

Send:
The best part about this last step is that it's not yours to complete. Today's all-in-one postcard marketing services will ship your cards directly from their location-all you have to do is select your mail date when clicking through your order process. Your card design, list rental, and postage are all under the same bill. This saves you time, money, and a trip to your local post office, so you can focus on those patients currently in your office.

Acquisition mailings are a fantastic way to connect with the potential patients in your community. Whether they've just relocated to the area and are looking for a new family dentist, are current residents who haven't seen a dentist regularly, or are someone else's unhappy patients looking to switch, dental postcard marketing can help get those new mouths in your door!

MaKenzie Birchell is the Marketing Coordinator for Splash Postcard Marketing and Bluewater. She has over 7 years of experience in the creation, implementation, and execution of marketing campaigns. Article Source: http://EzineArticles.com/?expert=MaKenzie_J_Birchell

 

10 Ways To Use Postcard Marketing To Boost Your Business

Interested in using postcrard marketing but dont have an idea where to start? Here are a few ideas thatll help you get those creative juices going.

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Postcard Printing

How to Create Impressive Postcards Out of Postcard Templates

Are you a businessman who needs to undertake postcard printing to advertise your product or reach out to your target consumers? Well, there is something that can make the job easier and faster for you --- using postcard templates. With these templates, creating your own color postcards can become easy as 1,2,3. What you simply need is the knowledge on how to use and work with these templates. This write-up shall give you some pointers on how to make postcard templates work for you. Let them serve as your guide in your postcard printing project.

First thing you need to do is to look for postcard templates of course. Now the question is where do you go to find them? The answer is easy. Go online. Do your search through a search engine. Just type in "postcard templates" and the results will appear quickly before you. You'll be surprised at the endless options you will find. There are numerous websites that can provide you with a variety of postcard templates with free downloads. However, if you desire a "hard copy" of these templates, you might want to visit office supply shops that offer blank postcards. They are available per piece should you need to print a couple of postcards only.

The second thing you have to do is get those postcard templates. As I've previously mentioned, if you made an online search for those templates, all you need to do is download them into your computer. There's no need to worry about costs to pay because they are for free. However, if you choose to go to the office supply store, you have to pay for the templates you got of course. It is more advisable nonetheless to use the downloadable ones for printing tests rather that those bought in stores. The former can help you lay-out any custom postcard you're doing.

Then the next thing to be done is use these templates to come up with the design you want for your postcards. It's easy to do. Just position your postcards image on the proper place on the color postcard. It will usually cover one whole panel of the postcard. On the other side, you should be able to lay-out your stamp, writing lines and your message. You can create or customize your postcards by doing some changes. And this can be done by using the right software.

Lastly, the end product of this whole activity is printing your postcards. You already have your design, thanks to the postcard template that you got, so now, you can finally print your color postcards. So what is the easiest and fastest way to have your postcards printed? Use your own printer. The results would be good enough. However, if you want a mass production for your postcards since you want a large market to receive it, you might want to hire the services of a postcard printing company. You can find a lot of these companies when you go online, even at the site where you downloaded your free postcard template. Again, just do an online search. Once you found the one that's right for you, you can now place an order, give them your design, and pay your printing bill. After a few days' time, you will receive your postcards. Most of these printing companies deliver the product right at the doorstep of their clients.

So this is how simple it is --- having your postcards created and printed out of postcard templates. You would truly be amazed of how fast, easy and convenient it can be. Thanks to the advent of the internet, it gave birth to a vast variety of free, downloadable postcard templates. Because of this, just about anyone can do postcard printing without any training or serious skill on the job.

Michelle Abreu has been writing articles online for about 2 years now in a printing company. You can also check out this website for more information on how to make effective postcard templates. Article Source: http://EzineArticles.com/?expert=Michelle_Abreu

 

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10 Ways to Use Postcard Marketing to Boost Your Business

Grand Opening/Open Houses:

Grand Opening postcards or open house postcards are a great way to drive traffic to your local business. If your customers happen to be any resident in your local area-Saturation direct mail campaigns are a great way to deliver your marketing message to everyone in your neighborhood. The best part about Saturation mail direct mail programs is that it is the lowest price postage that you can get from the post office at 13.9 cents. That's 70% less than the cost of a stamp!

