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- CHAPTER 2
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- MAIL ORDER AND DIRECT MAIL
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- Although they may seem similar and eventually have the
- same outcome, namely the selling of products through the
- mail, there is a difference between the Mail Order business
- and the Direct Mail business.
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- With Direct Mail, an advertisement, perhaps a brochure
- or a catalog, is mailed directly to a list of potential
- customers.
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- With Mail Order you start from scratch. You have no
- mailing list and you acquire your customers initially and
- primarily by advertising, although there are companies which
- will sell you a list of names and addresses. These names
- and addresses are usually filed by category - People who
- live in houses worth $500,000 or more - People who buy works
- of art - People who donate to charities - People who take
- vacations abroad, and so on. The price of these list can be
- anything from $20 per 1000 to maybe $200 per 1000 depending
- on the narrowness with which the category is defined.
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- As I mentioned earlier, there are times when the two
- methods of doing business cross the thin divider between
- them. People running a Direct Mail business will sometimes
- advertise in newspapers, and people running a Mail Order
- business will frequently use their growing list of customers
- and approach them by mail. But there are certain products
- which definitely sell better by one or other of the two
- systems.
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- When I say this, I have in mind the difference between
- impulse sales and enticed sales. Some products need quite a
- long approach. The enticed sale. The customer needs to see
- a list of benefits. They need to sit back and contemplate
- how that particular product can enrich their life. They need
- time to think about it.
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- These products are usually high priced items. Automo-
- biles, houses, televisions and packaged tours. Such items
- sell best by Direct Mail. The person receiving a catalog or
- brochure by mail is able to sit back, relax and compare the
- qualities or advantages of competitive products.
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- Perhaps you've seen the full page newspaper advertise-
- ments by Joe Karbo - "The Lazy Man's Way To Riches". Joe
- gives you lots of facts to mull over. His advertisement
- almost looks like a news feature.
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- Newspaper advertising is very effective with the Mail
- Order business.
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- Melvin Powers (Wilshire Book Company)
- Robert M. Haft (Crown Books)
- Frederick Mellinger (Frederick's of Hollywood)
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- These, among dozens of other entrepreneurs have taken
- full pages in major newspapers. The cost of this power
- advertising is daunting, but if it didn't return far more
- than the amount invested in the advertisement, these experi-
- enced Mail Order people would avoid such a huge expenditure.
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- Mail Order sales are usually impulse buys. The custom-
- er sees an advertisement that offers obvious advantages or
- fills a long felt need and they reach for their check book.
- Items that immediately come to mind are a gadget to
- increase an automobile's gas mileage or a cream that will
- soften facial wrinkles or a spray that will remove stains
- from a carpet. Impulse sales. A potential customer sees
- the advertisement and visualizes the need for it.
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- A strong word of warning at this point, and I will
- repeat it farther in the book, never advertise the advan-
- tages or qualities of a product which doesn't truly possess
- those qualities. To do so can cripple your business, cost
- you time and money refunding cash and place you in real
- danger of legal action.
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- If you are going to build a business, one that will
- grow and provide you with a substantial income over many
- years, your products must be well above reproach. Your
- customers must be so satisfied they will willingly deal with
- you again and again. Your products must be of sufficient
- quality to ensure you of future sales to those customers and
- give them reason to provide you with that most valuable of
- valuables, word of mouth advertising.
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- No matter how wealthy you are, how big your business,
- you can't buy word of mouth advertising - and it can be the
- strongest foundation on which you can build your business.
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- Many flourishing Mail Order businesses, if not most,
- have been started on a shoe-string. If you are already
- wealthy, if you believe you have everything you need, you
- are probably not reading this. If you are in a dead-end job
- or one that bores you to death, if you are looking for a way
- to implement an insufficient income, if you have been laid
- off or about to be, this book is for you. It can provide you
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- with enough knowledge about Mail Order to get you started
- immediately on the road to wealth.
