Marketing Support Materials
Small businesses need materials to support the marketing plan.
Your first consideration is color. What is a good color for your material? In general you want to be unique and distinctive. Like your marketing strategy, you need to be different. However, your color depends on the type of business your in. For the professions (accounting, law, engineering, etc.) you must look professional with subdued, “professional” looking colors. Hot pink, lime green can work for many businesses like a party store but not for others. Something in between for other businesses can work. Be creative. Frequently a two colors work with one color the ink. From a printing cost standpoint this is really only “one-color”. Talk to you printer Work you color scheme in with your logo.
Once you have this color scheme and logo, you use it on everything you can. This starts with your letterhead and envelopes and other stationery you might use, like postcards, notepaper, and invoices. Be careful with extensive color schemes and logos in electronic communication (email, for example), since you don’t want extensive download times.
Every business needs a basic color brochure about your company and your products or services. Depending on your budget, it doesn’t have to be long but should present what your potential customers need to know, why they should buy from you, and how to contact you. It should be the brochure around which you present more specific offers or proposals. To keep the cost per piece down, you should print lots of copies and make the content non-perishable. Put perishable information like special prices and promotions in other things like flyers or inserts. For very tight budgets you could have a simple tri-fold (8 ½ 11 in. folded 3 times) or even one that is only 1/3 of a page, but have something.
Next come specific-topic pieces. These are more in-depth descriptions or variations of each of your products or services. Frequently, a one-page description on your letterhead (color coordinated, of course) will suffice. In this way you can send several, very specific marketing pieces that makes it more customized for each application. These are prepared ahead of time so that you can develop this customized marketing package quickly for rapid response to a customer inquiry.
The next marketing item is the business letter. This obviously is unique since it is written to a specific customer. You should develop five or ten basic letters depending on the tone you want to set and your relationship with the customer or potential customer. Then you customize the letter by referencing something specific such as a prior conversation or specific question the recipient asked.
Another useful marketing approach for small businesses is to use testimonials. This occurs when you get favorable comments from previous customers and list these together. This shows previous customer satisfaction. Sometimes it’s appropriate to list phone numbers of previous satisfied customers for potential clients to call. All this, of course, is done with prior approval.
Finally, you can put all this together in a jacketed brochure. The jackets are oversized and have a slot for your letter, your general brochure, your specific-topic pieces and any other material that can help. The jacket should be preprinted with your company name and logo and most have four diagonal slots for your business card.
There are lots of ways to spend more money but this approach is a cost effective approach, while still being customizable and professional.
This article was written by Seattle SCORE Chapter member Fred Parkinson for the Kitsap Sun in Bremerton.