From our 20 point checklist of what to do in 2021, here’s the worst mistake, and how to correct it.
Only 30% of programs said they were mailing their print brochure a second time to past customers. This is the lowest percentage of programs in our survey doing this one of our 20 ‘must do’ tasks for 2021.
This is a basic rookie mistake for lifelong learning programs. Every program – – yes, yours- – needs to mail your print brochure a second time to past customers in order to maximize registrations and income.
Basically, you are just leaving lots of registrations and big income out there. A terrible waste.
What to Do
One to two weeks after you do your initial mailing of your brochure, do a second mailing of the same brochure (no changes needed to the brochure) to just your past participants over the past two years.
Why
This is absolutely the best use of your marketing dollars and staff time. It costs almost nothing. That second mailing has such a huge response in registrations and dollars, the ROI is the best you can get with any marketing or advertising.
It costs you six times as much promotion dollars to get a new customer than to get a past participant to return. You don’t have to believe LERN, that data is in your computer right now.
The reason of course is that your past participants have a much higher response rate and registration rate than your non-customers. In many programs past participants are as much as 30% to 50% of participants in their current or next session.
The Math
Do the math. Here’s a typical example.
Brochures printed: 30,000 for $7,500 or 25 cents each.
U.S. bulk postal rate and labeling costs 25 cents.
Total cost is 50 cents to print and mail.
Mail 25,000 to non-customers. The cost is $12,500 and a typical average return of 1% = 250 registrations. So a cost of $50 per registration.
Mail 2,500 to past participants. The cost is $1,250 and a typical average return of 6%= 150 registrations. So a cost of $8 per registration.
Mail a Second Time to 2,500 past participants. The cost is $1,250 and a typical average return might be half, but no less than half, of your first response, thus 3%= 75 registrations. So a cost of $17 per registration.
That second mailing means it is still three times cheaper to mail to your past participants a second time than to even mail to non-customers once.
Still skeptical? Do your own math with your own numbers. The data is all there in your computer right now.
No Negative Results
LERN has been recommending a second mailing to past participants for over 30 years. No program has ever reported the second mailing is not profitable.
The second mailing is of course standard practice in the catalog business. You already know this: you buy something and you get more than one catalog in the mail the next buying season.
LERN’s Senior Vice President Julie Coates is reporting that both eBay and Amazon, online giants, are now doing print brochures. Who are they mailing the print brochures to? Yes, their past participants.
Mail a second brochure to your past participants, people who have registered with you in the past two years. It’s simply the most cost effective marketing with the best results you can ever do.