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ARE COMMISSION CIRCULARS RIGHT FOR YOU?

Everyone that starts out learning the mail order business is normally introduced to Commission Circulars very early in the game. Commission Circulars are ads that are already typeset. You stamp YOUR name and address in the “order from” box, then you print and mail them. It’s a very simple process and serves an excellent purpose for many people.

Commission Circulars allow a person to make money without handling the product. Orders normally will come directly from the customer to YOU. You keep 50% or more of the money and send the rest, with the customer’s order to the dealer. The dealer will process the customer’s order and ship it directly to them. Your only function is to take your money out of envelopes and re-mail the rest of the order and money to the dealer who is the prime source of the product. Some people base their business on Commission Circulars alone. Some people really love separating copies, stamping their name with a rubber stamp, collating and stuffing envelopes and mailing them at the post office. Some businesses get their families involved because children can help in most phases of this business process. It’s really a fun hobby for some people.

However, what happens if you are not right for Commission Circulars? What if you are just getting started in the mail order business and don’t mail more than 10 letters per week? What if you don’t know anybody to send the circulars to? Some people will tell you to buy a mailing list — but can you really afford to spend $290.00 for first-class postage to mail to 1,000 people at this time? Besides, 1,000 people probably wouldn’t bring in more than 2 or 3 orders. If you are only getting $2 or $3 commission from the circular — you’d go broke quick!

You need to ask yourself several questions before ordering Commission Circulars. First and foremost, you need to determine how much you are mailing per month. If your postage costs are less than $200 every 30 days, it probably won’t pay you to order Commission Circulars. However, if the Commission Circular can become a part of your mailing without causing you an extra postage expense, you might consider them. Commission circulars bring in good profits only when they are mailed to a lot of people — 1,000 won’t cut it. Big mail dealers who process tons of mail per week and mail to thousands every month benefit the most from Commission Circulars. They have the volume it takes to participate in this type of business and will generate enough orders to make them pay for themselves.

Now, a lot of people may disagree with me about Commission Circulars. Some people feel if you only mail 10 per month, it will bring in money. I agree — it will, but it will take many months (possibly years) at this pace to make it worth your time. A commission mailer who mails Commission Circulars is normally responsible for his/her own printing (some people provide pre-printed circulars at a cost) as well as their own time in mailing and postage. Depending on the amount of money (or stamps) the Commission Circular pays, you may not re-coup enough expenses unless you receive several orders. In other words, don’t expect to mail 1,000 circulars and get 500 orders REGARDLESS of what anyone tells you. There are so many variances in mailing lists and human beings it is really impossible to determine response rates.

There are a number of ways though for the new beginner to take part in Commission Circular mailings and receive a response that is sufficient. One way is to take part in Co-Op Printing deals. Read and study the mail order publications and you will find several good co-op printing deals. This is where you send a circular to a printer. He or she will print a certain number of copies. Your ad will be printed on 1-side and the printer’s ad will be printed on the other. They will send all the copies back to you and you are responsible for mailing them. This immediately cuts your printing costs in half! A lot of people use this method if they do monthly bulk mailings or mail a lot. (Just be sure the ad the printer puts on the back of your ad is something that doesn’t conflict with items you are selling also.)

If you don’t do a lot of mailings and/or you don’t want the hassle of stuffing and mailing a lot of envelopes, you can advertise your circular in a mail order publication. At a standard rate of $25 per 1,000 — you can get your circular printed and mailed without any additional work on your part. This is the least expensive way to take part in Commission Circulars because you save on postage, envelopes, mailing list of names, folding, stapling and the time spent carting everything to the post office. Purchase a few Big Mails and keep up to date on publications and prices.

The third way of getting your Commission Circulars out is by printing them yourself and having someone else mail them for you. Most bulk mailers (people who process large volumes of mail) will normally include your 8 1/2×11 circulars in with their own mail for 2c to 4c each. You benefit from the mailers own mailing list plus you are saved the time of mailing and processing them. If you have a office copier or other printing equipment that will make copies from a camera-ready master, you’re in business. Just print as many copies as you want, box them up and send to the mailer you select.

