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Preparing
your operation carefully
The
quality of your mailing list: a crucial element
Making sure that a mailing list is up to date
and accurate requires constant attention.
You may be sending the right message, but
if this does not reach the right telephone
numbers or recipients, your operation will
be a waste of time and effort.
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check your mailing list and update the
information it contains, especially for
the fields that you will use to customise
your messages (company name, recipient's
name), job titles, fax numbers, etc.
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if you are starting from scratch and
if you require a mailing list, there are
service providers specialising in
this field, who can provide the names
and addresses you need. The advantage
of this solution is that your mailing
list is kept up to date, reliable and
complete.
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if you are renting your mailing list
from a service provider, define your requirements
in terms of content as clearly as possible
with the company, and make sure that the
list is targeted at the people you want
to reach. Some service providers are fairly
"general" in their approach,
while other are more specialised (by business
sector, technology, sales, industry, geographical
areas, etc.), and are able to provide
more precise information, which is very
useful if the message you wish to broadcast
is highly specific.
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watch out for the "unwanted numbers"
list: this is equivalent to a list of
ex-directory telephone numbers. It contains
the numbers of fax subscribers who do
not want their number to be disclosed
and wish to be protected from unwanted
fax messages. If you carry out a direct
marketing operation targeted at a large
number of prospects, make sure that your
list is completely free of "Safran"
numbers. Failing to do this could result
in you being investigated should an unhappy
recipient decide to make an official complaint.
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watch out for "telephone numbers":
make sure that your list only contains
fax numbers, and that no telephone numbers
have been accidentally included. The recipient's
telephone will ring, because of the carrier
wave signal," until he or she picks
up the phone. If they decide to investigate
the source of this call, they could take
legal action against you.
A
pertinent and attractive message
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your offer should be as attractive as
possible, and your message should create
interest.
The message you are going to send will
no doubt have a specific objective. This
could be to sell a product (promotional
marketing campaign), to provide information
about a company, a brand or a service,
to invite people to an event you are organising,
or to send out a postal questionnaire
in fax format
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for corporate messages intended at conveying
an image, care should be taken to create
a layout where the message is as easy
to read as possible, where the written
part is relatively short and hard-hitting,
while remaining serious. Margins are important
too, since they give the text space and
improve readability
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if you are sending a promotional fax,
readability is less important than the
need to attract the reader's attention
using the traditional array of eye-catching
devices used in paper promotional campaigns.
This involves star-shaped backgrounds
to indicate a promotion, and above all
the prices shown in large characters,
given that prices shown in small letters
are associated with luxury goods
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if you are sending out a questionnaire,
the rules are different, and you should
take inspiration from an existing questionnaire
design method, such as the design
of questionnaires in 12 steps
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avoid using graphics and pastel-coloured
logos: they print very badly in black
and white fax format, which can have a
negative effect. Furthermore, these faxes
take longer to send, which means higher
communications costs for you
AIDA,
or the key to a successful fax broadcast
As usual, the simplest things work the
best. That's how the famous AIDA method
came about, which represents an excellent
reminder for professional wishing to launch
a successful multicast.
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A for ATTRACTION
Attract their attention, i.e. surprise
your target prospects. However, don't
lose sight of the aim of your mailshot,
as we mentioned earlier
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I for INTEREST
Creating interest means talking to your
prospects about what concerns THEM, rather
than simply passing on your own personal
visions. This can be the most difficult
task of all, because you have to see things
from your customers' or prospects' point
of view. You may have carried out a market
survey prior to organising your mailshot,
which will make planning the project far
easier
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D for DESIRE
Stirring up interest also means stimulating
your readers to go where you want them
to go. To do this, you need a commitment
to sell, which provides a guarantee for
the reader that he or she has something
to gain from your offer. This is particularly
difficult to achieve, as both professional
and public prospects are submerged with
information, prospectuses and, increasingly,
unsolicited e-mails (see spamming)
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A for ACTION
Desire is fine, but you still need to
secure either the sale or the target's
reply. To achieve this, you need to provide
prospects with an easy way to contact
you, underlining the specially adapted
communications channels (such as your
unified mailbox, for example)
Choosing
the "right moment" to send your
faxes
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Technical
means for broadcasting faxes to hundreds of
different recipients
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service providers capable can take care
of routing your fax mailshot in the shortest
possible time, whatever the number of
recipients. They are equipped with platforms
which enable the simultaneous channelling
of several hundreds or thousands of faxes.
They are generally supervised by trained
operators, redial busy numbers, and keep
you informed on the status of your project
via operation reports
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specialised software packages enable
you to create your document with personalised
fields, and to compile them with your
mailing list. These software packages
are offered by the above service providers,
who frequently develop them themselves.
As a rule, you can download them onto
your computer, and interface them with
the platform of the service provider supplying
the link for your operation
Monitoring
your operation in a serious and in-depth way
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you should arrange for a person or a
team to take care of following up returned
coupons, and to ensure monitoring of "qualified"
contacts. Every contact is worth its weight
in gold, and must be processed. A mailshot
operation (whether by fax or other means)
without a system of following-up contacts
is a fairly pointless and irrelevant project
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