Do You Struggle With Direct Mail Marketing For Your Restaurant?

I remember doing an article on direct restaurant marketing a few weeks ago. I had good things to say about the method. Direct mail marketing is the future of restaurant marketing, and its only a matter of time before big-name franchises starts joining the bandwagon as well, if they haven’t already.

But according to an article in The Wall Street Journal, some businesses are eschewing direct mail marketing in favor of the good ol’ ways of snail mail marketing. The article goes,

“Spending about $20,000 on the personally signed letters, which offered customers a discount on early orders, seemed indulgent for Per Annum Inc., which sells city diaries, albums, and planners in the struggling corporate gift market. But after swapping snail mail for email last year, Ms. Settle saw a 25% drop in early orders compared with the same period the previous year.

‘We realized we had made a huge mistake,’ says Ms. Settle, president of the New York firm.“

The problem with most restaurant operators–or most business owners—is that they hear about a new and effective marketing approach and quickly see it as an easy way to attract more customers. Let me get one thing straight: there’s no such thing as an “easy way” in the foodservice industry. While direct mail marketing is more costly and expensive than email marketing, it is also much more effective, when done right.

For example, direct mail marketing research firm Mintel Comperemedia tracked nearly 5.2 billion direct mails sent out during the third quarter of 2009, down 27% from 7.1 billion in 2008. How do these business owners expect to reap more sales when they’re sending out fewer advertisements? It doesn’t take a genius to figure out where the problem lies, and I’m pretty sure the method itself—direct mail marketing—is not at fault here.

Here are some tips to improve your direct mail marketing endeavors.

1. Please, personalize your pieces. The best way to grab a customer’s attention is to make them feel special.

2. Mass distributing of fliers and coupons isn’t very effective. It’ll also drain your budget faster than you think.

3. Find a way to balance your snail mail marketing and direct mail marketing efforts. There’s no need to abandon either. Figure out the perfect mixture of the two that works best for your restaurant business.

Even Ms. Settle concluded the same thing. “Ms. Settle, for instance, plans to use e-marketing to complement the hand-signed direct-mail piece, not replace it.”

Tell me what you think by leaving a comment below.