How To Command Audience Attention With Postcard Marketing

Postcard design is a huge part of postcard marketing, as I’m sure you can imagine. Think back to a time you’ve received direct mail cards. Which one do you remember the most? The one that boringly listed information, or the one that was colorful and creative as well as informative? You probably remember the creative postcard design because it caught your attention.

All the best marketing postcard designs are attention grabbing – businesses are competing for the attention of the recipient – if your postcard design isn’t fun or eye-catching, it’s first reader is likely to be the trash. It’s easy to say that your postcards need to catch the attention of your audience, but it takes some work to make sure it’s doing just that.

Some quick tips to create the best marketing postcards

1. Use big, bold headlines! A size 12, Times New Roman headline is not attention grabbing, it’s boring. It’s newspaper article boring. Your headline is bound to be your business, the product/service you’re offering, or a discount you’re offering, which is the really important part of the postcard, so that should be the most eye-catching just in case it’s the only thing the audience reads.
2. Use strong but easy to read fonts. Your audience needs to be able to read your font. Even though the one with the curly letters is super cute, it’s going to distract from your message. You need an interesting, easy to read font that will contribute to your message without taking away from it. Emphasis on ‘strong’ and ‘interesting fonts’ as this adds to the attention grabbing factor. I’ll say it again… Times New Roman is not fun!
3. Use fun images! This one should be a given, but if it wasn’t on your list, here you go. Use fun, unique, and interesting images. If a person gets 5 postcards from 5 different lawn care companies, you need to make sure that your postcard is the one that stands out. Everyone is going to be using photos of a beautiful lawn with a nice house behind it, those aren’t the memorable ones. If you’re really set on the picture of the grass and the house, find a way to make it interesting on the postcard. Edit the photo to have an interesting effect – just make sure your mailer isn’t like every other card your audience is receiving.
4. Use colors that stand out. Don’t be afraid to put some color in your postcard, in photos or text. Colors are very attention grabbing, and there is even some psychology behind colors and postcard advertising – some colors evoke you to feel or act a certain way. Now, I’m not a psychologist, but that might be something worth looking up to see how you can incorporate certain colors into your postcard. If you aren’t interested in the psychology of things and using colors to persuade your audience to buy from you, you can always use colors that are bright and fun. Bright colors are sure to catch the attention of readers because it pulls away from the monotone look of every other piece of mail in their mailbox. Contrasting colors are also a good idea to use with your mailers because they go together very well. Shoot, red and green are complementary colors and they symbolize one of the biggest holidays of the year.

Here’s an example of a ‘bleh’ postcard. The message is clear, sure, but it’s boring. The font is static, the photo isn’t very exciting, and if it were in my mailbox, it would almost immediately meet its new friend… the trash. Nothing about this postcard would make me say ‘oohhh, that’s neat’.

Alternatively, here’s an example of a good postcard design using the attention grabbing criteria listed above. The fonts aren’t boring, but they aren’t too outlandish. The photo is more than just a lawn, which is overused, and the headline is eye catching, and is very likely to be the first thing the audience sees.

If you think you’re ready to create your own attention grabbing postcard to advertise your business, that’s great! There are multiple programs that allow you to create postcards and you can send them out yourself through Every Door Direct Mail at your local post office. If you aren’t really sure where to get started or you refuse to use the post office, MapYourSales is a service that allows you to create your postcard, choose where you want them to send, and then just goes ahead and sends them for you – so you don’t need to leave your couch. MapYourSales also offers pre-built postcard templates that already follow this criteria, so you just need to tweak a little bit to represent YOU!

Start Marketing With Postcards Today – Choose An Option Below