dental articles from 2 Dental.com

by Cindy Bouchard

Today, more than ever, companies need to be smart about their promotional dollars. With the rising cost of just about everything and with consumers cutting back on spending, it is easy for companies to follow suit. However, promoting your company makes even more sense in a weak economy.

As with every economic cycle, a downturn is always followed by a strong recovery. By distributing cost effective, attention-grabbing items to promote your business during tough times, you are positioning your company for success. When customers are ready to buy again, you will be the first company they think of.

There is no more effective way to keep your company on someone’s mind than to have your company logo in front of the customer’s eye every day and you don’t have to break the bank to do it.

Here are some very effective promotional ideas for under a dollar:

Personalized pens are one of the hottest sales tools. Your logo, phone number and website address are literally at your customer’s finger tips. Front and Center Promos offers pens at the lowest price possible. Several pens are around $.50 each. They even offer a low price guarantee.

Imprinted Mini-Calendars are usually placed in one of the highest traffic areas of the home or right on the desk while working. There is no better way to leave your vital contact information and message than with a calendar that will be seen 365 days a year!

Logo Keychains are a key promo items because you are assured that they will be used at least once a day. With many shapes and colors to choose from for under $.70 each, this is one winner of a promotional item.

About the Author

For More information on how to save money on promotional items, visit http://www.frontandCenterpromos.com

by Robert A. Barber

It is important for any hospital, medical office or clinic to stand out to appear to be something more than just another place to go when you’re ill or injured. Competition is stiff, and people are beginning to “shop around” when they are looking for health care. The average citizen is probably not able to gauge which location or medical group is better than the others, so they will choose where to go according to which one seems more appealing to them, or go to the facility that they have seen or heard about in various advertisements. It may not be the ideal method for choosing health care, but facts are facts. That’s the way people do it.

The Advantage

Take advantage of this fact and promote your health care facility so potential patients will think of YOUR office or clinic instead of a different one. That is easily done with advertising. Electronic media is expensive, and print media is losing readers all the time. Billboards aren’t cheap, either. The recommended path to take for effective and inexpensive marketing is the good ol’ direct mail campaign. Direct mail has been a successful marketing ploy for many years. Why? Because it works! Period. Your return on investment is superb compared to alternate advertising avenues.

Believe the Facts

Studies have indicated that humans require repeated exposure to advertisements before it becomes fixed in their minds. Why do you think that those expensive radio ads are played over and over all day? Standard direct mail products are generally a paper postcard with the businesses information, services or products, and contact information printed on it. Even though the old style has been working for a long time, there is one problem with it. Many - if not most - of the postcards get tossed in the trash very soon after the recipient sees it. That is because it is “just a piece of paper.” The few paper mailers that are saved do get viewed a number of times and the desired effect is realized.

The New Product

Expounding on that phenomenon is a new product for direct mail. It consists of a postcard with a refrigerator style magnet glued to it. The person receiving it peels the magnet off, but instead of trashing it because it is “just a piece of paper,” the magnet gets stuck to the fridge or computer case at work or hundreds of other spots. The magnet seems to have some intrinsic value, and people naturally don’t want to throw out something like that.

Now that the magnet has a home, entire families and workforces see it on a regular basis. Human nature takes over and the facility begins to become familiar to the people. The name, the logo, the phone number are all etched into their minds, and when they require some medical service they will more than likely remember the magnet and give them a call. Presto! A new patient.

About the Author

Robert is currently working for Healthy Promotion, a supplier of top quality magnetic promotional products for the Health Care Industry and Business. He lives in eastern Kansas. A retired police dispatcher, he now resides in the country with his wife and 2 of his 3 sons.

by Paul Whitney

My research tells me something that is fairly obvious. If a nice shiny pack arrives in your business mail it will grab your attention more than any of the flat white envelopes. With that in mind, if you are planning a Business to Business direct marketing campaign, maybe you should consider some alternatives to white envelopes. Your main consideration should be to find a product that will have a very positive effect on the success of your direct marketing campaign. I am talking about bespoke mailing packs. The style is up to you but whatever you choose will be a massive improvement on a white envelope!

Promotional mailing packs can be made as folders, as sleeves with trays or as boxes. It would be a good idea to talk to your design agency about costs as it is quite possible that a campaign could be designed so that your promotional literature and the mailing pack could all be printed on the same sheet. This would have several advantages.

Let’s say that your promotional piece was a pop-up card printed on 350gsm art board. The agency could easily design a presentation mailing pack that would enhance the promotional product and increase the chances of the project becoming a success. The material would be suitable for both the pop-up card and the mailing pack and could therefore be printed on the same sheet. That would save money on printing and on die-cutting whilst also help to tie the whole project together.