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Steps to Successful Postcard Marketing

Setting up a good postcard marketing campaign is a great way to target a specific market on a budget. Postcards are very cheap and inexpensive to mail and can and will generate new and repeat business when done correctly. Being a professional marketing and designer there are specific steps to running a successful postcard campaign.

Below are a few steps I go through when running my postcard marketing campaigns and they always work!

Step 1: Target your Audience!

Targeting your audience is the most important fact to postcard marketing or any other kind of marketing! You want to target people, or companies that need your service. It is much better to send your postcards to 50 Targeted people than 1000 untargeted.

Step 2: Create a specific offer for your campaign

Creating a offer to go along with the campaign, if its just a simple postcard saying Malpractice Lawyer Call xxx-xxx-xxx you probably wont get as much as a post card saying "Are you in need of The Top Malpractice Lawyer? Call me today at xxx-xxx-xxxx for a free consultation!" By offering a free service and adding some spice to your post card you can really see a high increase phone calls and emails back.

Step 3: Headline, Call to Action, Deadline

These three things are very important in grabbing your clients eye and having them actually follow through not just throw away your post card. Having a good headline will grab the users eye and make them read on. A good call to action is a incentive or a reason for them to contact you because of the post card. Set a date where this is good until, it sets urgency and you can know what to expect for your campaign.

Step 4: Create a good design

Having a professional and eye catching design is a very important aspect to Postcard Marketing. If its not eye catching then most likely. Apollo Marketing Group provides professional Postcard Designs.

Step 4: Test and Repeat

Once you have your campaign setup, test and repeat! If it works and is making you money do it again.

Postcard Marketing - Professional Web Design, Graphic and Stationary Design, Web Development and more! Article Source: http://EzineArticles.com/?expert=Tony_Pierre

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10 Ways to Use Postcard Marketing to Boost Your Business

Thank You Note:

As the old saying goes-"a little thank you can go a long way." I don't know about you, but I do business with companies that are appreciative of my purchase. Sending a hand written thank you card to a customer for their order is a great way to show appreciation for the order. Additionally, it's also a good time to ask for a referral or feedback regarding the customer's experience.

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Letting Personalized Postcards Invite Interest in Your Business

Postcards have been around for generations, giving a glimpse of life at the beach, or some other tourist location as a way of marking where you've been in life. Businesses have found the value of postcards by using them to reach out to their customers and potential clients with information, pictures about their products and even as humorous attention getters to cause people to think of them or their products at some point in time in the future. But what does that actually mean a postcard is?

Just turn over a postcard and see how it makes perfect sense to use them as invitations. It can be an invitation to try a new product, a chance to win a prize by visiting a booth or business location, or a reminder of an appointment. The overall intent of a postcard seems to be as an invitation. So how do we get the most out of our invitations?

First off, think of what you want an invitation to say. What you're being invited to is the main function of a postcard. From invitations to events at large arenas to scheduled office visits or trying out a new product, postcards are the perfect solution. Having that reason stand out, either on the "show" side or as the banner for the information side, letting people know what they're being invited to is of primary importance.

Next is the when. If you are using the postcard as a literal invitation, this would mean the need to provide a date and time when the event is to take place. While not as formal as a full blown invitation card with RSVP notes and other trappings, a postcard makes a very effective way to set a time and date as well as the location for an event.

If a specific time in not available such as a chance to try out a new product, postcards can still be a great way to get information about the product to the customer. This kind of encouragement enables the customer to still have that "event" type of presentation to them, and also have the open-ended time-frame that allows them to choose when to take advantage of your products or services.

Postcards have quite a lot of value as an invitation. Using postcards to reach out to potential clients or customers you haven't seen in a while can be quick and easy. Take advantage of postcards for your invitation needs today.

