I sent out about 18,000 direct mail pieces last month, and I learned a few lessons, just like I always do. Maybe I can save you a few dollars, and a few lessons by sharing some of the most important things I’ve learned over the years about direct mail.

Below is a list of 10 very important things you should look at when sending out direct mail.

10. Differentiate Your Marketing Piece – if it looks like everything else, it’ll get handled like everything else (put in the trash)

9. Your Mailing Should Have a Single Purpose – don’t ask your reader to do too much, they simply won’t. If you ask them to download a report, then go to a different website, then call your 800 number, then…. get the point? One thing. Really. One thing is all you should ask them to do.

8. Provide Several Ways for Prospects to Respond – Give them every conceivable way you can think of to reach you. Phone, email, fax, carrier pigeon– whatever it takes! The worst thing that can happen is that your mailing piece gets your prospect all hot and bothered, but at the time they want to respond, they can’t. For instance, what if they are reading your mailing piece but have to run out the door to a meeting. If you only give them a website, then they’ll have to wait until they return (which will probably never happen). If you give them a phone number to call, they’ll have the opportunity to call you while they’re running out the door on their way to their next meeting. Seriously think this through, mailing is expensive, particularly with stamps costing almost 50 cents each, you don’t want to blow any opportunity you get for someone to respond. (and YES many people have tested it and time and time again LIVE stamps outperforms metered mail or bulk mail. Buy crazy looking themed stamps, and put as many as you can to get to your postage amount. 2-4 stamps, crooked (seriously), makes it look like you really wanted this piece to get out to the person opening it.)

7. Measure the right metrics – ROI is all that matters. It doesn’t matter what percentage of people respond, or how much the mailing cost you to send out. The only thing that matters is if you made money in the end or got new leads to work (whatever your goal from the piece is).

6. Test, Test, Test, Test…. – you get the picture. Simple things like how many people are in a photo, whether they are male or female, old or young can change the response of a piece. There is no magic answer, just test.

5. One Mailing is NOT Marketing – one mailing is a test. On average it will take you 7-9 times to get a prospect’s attention. Don’t mail the first piece, get no response and then give up. Whatever the response on your first piece, it will usually increase exponentially on each additional piece.

4. Include a “Call to Action” – You’ve got to tell people what to do when they read. Don’t just tell them all about your products and services, you’ve got to give them written instruction on what to do next. For example: Call us today for a free consultation and a complimentary $50 gift card just for inquiring! Or something that tells them exactly what to do. If you don’t tell your prospects what to do, they won’t do anything and they’ll move onto the next piece of mail in the pile.

3. Keep a Recognizable Element to All Marketing Pieces – if you’re going to all the trouble to mail people multiple times, make it known that you’re the same person or company that’s been trying to reach them, and that you continue to try. If you send out 7 – 9 pieces that don’t have a common element, you will not have as good of a chance at being recognized. Think about it, wouldn’t it peak your interest if you saw the same logo, photo or slogan in your mail box 5 or 6 times in a short period of time?

2. Personalization – How many mailing pieces do you read that say “Dear Valued Prospect/Customer/Client.” Right, none. Don’t be lazy, don’t be cheap, personalize as much as you can. You can certainly personalize letters, and now even graphic postcards are becoming easy to personalize. If you need a source for this, let me know. Also, I’ve been testing Personalized URL’s or “purls” for short, that contain the prosect’s name in the web address, for example: www.DOMAINHERE.com/John.Doe and then I send it to John Doe. The good news here, is with any proper Purl system, whether John Doe contacts you once he reaches your site or not, because he entered in his unique url, you get a record of his visit. So, even if he’s shy and doesn’t respond, you know he was interested enough to visit the site and then you can take a few more shots at him with follow up letters. This is a great strategy to pare down a list. Suppose you have a starting list of 2000 people. If 3% of the people come to the Purl page, that would be 60 people. It’s a lot cheaper to pound away at 60 prospects that have indicated they are interested, than it is to keep mailing to 2000 people who you have no idea are interested or not.

1. Don’t rely on one marketing Method – Direct mail is a great COMPONENT, not the single solution. The same can be said for Websites, SEO and Pay Per Click, Email, Ezines, Display Ads etc. Use multiple media and track their responses separately. If you want the easy way to do this, assign different 800 numbers to each piece of media (1 for the website, 1 for the postcard, 1 for the phone book ad, 1 for each magazine or newspaper ad that you place, etc) then check out my good friend The ROI Guy at www.YourROIguy.com – tell him I sent you. Richard will take care of you!

Feel free to let me know your thoughts as well as if you have any tips I might have left out by commenting below.

Nick Nanton, Esq. co-founder of the Celebrity Branding Agency™, was recently quoted in an article on TheStreet.com about celebrity marketing and branding of alcohol products.

Orlando, Fla. – July 22, 2009 – Nick Nanton, Esq., The Celebrity Lawyer and co-founder of the Celebrity Branding Agency™, a franchisor of independently owned and operated Media, Marketing & PR agencies across the country, was recently interviewed about his opinion on the effectiveness of celebrities marketing and branding adult beverages.

The article, written by Jason Notte, called “So Over It: Celebrity Booze,” was a feature article on TheStreet.com and discusses the growing trend of celebrities using their brand to market adult beverages. Notte sites examples of Justin Timberlake having his own tequila, Kid Rock having his own beer, and Diddy getting a 50% share of Diageo’s Ciroc Vodka. These branding strategies have helped boost an otherwise shrinking market.

The article quotes celebrity branding expert and branding consultant, Nick Nanton, Esq. saying, “You don’t want people thinking about the name Ciroc, you want them thinking about Diddy.” “He ideally wants them to go buy a bottle of Diddy,” Nick continued.