Commission Circulars are really a great way to help others promote their products and bring in an income also for you. I myself participate in 3 different commission programs, however I co-publish publications. The only difference between them and Commission Circulars is the fact that they are publications. You make money on any advertising ordered through you as well as subscriptions. Advertising, printing and mailing are the 3 MOST sought after products in mail order. So naturally, I take part in the promotion of advertising.

Before participating in any Commission Circular or Co-Publishing effort, you should always take the time to inspect the product you are promoting. If it’s low in cost, order it before promoting it. This way you will be able to answer questions if potential customers call or write you about it. If the product is more than you can afford or you don’t want to buy it — ask the dealer to send you a brochure or other information. You need to be aware of any product or service you are promoting because it is a direct reflection on YOUR company. Your company name is on the circular and people will think you are the Prime Source.

Think about it this way. Suppose a shoe salesperson came to the door without any shoes to show you. They had no brochures, no information about their product and no knowledge of what shoes were available. Would you make a purchase simply from a price list? Probably not! And your customer probably won’t either. If they do happen to take the time to request more information — get it for them. Don’t toss their letter in the trash and not answer it because you don’t know the answer. You could be throwing away a $100 order. Wouldn’t it be worth the 29c investment?

Direct Mail Mailing Tips

If you do decide to mail your own circulars yourself because you want to be sure they are mailed — here are some tips to cut costs:

• Be sure ALL the circulars are printed on BOTH sides of the paper. This way — you can get 8 circulars (4 sheets of paper printed on both sides) in a standard business-size envelope for 29c.
• Never, never, never put only one sheet of paper in an envelope and mail it. The person receiving it will be confused and you will automatically be recognized as a newcomer who loves to waste money!
• If you choose to include a cover letter with your direct mail, put a coupon or bonus offer at the bottom of the letter to encourage the customer to look through your offers and consider them.
• Fold your circulars in a “Z-fold” when placing them in the envelope itself. This way, as soon as the envelope is opened the customer does not have to unfold it. Your best offer or “eye-catcher” is looking directly at them.
• When printing circulars on the back of other circulars, turn one of them upside down. This way, the order coupons for the flyers are not back-to-back and customers can place two orders from one circular.
• Place similar or complementing offers in each envelope. Don’t put a hodge-podge of all kinds of different items as this will tend to confuse the customer. A good combination is:
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    • (a) Mailing List
    • (b) Stamp Program
    • (c) Printing or Typesetting
    • (d) Money-Making Program

Continually try different ideas to market your products properly. Work on it. Make a game out of it. Eventually you will hit upon the right combination that will literally stuff your mailbox with orders!

BEGINNERS TAKE NOTICE!

I’m not usually one that complains. In fact, I am normally the type of person that bends over backwards to help everyone — even if it means lost profits. So, being the understanding and caring sole that I am, you will normally never hear me complain.

However, I have personally been experiencing a re-occurring problem and feel that other mail order dealers are probably experiencing it too, hence the reason for this report. I hope a lot of people read and understand our problem and will try and correct it in the future. We’d all save a little on postage and help each other in the process.

What is this problem? It’s having a customer order something without including any information as to what they are ordering. Would you send Sears $20 and expect them to know you were ordering an alarm clock you saw in their catalog? Would you send your electric company a check for $15 and expect them to know what account you were making a payment on? Of course you wouldn’t — so how are mail order businesses supposed to know what you’re ordering or requesting?

And a note like “Send me info” is NOT sufficient enough. Remember the rule of “who,” “what,” “when,” and “where” we learned in grade school English? “Send me info” still doesn’t tell a business what you are ordering. Most mail order businesses carry a large number of different products. If they send you information on everything they sell, not only would it cost a lot more in postage and require a 9×12 envelope — but you’ll get a lot of different information on products you may not be interested in. In fact, the business may not include the information you originally requested because they had no idea what you were ordering and couldn’t afford to send you everything they have.