Vickie Lexom wants to celebrate the anniversary of her coffee shop's opening and needs a creative and inexpensive invitation. Printable postcards from PaperDirect are the perfect solution.Custom postcards will allow her to create the image that will represent her business and save money she can use for the cake! Let PaperDirect invite your customers to stop by and celebrate your business. Article Source: http://EzineArticles.com/?expert=Vickie_Lexom

 

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10 Ways to Use Postcard Marketing to Boost Your Business

Mini- Newsletter:

Don't have the budget to send out a full newsletter? A large 6x11 postcard can fit as much information as a 2-page newsletter if done designed correctly. Mailing a 6x11 postcard will cost less than a traditional newsletter for a variety of reasons. First, postage will cost less than mailing an 8.5"x11" and secondly, you won't have to fold and stitch like you would a newsletter.

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Postcard Marketing

The 4 Objectives For a Postcard Design

Contrary to what you may believe when you print postcards, the objective of creating those postcard designs is not just for them to be looked at. There are a lot more, deeper objectives in postcard printing that your designs should try to work on. So do not just base your designs on postcard samples that promise your postcard to be seen. You should try to shape your designs considering the proper objectives in printing postcards. Let me give you four of the most important objectives that should get you started in an effective postcard design.

1. The communication objective - The first and crucial objective of a color postcard is to communicate information. More than just "being seen", a postcard must tell its message effectively to readers and of course it must be thoroughly understood as well in the process. This may sound simple enough, but it is a bit more work than you might imagine.

To achieve the communication objective in postcard printing, you have to write your content in a detailed but short manner. Being a postcard, you will not have enough space to write long winded descriptions in your layout. You will need to write concisely with simple and direct words to communicate well with your custom postcards. So make sure you have the talent to write a compact but powerful message or try to hire a professional writer to do your short and sweet messages in custom postcards. This is what you need to effectively get your message across and achieve your objective for your postcards.

2. The impression objective - The second deeper objective in postcard design is to basically impress people. Now, this is not just about pulling all the stops when it comes to the design (though a major part of this is just making the best design). To achieve the impression objective in postcard printing in a far more potent way, you will need to display the right design impression for the particular audience you are designing for.

For example, if your custom postcards are aimed for family and friends, then you would want to design something that is warm, affectionate and very personal. However, if you are printing color postcards for business, such as in a promotional postcard for advertising, then you may want to go for a more creative and energetic design that makes readers more excited. So as you can see, you should not just think of a great impressive design. Think of an impressive design that makes THE RIGHT impression on the target people for your postcards.

3. The "memorable" objective - The third important objective of printing postcards is the "memorable" objective. Basically the goal here is to be remembered by people long after the postcard design has been seen. This objective is most especially important for promotional postcards that need to sell something. You will need to be really memorable so that people will be able to respond eventually to the postcard message.

Achieving a memorable objective is actually pretty simple. All you have to do is add a certain design element that is very distinctive and out of the ordinary. For example, you can use a really wild or funny image that most people have not seen yet. Or maybe you can use very vibrant and unusual background colors that really make your postcards stand out. These and other kinds of tricks similar to them all make a postcard more memorable. The easier it is to remember your postcard, the more effective they are at their job.

4. The influence objective - Finally, you have the "influence" objective in printing postcards. This basically means that your postcard message must have the power to influence people to act. Depending on your postcard's purpose, this can be in the form of getting people to contact you personally, buying your products, going to your place of business, or even just going to your website. This is really how your custom postcards deliver their worth. That is why it is important to develop the influence of your designs.

Achieving this objective is actually pretty straight forward. All you have to do is to tell the readers directly what you want them to do after reading your postcard. You can tell them to "call us at..." or maybe you can say "hurry! buy now!". Most people actually like knowing what they need to do after seeing a letter or a postcard, so a direct statement is a powerful influencing factor indeed in postcard printing.

Now you know the four proper and deeper objectives in postcard design. This should give you on how to really compose your layout to make your postcards more effective, impressive and influential.