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- How much will it cost to get into the Mail Order busi-
- ness?
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- To start with, to get you off the ground, we will try
- to keep everything to a minimum. The products will be
- inexpensive, offering a reasonable mark-up. The advertising
- will be aggressive, but again kept to a minimum. You will
- need a small amount of money for the following.
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- Printing, stationary, postage, products and advertis-
- ing.
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- Exactly how much you will need for each will depend
- upon the way you approach your business. Some expenses,
- such as postage, you can't avoid, although even this can,
- and should, be kept to a minimum. When your business is
- large enough, bulk mailings can save you a lot of money.
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- With regard to advertising and stationary, it is here
- that your computer can save you dollars. By using one of
- the many letter heading programs available in computer
- stores and on Shareware, you can print your own letter
- headings as you go, saving the cost of having a print shop
- provide you with stationary.
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- By using your computer, together with suitable pro-
- grams, you can devise and print your own flyers and adver-
- tising, so saving more money, but more about that later in
- the appropriate place.
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- As you can see, I am approaching this with a view to
- keeping everything as inexpensive and simple as possible.
- Later, when the money is coming in at a steady and constant
- rate, you can begin to reach out.
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- By starting small and by choosing this particular
- business, you have several very big advantages. Let me tell
- you what they are and how you can make them work for you.
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- A. Let's say that you are very small, a one man busi-
- ness perhaps or a husband and wife team.
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- Advantage #1.
- Although you may not appreciate it at this time, being
- small makes you tremendously powerful. You don't have to
- hold consultations with a board of people before you make a
- decision. You can turn on a dime. Without breaking stride
- you can reverse decisions and be up and running with a new
- project while bigger companies are still thinking about it.
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- Advantage #2.
- You can avoid creative restricting pressures. You are
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- answerable to nobody but yourself. Nobody tells you what to
- do. It is very difficult to think creatively when someone is
- breathing down your neck demanding results.
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- Advantage #3.
- You can do what you like with your profits. You can
- plough them back into the business, increasing your range of
- products or buying new office equipment etc., or you can
- diversify, opening an entirely different type of business.
- It's your business, you make the decisions.
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- B. You have chosen Mail Order as your business.
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- Advantage #1.
- You can keep your overheads down to a minimum, even to
- working on your kitchen table if necessary. One of Europe's
- largest cosmetic companies started out just like that about
- eight years ago. A husband and wife team making the creams
- and lotions themselves and working on the kitchen table
- writing the labels for each bottle by hand. Today Natural
- Cosmetics dominate a large section of the beauty products
- market in England, where they started, and can now be found
- in America, France, Germany and Australia.
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- Advantage #2.
- Mail Order is very well accepted by the public. It is
- a highly respected, self regulating business, and is one
- which the public trusts.
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- Advantage #3.
- It provides aspects which the public happily embrace.
- Each time a customer opens a package received by mail they
- get a pleasant surprise. It's almost like an un-birthday
- present. Add to that the convenience of not having to travel
- to the local Shopping Mall and you can appreciate why Mail
- Order is so popular.
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- Advantage #3.
- Many of the items sold though Mail Order cannot be
- obtained anywhere else. This is one of your biggest advan-
- tages. If you can pull off an exclusive deal with a manu-
- facturer, not only will you arouse considerable envy in
- other Mail Order firms, but you can use that exclusive
- product as a door opener to new customers.
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- In the next chapters, we'll explore the advantages
- mentioned above and how you can tailor them to your particu-
- lar business. I will explain how you can engage in adver-
- tising target shooting, how you can use your own personality
- and motivation to discover exclusive products, and how you
- can use a competitor's business to further your own.
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- Mail Order is an interesting and challenging business.
- It offers individuals immense and unique opportunities to
- achieve wealth. There are very few other businesses which
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- will provide a steady income while you grow and while you
- gain expertise.
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- If you want a comfortable and affluent life style, Mail
- Order can give it to you, but you have to reach out for it.
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