|
|
|
Creative
and Professional Web Site Design for Small Businesses
and Individuals
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Small
Business Home >> Advertising
>>
Code Your Ads Without Adding Words
Coding
advertising is not the big secret or the involved process
many would have you believe.
A great
many firms sell reports on how to code your advertising for
$3 or more, when it's nothing you can't learn with a little
study of a few mail order publications.
Coding
advertisements is simply a means of determining where your
orders come from, and in cases where you don't use coupons
or separate order forms for several different products, a
method of double checking on what the customer actually requested.
For the
purpose of demonstration, let's assume you have a company
called JONDO COMPANY, your name is JOHN DOE, and you market
publications by PRINTCO and PUB-GUYS. You decide to run ads
for different products in three publications and teaser ads
for your catalogs in two others, one for each publisher's
catalog. Coding the latter two is easy.
For simplicity,
where you put the name and address of the company when offering
Printco's catalog, mark the name as PC JONDO, ADDRESS, ZIP
CODE. When the envelope arrives and no indication is given
of what was requested, you can tell at a glance what was requested.
Now Printco
and Pub-Guys sound and look alike, so for the second ad, mark
it JONDO-PG. If you're advertising the same catalog in three
different magazines, use different codes for each to see which
one gives you the best response, for example JONDO-PG, JOHN
DOE PG AND P.G. JOHN. You can easily separate them as you
receive them.
The permutations
are endless: P.G. DOE, P. DOE, G. DOE, DPG, JPG, JDPG, and
if that's not enough, code the address, perhaps BOX 99, DEPT.
PG, BOX 99-PG, BOX 99 DESK PG, BOX PG-99, and so on.
The person
ordering wants to be sure you get his request and almost always
faithfully reproduces whatever is listed as the correct address
right down to the last comma. You can never run out of ways
to code. PG is the obvious code for PUB-GUYS, but you could
use an arbitrary number code chosen by you and in fact, number
codes are invaluable codes for making dates on the ads, to
see how many trickle-in orders you get long after the ad stops
running, and what months and season are most productive for
selling your products.
Date coding
involves using numbers in sequence to indicate magazine issue
number, sequence number, or date published.
This coding
is virtually essential in later campaigns. Once you've got
a fair-sized mailing list, it will be far easier to use advertising
codes to indicate their interests than to keep a complete
ledger of every person and what they purchased. It also makes
computer entry a snap, especially with a good filing program.
One thing
that scares people about coding is receiving checks or money
orders coded like the ads. People become somewhat afraid that
they won't be able to deposit them because their account is
registered to JONDO, not JDPG or whatever. Have no fear. Your
company will be registered to your mailing address. By showing
the clerk a copy of the advertisement with the address, there
will be little doubt as to who should rightfully receive the
money, and your checks or money orders will clear like clockwork.
If by chance you do encounter a bank that won't accommodate
this requirement, bank somewhere else where they understand
the workings of mail marketers.
Return
to Making Money Online with Your Own Home Business
|