Then, to top it off — some of these people that wrote to the mail order business requesting information will get upset and file a complaint against them because they never sent the proper information. This is a big problem we see getting bigger and bigger and I hope this report will do a small part in clearing it up.

Okay — let’s be realistic. If you are guilty of inflicting pain on dealers by not letting us know what you are ordering or requesting information on — don’t worry. We don’t hate you and want you to hang your head down and slink away in shame. On the contrary — we want your business and we want to keep you happy as a steady customer. The next time you order something, read your note or letter ONE time before putting it in the envelope and sealing it shut. Ask yourself if you have provided the business with enough information to process your order. That’s all there is to it!

A correct form of writing a business letter should go something like this:

Dear (Name),

We noticed your ad in (name of publication) and would like more information on (product or service). Your attention to this matter would be greatly appreciated.” If you don’t want to take the time to write this much, you could just cut out the ad you saw and tape onto your letterhead or a note paper. Enclose the proper stamps, money or SASE for a reply and you’re ready to fold in an envelope and mail.

And by all means — place your RETURN ADDRESS on the outside of the envelope. Believe it or not, I personally receive 100’s of orders per year without a return address with a few dollars stuck inside an envelope. I have no clue “what” is being ordered and even less of a clue as to “where” to send it.

As mail order dealers, we sometimes believe that we are totally alone in this business. Since most of us work by ourselves, isolated from most of the working 9-to-5 world — the dreaded “lonelinosis” sets in. But remember — just because we don’t see our mail order dealers and distributors face to face, they are here. This statement may sound a little too elementary, but sometimes we overlook the obvious. Mail order is full of fine, upstanding and caring mail order dealers. Every one of us are breathing, thinking human beings. We fall in love, have personal problems, have bad days, have slow months, have busy weeks and have lives to lead. A majority of us have children and all of us have family and friends that occupy our time.

We should all support each other and make as many friends as we can. Although the world seems like it is self-oriented half the time, the only person that can begin a change is the one in the mirror. Think of others and try and be more understanding. I think I speak for all dealers in saying that we all WANT to fill your orders and process them as quickly as possible. All we ask if that you let us know WHAT you are ordering or WHERE you saw our ad so we can send you the correct information you need the first time around.

There are many schools of thought on how to write a successful ad, letter or brochure. Some say you need to be subtle, some say be harsh, some say be roundabout, some say be direct. There is one technique, though, that is coming to the forefront as one of the most successful to employ. This is “info-jamming. “Info-jamming is, simply put, overloading the prospect with information about your product or service. The theory is, you give the customer more information than they’d ever want on your product/service, and they’ll feel more confident about you and what you offer. Also, the customer that actually reads through it all is the one who’s interested enough to buy what you offer. The good news is; it works!

Here’s how to do it. Say you’re planning a quarter-page display ad in a magazine. Instead of leaving a lot of white space, so it looks open, and instead of putting pictures in to catch the eye, fill the whole space with text! Load it with as much information as you can fit in, without making it unreadable. To prevent it from looking like a grey blur when the reader’s eyes scan through the page, put a bold, black box around the ad, a bold headline, and emphasize important words and phrases with bold print.

You can do the same thing with a mailing. Put together four-page sales letters loaded with copy, and then add a brochure/flyer that re-emphasizes the important points in even greater detail.

A few cautions with this technique. First, make sure you actually have something to say! We are so conditioned to being economical with our words in advertising that it’ll be hard to info-jam without feeling repetitious. Instead of rambling on about features, tell customers every single benefit they’ll get from your product/service. BENEFIT is the important word. Rather than telling them your “miracle dust-rag” has twice as many dust picker-uppers, tell them their cleaning will be done in half the time with half the effort. Tell “what’s in it for them.”

