Print Solutions July 2006
Cover Story
Experiment No. 5:
AmeriPrint Corporation gets its message to distributors.
In Brief
By coordinating a direct mail campaign with trade show appearances and magazine
advertising, a manufacturer increased its sales volume. |
“We found that if it’s specific to one product area you get a better response rate.” Gary St. Onge, vice president of sales and marketing AmeriPrint Corp. Harvard, Ill. |
Objective:
In 2005, the Harvard, Ill.-manufacturer wanted to broaden its geographic sales
area through aggressive marketing.
Hypothesis:
By creating a marketing plan that includes direct mail pieces, magazine
advertising and trade show appearances, AmeriPrint would increase sales. The
company also wanted to highlight new product offerings which included laser
compatible checks, high-tech document security features and Check 21 solutions.
“I started with this company about six years ago and they weren’t doing a lot of this,” says Gary St. Onge, vice president of sales and marketing at AmeriPrint. “The company had its own system in place. I just did this based on what had
worked for me in the past and what they were doing when I arrived.”
Procedure:
1) Send direct mail pieces once a month and make sure the pieces are product
specific.“We found that if it’s specific to one product area you get a better response rate,” St. Onge says. AmeriPrint also tries to focus its mailings to distributors who
are mostly in the Midwest, where its headquarters are located.
“We rarely do business west of the Rockies because most of our products are very
region-specific,” he says.
The direct mail pieces include postcards, one- to two-page mailings that mention
something about an AmeriPrint product and product samples.
“For example, if we have a new integrated label that we’re trying to pitch, we’ll include it with the mailing,” St. Onge says.
2) Incorporate the direct mail pieces into your overall marketing plan. “We try to work the direct mail pieces along with ads and trade shows,” St. Onge says. “In April, we started advertising in Print Solutions magazine. We also attend
DMIA TradeMarts.” When booth workers meet new distributors at trade shows, they immediately send
the distributor a mailing.
“We mail everybody who attended the trade show, regardless of whether they
stopped at our table or not,
” he says. If the distributor did stop at AmeriPrint’s booth, the company sends a mailing that makes a specific reference to a
product that may have sparked some interest.
Results:
The response rate to AmeriPrint’s direct mail pieces vary from 1 to 3.5 percent. “The percentage goes up when we’re talking about a new product,” he says. The company says the direct mail advertising and trade show
participation
“resulted in a substantial sales volume.” During FY 2005, AmeriPrint increased its sales by 19.6 percent due to
advertising and additional product offerings.
AmeriPrint Corporation kept its direct mail pieces product focused, sometimes
including samples of the products in the piece to produce higher response
rates.
Conclusion:
“I don’t think anything we’re doing is new,” St. Onge says. “We just have to have a plan and we need to follow it.”
LaShell Stratton is assistant editor at Print Solutions magazine. Email her your comments at lstratton@PSDA.org.
