This week's 5 question interview features Craig Dickhout of Think Ink Marketing. Think Ink Marketing helps you get your mail opened by providing 100% handwritten mail pieces. See some great samples on their website.
1. What do you do for a living?
I own Think Ink Marketing, a direct mail company with a unique and effective niche. We specialize in 100% real handwritten marketing. Our standard mailing method is to use a #10 white envelope, with a live stamp and a blue handwritten name and address. This guarantees at least a 95% open rate. Our mail simply does not look like a solicitation so it gets opened and read. It also works great for companies that are looking to strengthen their relationship with their customer or potential customer. We can personalize mail with a simple hand signature on a letter or write full greeting card messages for our clients. A handwritten envelope, note or message has and always will be a very personal and effective way to communicate with your target audience.
2. What makes you different from others in your industry?
Think Ink Marketing is the original and largest hand personalized company in the nation. We mail between $2 and $6 million hand personalized pieces per month and can handle marketing campaigns of any size. We provide excellent quality in every piece we produce at the most reasonable prices in the industry.
3. Who is your ideal customer?
Handwritten envelopes ensure that the direct mail pieces get opened. So my ideal customer is really anyone who wants to ensure that their mail is getting opened and see an increase in their response rates. We successfully handle marketing campaigns for a wide range of industries including mortgage, automotive, skin care, diet, real estate, debt and seminar.
4. What has been your most effective marketing strategy to date?
We recently did a marketing campaign for Direct TV that was especially successful. A card was sent to all prospects that had called inquiring about Direct TV's service but did not sign up. The card offered the exact same offer that customers were offered initially. The card was sent in a hand addressed envelope with a live $.44 stamp. Direct TV had a response rate of over 10%. This is virtually unheard of in the direct mail industry. For us, it's not too rare!
5. I would be more effective at marketing my business if…
This is a tough one. I think I market my business pretty well simply because that is my business. We send our personalized direct mail to our prospective clients often to ensure that we continue to grow as the largest hand personalized mailing house in the country.
Swiftpage is a great tool for implementing a drip marketing campaign. Swiftpage allows you to create multistep marketing plans, giving you tools to intelligently and automatically reach out to your leads, prospects and customers.
. Adapted by David Mattson, outlines 49 "Sandler Rules". These timeless selling principles will be more successful by showing you how to be "180 degrees different from the traditional salesperson".