Give this a try. Depending on your audience and what you’re trying to sell, you may find that info-jamming can jam more sales into your bank account!

Now you’ve read about the 10 best mail order businesses.  Have you noticed how some of them fit together?  Well, in all actuality, ALL 10 fit together.  You can have a profitable, part-time or full-time mail order business by running as many of these mini-businesses together as you can.

Take another look through the reports and see how producing and selling information, print brokering, circular mailing, producing ad sheets, co-publishing other ad sheets, big mails, mailing list rental, typesetting, rubber stamps and clip art all fit together with each other.  You can advertise your services in flyers that get mailed with other circulars and ad sheets in your big mails, which are ordered by customers whose names and addresses get added to your rental mailing list, which is ordered by other dealers who find out about your other services.  Customers who aren’t in the mail order business can still gain useful information from your products, use your print brokering services to get the best prices on their other printing needs, and can purchase return address rubber stamps from you.  It all goes together in a cycle that will make money for you.  All you need to do is be persistent (VERY persistent) and remember the following tips.

*  ADVERTISE!  People can’t and won’t order from you if they don’t know who you are and what you sell.  Get those ads out there!  You don’t have to spend thousands of dollars on full page ads.  Put those one-inch ads in the ad sheets you get in the mail.  They’re cheap, and they WORK.

*  REINVEST!  Don’t expect to build a full-time business by putting a few ads in ad sheets, then never advertising again.  If you want to succeed, you MUST put at least 50% of your profits back into advertising.  Expand the amount of advertising you do until you saturate the market.  That’s the way to be a success.  Start your business part-time, and keep your full-time job, so you don’t NEED to dip into your profits for spending money.  If you pour your profits into advertising at the beginning, it will take less time for your part-time business to become self-supporting and full-time.

*  STAY ALERT!  Read and save all the mail-order related mail you get.  Your files will prove to be a valuable source of information and ideas for future products, ads and services.

*  WORK WITH OTHER MAIL-ORDER DEALERS!  You will find that the competition in this business can also be your friend.  When co-publishing and mailing other dealers’ circulars, you will be helping them.  They will help you in return.  Be honest, trustworthy, and deliver on all your promises, and the other dealers you work with will do the same.

*  DON’T GIVE UP!  If you think you can get rich overnight in mail order, you need to rethink things.  Sure, some people have gotten lucky, but the majority of mail order businesses start slow and build slowly.  You can’t give up after the first month.  Be like the little engine that could, and keep pushing along.  It will take time, but the time you take will be worth it.

*  BE SKEPTICAL!  If you see an offer in the mail that is far too good to be true, it probably IS too good to be true.  Don’t fall for the get rich quick junk, and don’t try to sell the stuff, either.  Your customers won’t be very loyal after you burn them.

*  REMEMBER, THE CUSTOMER IS KING!  Customer service is of the utmost importance in mail order.  Give a good guarantee on your products.  If they are good and deliver on your advertised promises, you won’t have to worry about many customer returns.  If a customer has a complaint, make sure you answer them quickly and kindly.  Sometimes, the best return customers are the ones who have had problems that you’ve corrected.  They see that you have their interests in mind, and respect you for that.

*  STUFF THAT ENVELOPE FULL!  Return business is the key to making money in mail order.  That first order covers your costs; the return business is profit.  Always give your customers a lot of products and services to choose from.

If you follow these rules and use the information provided in this report set, you should find yourself on the way to an exciting part-time or full-time mail order business that you can operate out of your own home!

Suppose you’re new to mail order, and you want to put your ads into the many ad sheets, tabloids and publications you’re seeing in your mail box everyday.  The only problem is, you don’t HAVE any ads!  Here’s where a typesetting service comes into play.  Typesetting isn’t as hard as it sounds.  It’s just a glorified name for making a clean, clear, ad.  If you have a computer, you can produce professional quality typesetting easily and quickly.  However, typesetting can even be done with a regular typewriter.

