They can't use you if they can't find you.

Why use Every Door Direct mailers?

By Ed Duffy
Easy Street Designs

They can’t choose you if they don’t know you’re there.

Most people know the value of shopping local, when the quality is there. It promotes local economic well being, which benefits the whole neighborhood. The key for local independent businesses is to present them an opportunity to do so, then execute on the promise.

Execution is the long term key. If you bring people in and disappoint them, you’ve done worse than just waste the money you spent getting them there, you’ve diminished the effectiveness of future advertising because disappointed customers often share their experiences with others, especially on social media.

But you can’t even put yourself to the test if your potential customers aren’t aware of your existence. Every Door Direct mailers are a great, cost effective way to reach nearby neighborhoods and ensure that you’re inviting everyone to give you a try.

What is Every Door Direct mail? It’s a form of direct mail that doesn’t require any special permit. Anyone can do it. You can get your own account on the USPS website or a printer, such as Easy Street Designs, can use their account and help you select the neighborhoods based on your target market and your budget.

The Post Office can offer a very good rate (about 18 cents per piece) because the parameters (requirements) make it easy for them. There are minimum size and weight requirements, which make them easy for the mail carrier to handle and distribute. They don’t have individual addresses, it’s just one per home. They cover entire carrier routes so there is no machine processing Bundles are simply given to the carrier responsible for that route. The customer is responsible for labeling the bundles and bringing them to the individual post office that serves the routes they’ve selected.

Customers can select carrier routes online and set up an account if they like. You can also view and select carrier routes without an account and give the information to your printer, if they offer EDDM services. You must choose at least 200 addresses (most carrier routes are bigger than that anyway) and fewer than 5,000 per order.

Terms, pricing and specifications for the mail pieces themselves will vary from printer to printer.

Easy Street Designs, in Colorado Springs, offers EDDM products through their Neighborhood Values products at www.NeighborhoodValuesDirect.com. We have an individual mailer, where one business can use and entire 9.5” x 6.5” full color, two-sided post card, on 100lb gloss cover stock. Cost is 50 cents per address and is all-inclusive. We’ll help you select routes, do the design and layout (you may also provide your own if you’d like), print the cards, place the order, pay the postage, fill out and attach all paperwork, and deliver them to the servicing post office. This service is available throughout Colorado Springs, Security-Widefield and Fountain, Colorado.

We also offer a group promotional product called Neighborhood Values postcards. In this case, Easy Street Designs selects the mailing area, which is usually between 2,500 and 4,000 addresses, and lets people know through the blog and on Facebook where the mailer is going. There are a maximum of 6 ad spaces, full color, measuring 3.75” x 4.25” available on the 9” x 6” postcards, which are also printed on 100lb gloss cover. Cost on this product is just 10 cents per address and again is all-inclusive. At this time, Easy Street Designs only offers this product in the Security-Widefield, Fountain, Colorado area.

If you don’t have a printer in your area that offers EDDM products, you can set up an account on your own. The EDDM indicia is generic and can simply be downloaded and printed as part of your post card design. You can print out mailers yourself, following the USPS guidelines for EDDM products, or have a local printer do the printing, according to specs, then bundle and deliver them to the post office yourself.

If you do live in our neighborhood and want to take advantage of Every Door Direct mailers, we invite you to give us (Easy Street Designs) a try. Otherwise, if your local printer isn’t currently offering this kind of service, maybe you can convince them they should.