You've Got To Remember This on Monday...

Sunday
September 11, 2001

This will change the way you think about marketing if you just read this and then actually take some kind of action this week.

You have to do direct response marketing.

So you're asking, "What is direct response marketing?" It’s not an ad without a way to contact you. Those ads are called institutional ads (institutional because you need to be in an institution if you're running them) and they are for large companies like Coca Cola and American Express. You want your ad to move someone to call a phone number, fill out a form on your website or mail something in for more information. You want to create an ad that will move your prospect to action, just like I'm trying to get you to take some action after reading this. And that action will create a new customer or patient for you. All other kinds of advertising are virtually useless.

Your direct response ad should contain the following:

* A good, attention getting headline
* Something that creates interest for your product or service
* Creates a burning desire in the prospect
* Has a specific offer that they can take action on
* Has a date to act by, an expiration date, or a deadline

Most ADS in the magazines, newspapers and TV are institutional advertising. With institutional advertising, there is NO specific offer and NO way to track your results. You want to be able to track your results and where your sales, customers, new patients or clients are coming from. Don’t waste the money and the resources to do otherwise.

Why do advertising agencies like institutional advertising? Because the results can’t be tracked. If advertising agencies had to be held accountable for bringing in X number of leads, for X amount of dollars, they would go out of business. They tell you just getting your name out there is enough — and it’s not enough! You need customers/clients/patients walking through the door, everyday, or you’re going out of business.

Here is a simple way to track your ads: With KALL8.com you can track all your ads with a separate local or 800#. You can even—get this—record the call to see how you or your sales person does on the phone call. You can get a local number for just $5 a month and a few cents a minute and an 800# is only $2/month. I’ll talk more about tracking your advertising later on.

The only reason you should advertise is to get more customers, clients, or patients. You should ONLY advertise if it’s going to bring in money–PERIOD! Don’t get caught up in the “image” thing. The only thing your image will do for you is to help you go broke. You can’t CASH in your image at the bank. If done correctly, you can get lots of business with your direct response marketing.

Here are some rules when using direct response marketing:

Rule #1 – Never do anything that you can’t directly track results.

Rule #2 – Never run an ad a second time that didn’t work the first time.

Rule #3 – Never fall in love with your ad.

Rule #4 - This last rule is a common mistake for people first starting out with direct marketing–they fall in love with their advertising. I know a man that had a consulting business, and he was called in to a real estate office to see if he could get them more listings. The new owner of the agency had these gorgeous ads made up. They were pretty. I asked him how they were doing. He told the man that he ran them a few times and they got NO calls. He told him why and he didn’t listen to him. He kept running those same beautiful ads. Six months later he ran into him and asked how things were going. He closed his agency and went to work for another one.

Become a student of direct marketing. Learn everything you can about it. The more you learn about marketing, the more money you will make. An ad is only as good as its results—PERIOD!

My clients, the ones that pay me $497 a month, have handouts, ads, flyers, newsletters, etc. done for them. It's a no brainer, but some people think they can do a better job.

Well what happens is that they procrastinate if they do it on their own and then they get behind. I had a friend who thought he was going to finally do what I told him to do. He started doing postcards. He sent me his postcard, I revamped it and sent it back to him. He did it for two months. He even got some new patients. Then he missed a month. Then another, and now he doesn't do any direct response marketing.

Why?

Because he says it didn't work. I don't know what four reactivated patients are, but he didn't think it worked. Doesn't make sense to me.

Whatever you do, keep doing direct response marketing. If you're not doing it, start.

That's the secret.

Talk soon.

Dr. Carney