Michelle Abreu has been writing articles online for about 2 years now in a printing company. You can also check out this website for more postcard samples and tips on how to print postcards effectively. Article Source: http://EzineArticles.com/?expert=Michelle_Abreu

 

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Postcard Marketing

10 Ways to Use Postcard Marketing to Boost Your Business

Bring a friend:

If you are a hair salons, fitness center, health club, tanning bed the "bring a friend for free" promotion is an amazing tool to generate a lot of interest. You'll find the best results using this postcard on your internal mailing list. This type of promotion is sure to incite your customer to refer your business.

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Nicaragua Travel - Travel Video PostCard

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Homemade Personal Holiday Postcards

While greeting cards are the traditional printed gift for the holidays, you should never forget that postcard printing can also be a nice gift. In fact, if you want to be unique this holiday season, you should send nice personal custom postcards to your friends and family instead of the usual greeting cards. Do not worry, postcard printing is not really hard. Here are four simple steps that you can follow to create your own custom postcards from home.

1. Getting that right picture.

First, since postcards have big cover images, you should try getting the right picture. The right picture is a simple and very straightforward image that communicates your message to people. So for example, if you want to greet people with your holiday postcard why not take a picture of yourself in a Santa hat. It is simple but quite interesting since it is a custom design. Do not try to confuse people with exotic abstract images that they will not really understand. You will only have a hard time getting your message across. Just use something personal and quite touching or funny.

On the technical side of things, the right picture should always be large and in a digital format. By large, I mean the pictures must be in a high resolution anything from 300-600 dpi should be good. This should make the image appear on the postcard far clearer. So scan your images using the large setting and if you are taking digital photographs, make sure that the camera is always set into high quality.

2. Getting the right template.

After getting the right picture you need to get the right postcard template. Since a postcard must have a standard dimension that the postal service will accept, it is good to download templates that are of course within the standard specifications. I recommend downloading postcard templates from actual postcard printers since they will usually have the best and most accurate templates. Try looking online and you should find plenty of useful ones.

3. How to design your postcard.

Now, to finalize your design, you actually only need to combine three things. You just need to use your postcard template and merge that with your cover image. Try to see if the template provides guidelines on where exactly your cover should align to. Once done, you should then just add the simple greeting message that you want. Place the text on an area of the cover with the least amount of design details. You can do this in 10-15 minutes since it is very simple.

4. How to print your postcard.

Lastly, to print your postcards, it is possible to do this quickly and professionally by online postcard printing. Just use the company where you got the postcard templates from. It should make your postcards designs quite ideal for professional printing. After the payment and design has been sent, all you really have to do is wait for the delivery and you will have your nice and professional customized greeting postcards.

As you can see, it is very easy indeed. You should be able to send your personalized greeting postcards to your loved ones and they should be able to appreciate the personalized gesture. So why not try out a little deviation from the norm and use greeting color postcards? See how your friends and family react!

For comments and inquiries about the article visit: Postcard Printing. Janice Jenkins is a writer for a marketing company in Chicago, IL. Mostly into marketing research, Janice started writing articles early 2007 to impart her knowledge to individuals new to the marketing industry. Article Source: http://EzineArticles.com/?expert=Janice_Jenkins

 

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Pizza Restaurant Marketing - Free Pizza Postcard Templates That Increase Sales!

Many pizza restaurant owners recognize the need for direct mail advertising because it is the most effective method of reaching a targeted market area. That being said, they don't take advantage of it because they feel that it will be cost prohibitive. Actually, by utilizing free pizza postcard templates online, total direct mail costs can be kept to a bare minimum while delivering the maximum impact.

The process is fast and easy, and with just the first mailing you will notice considerably increased sales. This is because 98% of all consumers pick up their mail daily, look it over and keep what is interesting (according to the USPS website).

With professionally designed pizza postcard templates, your advertising will be among the first to be tacked up for future reference. At a popular printing website that ranks high on Google for "pizza menu printing", one customer wrote in, "My pizza restaurant's sales are up 90% this week from one mailing..." This type of success starts with good food, great service, and excellent marketing. Customizable pizza postcard templates are perfect for both beginners and marketing pros.

