8 clever ways to make your marketing postcards unique

Marketing postcards are a great way to raise brand awareness and generate leads, especially if you have a target audience that digital marketing can’t comprehensively reach. But there’s a problem – tons of brands like yours are already using postcard marketing strategies. As a result, most consumers are bombarded with marketing postcards.

If you want to rise above the fold and persuade your recipients, you need to make your postcards unique in some way. So how do you do it?sp

Why Differentiation Is Important

Why not just copy what your competitors are doing? After all, they’re probably using tried-and-true postcard marketing tactics that convert recipients.

Competitive differentiation is important for several reasons:

•       Grabbing attention. If your postcard is unique, it’s going to get noticed. When people sort through the mail, they can readily identify and throw out what they perceive as junk mail. If your postcard ends up in that pile, you’re not going to generate any traction. But if you offer something a recipient has never seen before, they’ll actually take the time to look it over.
•       Demonstrating value. Putting in the effort to make your postcard unique shows that you’re willing to put in extra effort as a brand. If you invest in better materials, it shows you care about quality. If you’re more creative with your wording, it shows you want to make a good impression with your audience.
•       Improving memorability. People are much more likely to remember things that are novel. If your postcard shows them something they’ve never seen before, or even something they don’t see often, they’ll be much more likely to remember your brand and your message.

How to Make Marketing Postcards More Unique

So what steps can you take to make your marketing postcards more unique?

1.       Use better stock. One simple step is to invest in better-grade stock. When printing postcards, you’ll have several options for the stock you use for printing. Generally, thicker and more durable stocks make a better impression, at a slightly increased cost. You can also invest in a gloss coating or other upgrades that make your product shine.
2.       Hire a professional photographer. Next, make sure you hire a professional photographer (if you’re including photos). Postcards don’t give you much room, so you can usually only include one or two prominent images. Those images need to be immediately compelling if they’re going to make an impression on your audience – and a professional will be able to help you accomplish this.
3.       Start with a template, but break away. Postcard templates are great for a number of reasons. They help you plan for the amount of space you have, they help you start generating ideas, and they can give you a sense of what other people are doing. But you also need to break away from them; never use a template point for point.
4.       Employ minimalism. Minimalism is the key to effective, unique postcard design. Most amateur marketers who attempt postcard design recognize the spatial limitations of this format and try to cram as much information as possible into this tiny space. Don’t fall into this trap; instead, focus on only one or two most important design elements and give your postcard layout room to breathe.
5.       Use a personal touch. Make your postcard warmer and more personal to form an immediate bond with your recipients. You can offer something simple like a professional headshot or hand-write a letter to your target audience. Any step you take to make your postcard more personally inviting will help you stand out from the crowd.
6.       Customize and personalize. Take the time to customize and personalize your postcards. It’s extremely inexpensive to print large runs of postcards that are identical to each other. You’ll have to pay a bit more if you want to add custom names and addresses to each piece – but it’s usually worth the cost.
7.       Send follow-ups. Don’t give up just because a recipient didn’t respond to the first postcard you sent. Instead, be prepared for an entire follow-up campaign; use different designs and different angles to reinforce your brand familiarity and eventually win over those apathetic initial customers.
8.       Integrate. Finally, make it a point to integrate your postcard marketing with other aspects of your overall marketing strategy. QR codes and digital tracking, for example, can help you connect postcard recipients with your online marketing empire.

Of course, these are just some of the ways you can make your marketing postcards more unique. Designing original illustrations, coming up with compelling headlines, and adding unique cuts and shapes can all give you a boost as well. The more creative you are, and the better targeted your content is for your audience, the better your chances of success.