Some promotional products, such as those with an automatic pop-up, are often supplied with their own custom-printed, sturdy, all-board mailers and they make a fine mailing pack. In fact, they can look quite ridiculous in an ordinary envelope. The internal rubber band tries to force the product to pop-up and as a paper envelope offers no resistance, the product pops up as far as the envelope will allow leading to your prestigious promotion looking something like a bag of crisps!

However, most manual interactive products are supplied just as they are, without a custom designed mailing pack but you can address that situation. If you have already made up your mind about using a certain style of interactive product such as a Starburst, a Flicker Card or a Dissolving Picture for example, then you can ask your design agency to look into making a custom mailing pack for these devices, too. It will convert your mailing into what the American’s call dimensional marketing and the success rates have proven to be far higher than flat mail in white envelopes. A glossy, printed pack looks much more like a gift and will be opened with anticipation.

Of course, mailing packs can be used to improve most promotional materials. Your product doesn’t have to be a high-action, interactive mailer. It could be that you want to create a different tone or it could be that the product that you are mailing just isn’t terribly exciting by itself. Wheel charts are a good example. Whilst wheel charts are very effective marketing tools, they can look pretty much like an everyday object and so to enhance their appeal as a promotional product you need to dress them up in an attractive mailing pack.

Whilst I acknowledge that white envelopes are one of the cheapest mailing options, I firmly believe that mail is much more likely to be opened and read by the person that you want to reach if it arrives in a neat little box or mailing pack. What could be better to do the job properly than a totally custom designed pack?

About the Author

Paul Whitney is MD of Whitney Woods in the UK. The company is a market leader in the field of promotional pop-up products and interactive mailers and offers a service to create custom-made mailing packs which can be seen on http://www.popupmailers.co.uk/popup_mailingpack.html. The author also publishes a blog which is updated on a daily basis featuring useful advertising and marketing ideas http://www.whitneywoods.co.uk/blog/

by Robert A. Barber

Doctors, dentists, chiropractors, hospitals, clinics and offices are competing among each other. Yes, they provide services that are needed by everyone, but they aren’t benevolent organizations that don’t care about making a profit. The fact is, without making a buck here and there, they’ll soon go out of business. They are a business just like an automobile dealership or an antique store. Their primary goal is to stay in business.

You Need An Edge

Since competition is so fierce, anything that might give them an edge over their competition is very valuable. Word of mouth is a great advertising medium, but it cannot be controlled. Wireless media is effective, but it is very expensive. Fewer and fewer people are reading newspapers today, so the print media are not the answer. One method of getting the word out is through direct mail campaigns. Bulk mail/direct mail advertising is one of the most cost effective marketing ideas that a health care facility can employ. Your Return On Investment is the greatest with direct mail.

The Secret

Paper inserts and postcards have been the staple of direct mail since its inception, but recently there has been a new product released that has expanded on that success. It consists of an attractive postcard mailer with a business card style magnet attached to it. The secret is the magnet. The old paper mailers don’t seem to have any intrinsic value to them. They’re ‘just paper.’ The magnet that comes on this new product, on the other hand, does seem to have some value. It’s not a throw-away item like a piece of paper. It gets stuck on the refrigerator at home or on a cabinet at work.

It Works

Once the magnet finds its home, it gets viewed over and over by everyone in the home or workplace. It is well known within the marketing world that repeated exposures to an advertisement is the only way to influence the potential customer/patient. Paper mailers get looked at for a few seconds and then tossed in the trash. Magnetic mailers are seen thousands of times a year as people get food from the fridge or go to the place at work where it is displayed.

Which do you think you want to use in your advertising budget?

About the Author

Robert is currently working for Healthy Promotion, a supplier of top quality magnetic promotional products for the Health Care Industry and Business. He lives in eastern Kansas. A retired police dispatcher, he now resides in the country with his wife and 2 of his 3 sons.

By: Samantha Fellows

There are several different methods of printing used on promotional mugs, just as there are for most promotional items you might buy. The specific method used to print your order of promotional mugs will depend on several different factors, including number of colors in the design, type of material that is to be printed, the specific colors in the design and the price that you pay for your promotional mugs.