Customizing A Pizza Postcard Templates and Selecting Print Options

The templates provided on print websites are easy to customize and it is only a matter of entering your business' information, uploading a photo if needed, and choosing color and paper stock options. Some options are dependent upon quantities as you may qualify for certain bonuses or price breaks at larger volumes. Postcards can typically be ordered in quantities of:

 

• 250


• 500


• 1000


• 2500


• 5000


• 10,000


• 15,000


• 20,000


• 25,000

 

The point is, you have flexible options available so that you can literally flood your market with ongoing direct mailings to increase sales beyond your wildest dreams.

Customized Pizza Postcard Templates - Direct Mailing Options

Once your postcards have been customized and printed, you printer can help you with direct mail to target your local area and increase your sales immediately. You are provided with a map of your specific market area, either by a radius of your store or by zip codes. Then, each map is further broken down into smaller sections such as neighborhoods and streets which are all numbered. The only thing left to do is hand-pick the specific areas you wish to target and your printer can take care of the rest.

Free pizza postcard templates are not only easy to customize, but they are designed to increase sales with the very first distribution. Although you can save money by customizing a pre-designed template online, you can also take advantage of marketing and printing expertise that was put into the postcard. It all goes back to using graphics that are designed to increase sales. Design is the name of the game, and you should take that very seriously. Find the right template, customize it, and get help with distribution while you sit back and reap the benefits of increased sales.

Chris Barr is a marketing professional and graduate of Christopher Newport University. His areas of expertise include direct mail, internet marketing, copy writing, SEO, and new business development. Chris currently serves as Marketing Director for Taradel LLC in Richmond, VA. Article Source: http://EzineArticles.com/?expert=Chris_Barr Copyright© 2010 Taradel, LLC. All rights reserved. Article Source: http://EzineArticles.com/?expert=Chris_Barr

 

10 Ways to Use Postcard Marketing to Boost Your Business

Survey:

Customers like to know that their opinion matters to the people they do business with. Mailing out postcards to get feedback shows that you want to meet their needs. They can either go to your website or use a postcard with a tear-off stub that they can fill out the survey and send it back to you. You'll find the best results when your customer can fill out the survey online. Driving your offline customers to your online website is a great way to get higher quality traffic to your website.

Continue Reading  10 Ways to Use Postcard Marketing to Boost Your Business

Old postcard-

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10 Ways to Use Postcard Marketing to Boost Your Business

Anniversary:

Send your customer a postcard celebrating their anniversary of the first order with your company. It may sound silly, but if the customer has been with you for several years, they will be impressed to the attention that your company gives. If they haven't ordered with you in a while, the postcard campaign should be a free or aggressively low priced offer to come back! If they've used your services before, there is a great chance they'll need you again in the future.

Continue Reading  10 Ways to Use Postcard Marketing to Boost Your Business

Formatting Mistakes to Avoid in Postcard Design

While the text itself is kind of secondary to the image in postcard printing, the formatting of that text is crucial for the overall look of the postcard design. Even with postcard templates, you won't be able to make your designs perfect if you don't know how to handle and format your text properly. So, if you are worried about committing formatting mistakes in your postcard design, I suggest you read through the list below. These are the common formatting mistakes that you should avoid when designing color postcards. Hopefully by knowing about these mistakes, you should be able to format your text in the right way for proper postcard printing.

• Too much typeface variation - The first thing that you should watch out for in formatting is the variation of typefaces in your text. Many newcomers in postcard design get too excited with the use of the bold, italic and underline effects. These formatting options are good in their own right, but when used a lot and in all places in the text, this begins to be a formatting problem that can make the postcard design look bad. So make sure you minimize your use of typefaces. Use them only for important text, and not on the whole postcard document.