Nick Nanton, Esq., The Celebrity Lawyer and co-founder of The Celebrity Branding Agency™ specializes in Celebrity Branding® entrepreneurs, authors, speakers and professionals as celebrity experts in their field of business and helps them expand nationwide.

In the Article, Jason Notte writes, “Perhaps no one has had more success cashing in on celebrity alcohol than Drinks Americas. The company partnered with Donald Trump on vodka and with Willie Nelson on Old Whiskey River Bourbon. Their celebrity cache lessened brand-building promotion costs and increased the chance of someone trying a shot.”

“If there wasn’t demand for such products, Drinks Americas certainly created it. Trump’s line sold 100,000 cases in its first year, while Willie has been good for 7,000 cases a year since launching in 2001,” continued Notte.

To read the full article, please visit http://www.thestreet.com/story/10546862/2/so-over-it-celebrity-booze.html

To find out more about and Nick Nanton, please visit http://www.CelebrityBrandingAgency.com and http://www.NickNanton.com

The Celebrity Branding Agency™:

The Celebrity Branding Agency™ is a Media, Marketing & PR agency that guarantees results and specializes in Celebrity Branding® entrepreneurs, authors, speakers and professionals as celebrity experts in their field of business and helps them expand nationwide. JW Dicks, Esq. & Nick Nanton, Esq., attorneys by trade and entrepreneurs by choice, focus on helping their clients build fan bases that can be monetized through their unique blend of Media, Marketing & PR…Guaranteed™. For more information about The Celebrity Branding Agency™ visit http://www.CelebrityBrandingAgency.com

About Nick Nanton, Esq.:

Known as “The Celebrity Lawyer” for his role in promoting, marketing and creating Celebrity Experts across such diversified fields as entertainment, health and fitness, law, medicine, personal development, finance, and real estate, Nick represents many top Celebrity Experts and serves as the Producer of America’s PremierExperts™ television show. He also produces The Next Big Thing™ radio show, designed to recognize the top Celebrity Experts and bring their solutions to consumers and media outlets alike.

Nick is the co-author of the best-selling book, Celebrity Branding You™ and serves as editor and publisher of Celebrity Press™, a publishing company that produces and releases books by top Celebrity Experts. Nick and his longtime business and law partner, JW Dicks, Esq., use their proprietary Celebrity Branding® process to help entrepreneurs, professionals, CEOs, authors and professional speakers realize their dreams of becoming Celebrity Experts, create multiple revenue streams through IDEA Marketing™, and ultimately grow their organizations based on their teachings and systems.

The CEO of the Celebrity Branding Agency™, Nick, along with partners JW Dicks, Esq. and Lindsay Glass, develop online fan bases for their clients through CelebritySites.com, while coaching those who desire to reach Celebrity Expert status through their unique Ultimate Celebrity Branding Experience™ program.

Nick’s impressive path of professional accomplishments has not just set industry standards, but has propelled him into the national spotlight. Nick has been named “Best of the Bar” and has even been referred to as “One of Orlando’s Top 10 Young and Powerful.” Prior to his days as an attorney, Nick spent more than a decade immersed in the entertainment industry. As an award-winning songwriter and television producer, he has worked on projects and negotiated deals from large-scale events to reality television shows—involving celebrities from a wide array of genres including President George H.W. Bush, Bill Cosby, Bill Rancic, season one winner of NBC’s hit TV show “The Apprentice”, Don Shula of the Miami Dolphins, Legendary College Basketball Coach Bobby Knight and Rock ‘n Roll Hall of Famer, Multi-Platinum Recording Artist/Songwriter and Drummer for Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers, Stan Lynch, among others.

Through his experience with celebrities, Nick has “cracked the celebrity code” allowing him to propel his clients to celebrity status in their business niche, increasing their profits and locking out their competition.

With a reputation as an energetic speaker and author, Nick’s work entails the Dicks & Nanton Business Law Library, as well as the educational courses 7 Secrets to Making Real Money with Your Music (co-authored with Bob Baker, author of the Guerilla Music Guide to Music & Marketing), Celebrity Franchising You™ and Blueprint to Millions.

Nick has been featured in USA Today, The New York Times, Entrepreneur® Magazine, and many more national publications on subjects ranging from branding, marketing and law, to American Idol.

Nick currently serves as Managing Director at the Law Firm of Dicks & Nanton P.A., is a member of the Florida Bar, holds a JD from the University of Florida Levin College of Law, as well as a BSBA in Finance from the University of Florida’s prestigious Warrington College of Business.

Prior to founding the Dicks & Nanton companies, Nick served as CEO of Cinemark Music Group LLC, a subsidiary of Cinemark USA, Inc., one of the largest motion picture exhibitors in North America with 3,288 screens in 33 States and Internationally. He is the past Chairman of the Orange County Bar Association’s Entertainment Law Committee, serves on the Executive Council of the Entertainment, Arts and Sports Law Section of the Florida Bar, the Board of the Florida Hospital Foundation and is a member of Florida Blue Key – Florida’s Oldest and Most Prestigious Leadership Honorary.

Nick is a member of The National Academy of Recording Arts & Sciences (NARAS, Home to The GRAMMYs) and casts a vote on the annual GRAMMY® Awards and spends his spare time rooting for the Florida Gators with his wife Kristina, and their two sons, Brock and Bowen. For more information about Nanton visit http://www.NickNanton.com.

What started out looking like a normal greeting card, turned out to be sheer genius. Click on the links below to see the Best Holiday Promotion Ever!

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