If you are going to typeset with a typewriter, you should first visit your local office supply store and pick up a carbon ribbon for your typewriter (it prints darker and more evenly than a nylon ribbon), some rub-on transfer letters and borders in different sizes (don’t worry if they’re big, I’ll talk about that later), a “non-photo blue” pencil (which doesn’t show up when photocopied) and a book or two of mail-order or business related clip art.  You should be able to get all this for $15 or less.

Next place ads in ad sheets and other publications for your typesetting service.  Observe what other typesetters are charging and be competitive.  You should probably expect to get $1 - $3 per inch.  This doesn’t sound like much, but the work is easy, and you will be doing other things besides just typesetting, as you will see later in this report.  Typesetting should be offered as an “add-on” service, best in connection with your own ad sheet.  Your customers will be providing the ad copy, so all you have to do is arrange it.  Usually, around 35 words will fit into a one-inch ad, leaving room for a border and a piece of clip art.

Here’s sample wording for an ad:  “PROFESSIONAL TYPESETTING - Get your ad typeset and mailed to 1000 hungry buyers!  $5/inch (35 words max) $1 each additional inch.  You get 15 camera-ready proofs FREE!  Send payment & 2 first class stamps to:  (Your name and address).”  What you will be doing here is typesetting the ad, inserting it into one of your ad sheets, and sending the customer 10 extra copies of their ad, along with as many of your other offers as you can for 2 stamps.  You may be giving the typesetting for free, based on your ad sheet rates, but it’s worth it, as this is a great way to get new ads, as well as new customers.

So, here’s how to typeset a one-inch ad.  First, don’t worry about trying to fit everything into one inch!  That’s right.  Make it twice the size it will be when printed.  This gives you more room to work with, plus it will be a better quality when reduced to one inch on a photocopier (that’s the trick!).  For a one-inch ad, make a 2 inch tall by 4 1/4 inch wide border on a piece of white paper with your rub-on borders.  Next, make a light guideline with the blue pencil for the headline.  Use rub-down letters of the appropriate size to make the headlines, being careful to follow the guideline to keep everything straight.  Then, load the paper into your typewriter and neatly type the copy into the remaining space.  If your typewriter will do extra-bold words, use them to highlight important words in the ad, as well as the name and address.  When you type the ad, leave a bit of space on one side for an appropriate piece of clip art.  Cut the clip art from the book, and using either rubber cement, “spray-mount” glue or clear, non-shiny tape, attach it to the ad.  Use liquid paper to cover any specks or smears on the ad.  Then, reduce it 50% on a photocopier.  You’ve just typeset an ad!

You should always offer extra copies of the ad to your customers.  So, make five copies of the ad, cut them out, and place them straight face down on the copier glass.  Make two copies of that, cut out the ads from the copies, and you have fifteen copies to send your customer, plus the original to put in your own ad sheet.

If you have a computer, it can be much easier, especially if you have a laser printer and a good graphics program or word processor.  Use your graphics program to do the layout steps above.  You can add clip-art in the computer, or manually, after printing the ad.  You won’t have to worry about reducing the ad on a photocopier, as you can do that within your graphics program.  Plus, printing extra copies is a snap.  Most graphics programs will let you “copy and stamp,” which means making a copy of what you have made (your ad), and stamping it elsewhere on the screen.  Hence, you can make your fifteen copies all on one page and print them once, quickly and easily.  And, your typesetting will look super-professional!

Remember how I asked for two first class stamps in my sample ad?  That gives you plenty of “envelope space” for your other offers and ad sheets.  You should be sure to include a copy of the ad sheet your customer’s ad appears in, so they can be assured you delivered on your promises.

Offering typesetting will get customers who are new to mail order, as well as seasoned professionals who don’t want to bother with doing their own ads.  It will also expand the number of people who get your ad sheets and offers.