3 Ways to Use Postcards for B2B Prospecting

Ask a successful Business to Consumer (B2C) marketer for their favorite marketing channels and it’s likely you’ll hear direct mail mentioned. From cost to effectiveness, direct mail’s benefits make it a natural fit for B2C businesses like retailers, cafés, and restaurants. 

While the huge value of direct mail is very well known among B2C marketers, many Business to Business (B2B) marketers and salespeople are unaware of the immense amount of value that a successful direct mail postcards campaign can generate. 

With the right combination of messaging, targeting, and a great offer, postcards can be an extremely powerful tool for B2B businesses interested in generating new sales leads and increasing interest in their products or services. 

Has your B2B business considered using direct mail postcards to generate leads and fuel growth? Read on to learn three ways your business can use direct mail to create new opportunities, find new customers, and build new client relationships.

Take advantage of seasonal marketing opportunities

Does your business offer a product or service that’s highly relevant and in-demand at certain points of the year? The demand for many B2B services fluctuates over the course of the year, making timely direct mail a great marketing method. 

If you run an accounting firm that specializes in tax planning, why not reach out to local businesses before tax season begins? If your company installs heating and air conditioning equipment for commercial buildings, start a campaign at the beginning of summer or winter. 

More than any other marketing channel, direct mail lets you closely control exactly when prospects will come into contact with your messaging. Time it just right and you’ll be able to generate profitable leads for your B2B business.

Target intelligently to reach your ideal customers 

Short of cold calling prospects directly, there’s no more effective way to target your ideal customers than by using direct mail postcards. B2B postcards allow you to hone in on an extremely specific audience using a huge range of targeting variables. 

Some of the options you can use to target your campaign include a small business’s credit rating, its number of employees, the number of PCs it has in its office, its sales volume, the square footage of its office, and even the gender of its owner. 

You can also target more broadly using options like the company’s age and trading history, its location, or whether or not it’s a new business. These give you a massive amount of power to reach only the prospects that are most likely to respond to your message.

Slowly and gradually build a relationship with your audience 

In many ways, direct mail postcards have all of the advantages that cold calls don’t – instead of being sudden and surprising, direct mail lets your business slowly build a relationship with its target audience before asking for their business. 

This is ideal for businesses that offer a high-ticket item or service. Since it typically takes longer to sell expensive products and services than cheaper ones, the gradual nature of a direct mail campaign can help your business become more familiar.

With familiarity comes trust, and with trust comes an audience that’s responsive to your business’s offers. By slowly building a relationship with your target audience, your B2B business can bring in new clients throughout the course of the year.