• Too much size variation - Another formatting mistake that postcard designers tend to do is to use too many different sized fonts. Some of the text might be horrendously big, while others are minutely small. When put together with other text of different size variations, this results in a very messy and not so appealing custom postcard design. That is why it is important to lessen your font sizes. Two or three set standard font sizes should be good enough for any postcard design. These will help you make your custom postcards look more professional.

• Off concept font styles - It is also a big and common mistake for people to use "off concept font styles". These are the font styles that are not necessarily good for the theme of the design, but they do look good unto themselves. Many beginners actually commit this mistake, simply because they are excited and hyped up to use that cool font style they saw from the Internet. While it is good to foster some creativity and originality, if the font style is really off the main concept of the design, it is only logical for the design to go bad.

The trick here to avoid going "off concept" in postcard font styles is to first choose a simple headline sans serif font as a placeholder. Typically it is best to use these simpler headline font styles as a base. Now, you should then try out the different styles of fonts you want to use and then compare it with that simpler font. Believe me, in a lot of cases, designers will eventually use the simpler font for their postcard designs, simply because it looks cleaner and is easier to understand. So always try to check to see if your font styles look great.

• Text clumping - Another big formatting mistake that you should avoid is text clumping. This is the effect of having all your text content clumped into just one side of the postcard without having a balancing element to come with it (such as a group of text or an image). When your text content for postcards are clumped like that, the postcard won't look as balanced and as clean as it normally should. This may lead to bad postcard designs that we should definitely avoid. So next time, always try to balance your text with an equal element on its opposite side.

• Overly aligned text - Finally, many designers often commit the mistake of overly aligning their text inside a postcard design. While alignment of text is a good practice for word processors, for designers text should be more fluid so that it can match the design, even if there are curves and swirls. So you should not always be rigid with the alignment of text. If your text content follow a diagonal or curved line for a better design effect, by all means try to use that to your advantage.

Now you know the things to avoid in postcard printing and design. Hopefully you should be able to use your knowledge to lessen the formatting mistakes in your postcard printing. Good Luck!

Michelle Abreu has been writing articles online for about 2 years now in a printing company. You can also check out this website for more information about postcard printing and on how to make the right design for your postcard templates. Article Source: http://EzineArticles.com/?expert=Michelle_Abreu

 

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How to Create an Audio Postcard

Audio postcards are an innovative way to add a rich layer of interactivity to your website.  With an audio postcard, you can record your greeting, upload a photo, dress up your postcard with numerous styles and colors, and even add a stamp for an extra touch of realism.

You can also use audio postcards in business as well.  Record a special offer for your best customers, give away a freebie to new users, or offer a discount code based on an event or holiday.  Audio postcards are excellent tools for email campaigns and stand out in a way that boring text emails can't beat.

To create your postcard, you'll first need to make your recording.  It can start out as a .wav file, as you can use the software tool below to convert it to a much faster-loading version.  Once you have your recording, you'll need to select the photo to go with it.  The software I use, Audio Postcard Creator (link below) lets you instantly add your photo and message and it takes over from there.

Using this software, you can select from many different styles and looks, including themed stamps to give it that travel-ready appeal.  The graphics and HTML template used to actually make the postcard look are created for you automatically, so you don't need any website editing experience.  Of course, if you know how to work with basic HTML, you can customize your postcard even more!

The most important thing to remember about using an audio postcard is that it must load quickly.  No one is going to wait while a huge audio file is downloaded to their email inbox or browse your web page and wait for your offer to show up. Fortunately, the technology used to make your presentation guarantees that it will load within 10 seconds or less - even on dial up!

The software itself is actually a small part of six different audio programs called Total Web Audio, which are used to create and edit professional-grade audio on your website.  Using this software suite, you'll never need another audio software program to convert, upload, mix and edit your audio files.

As you'll see, creating an audio postcard is a simple, 3 step process that anyone can do in minutes, even if you've never used one before.  See a free demo and download the software by visiting the link below.

Easily add audio to your websites in minutes with a custom audio player, fast streaming and more by visiting [http://www.addaudiotowebsite.com] Article Source: http://EzineArticles.com/?expert=Sherice_Jacob

 

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