- Screen printing is used for simple designs where the colors are clearly separated, there are no half tones and the area to be printed is at least the same size as the design. Screen printing is the fastest method of printing promotional mugs, as it can be fully automated and several thousand mugs can be printed per day this way. - Transfer printing involves printing the design onto transfer paper and then applying the transfer to the mug by hand. Your promotional mugs may be transfer printed when the printed design takes up a larger area than the standard print area, or when the design is to be printed onto steeply sloping or curving surfaces. It’s also used with four colour print processes, and on designs that have very fine detail. - Digital printing is sometimes used for smaller orders. The process uses a printer similar to your office laser printer to print the design to specially coated paper that is then applied to your promotional mugs as a transfer print. This method is most often used when the design includes photographic prints, or when high resolution quality is required. - Dye sublimation printing uses organic dyes and special inks that release their colors when exposed to heat. The design possibilities and bright colors can be stunning. - Laser etching results in high quality printing that is carved into the surface of the mug giving a bas relief appearance. - Full colour printing process uses the four colour scale (CMYK) to print a full range of colours on any surface. It’s ideal for use when the design is larger than the standard print area, or is meant to be a wraparound design.

The design that you want printed onto your promotional mugs will often determine the best printing process for your order. The design that you want will also sometimes be determined by your choice of mug and design, since not all designs are appropriate for all styles. If you are interested in a particular style of promotional mugs, speak with an account representative at your favorite promotional products supplier. They can help you choose the right mug for your purposes, or work out the right design for the mugs that you choose.

There are literally dozens of promotional mugs that you can choose to advertise your business, promote your services, introduce yourself to new customers or thank your existing customers. Promotional mugs are a great way to get your name out to your customers and prospective customers in a way that they’ll appreciate and use day in and day out.

Samantha Fellows is one of the top authors in the promotional merchandise industry. She is an important part of ClickPromoGifts and is sharing her extensive knowledge of trends and success in gifting promotional items, promotional gifts and promotional products.

The advantages far outweigh the drawbacks during a downturn when viewed from an online marketing perspective.

Every dollar spent on marketing whether online or offline give you much more during a recession if you apply your resources in the right way, like your ability to get the maximum from you publisher with your negotiating skills. If you take it positively, this is a god-sent opportunity for a marketer to get more return on your investment on marketing and advertising of your products.

Actually, businesses benefit more during a downturn provided you continue investing in marketing and advertising. This can be confirmed from various studies conducted by highly-acclaimed researchers. If you compare the statistics, you will notice that those businesses that promoted aggressively their products always gained 4% to 5% in market share when compared with their competitors who did not hike their spending on marketing/advertising during a downturn.

The key factors that you should take into account when marketing and advertising during a downturn are:

Customers: You know very well that in any business, customer is the king. It is highly recommended to provide all benefits to your customers like discounts and gifts and extra facilities like free downloads and free tools to help the customers to get more value from their online experience. This will ensure your customers will come back again and again to your business and thereby generate more sales.

Flexibility: For you to be flexible, you should be alert and oriented of your customers search behavior pattern. In other words, monitor your customers for what actually they are searching for, and then change your marketing/advertising strategies accordingly. Any rigid approach on your marketing strategy will backfire on you.

Cost-Affective Targeting: Please note that not everybody will succeed in cost-affective targeting. For any business to succeed, you should have certain key elements like well-known brand name, multiple products, targeted advertising, after-sales service, and support. These key elements are vital for any business to succeed. Any missing elements will have an adverse effect on your cost-affective targeting.

If you have studied recession or downturn long enough, you will find that this phenomenon does not last longer than 11 months or a year. Take recession positively, study it well, and apply your marketing and advertising strategies accordingly without compromising or downgrading your marketing and advertising costs. The key elements like well-known brand name, multiple products, targeted advertising, after-sales service, and support are to be incorporated into your business if you want to succeed.

Prahalad http://www.dhana.biz/articles

They set the mood. They invoke a wide variety of different emotions or feelings. They have a huge impact on the way we perceive nearly everything in life.

I’m talking about colors. Look around you and you will see countless examples of colors altering your perception of various aspects of life. This can be as simple as associating green with springtime, which in turn becomes associated with growth and vitality.

There is a reason why people wear black at a funeral and a reason why red is considered a power color. If you go to a toy store, odds are the section for young boys will be blue while the one for young girls will be pink. You simply cannot escape the idea of associating certain colors with different elements of our culture. Same association can be applied in advertising and color printing.

In designing ads, especially those that you would want to use a lot of colors on, you need to understand the kind of impact that colors can have on people beforehand.

The more visual advertising is the more important this becomes. Take for instance advertising flyers. This form of advertising requires a strong color motif to get people interested in looking at it. Unlike a longer form of advertising, such as a catalog, a single glance needs to hook a person when they look at an advertising flyer, which is why you need to be sure you understand what colors would look best.

Are you trying to convey a sense of prestige? If so, you might use silver in your ad. Alternatively, maybe you want to have a sense of spirituality and dignity. In that case you should have purple be a prominent color.

Of course, even in longer advertisements you will need to be aware of what colors look best. When using a brochure printing company, the colors can be just as important as it is with a flyer. Having colors that sync up with what you are trying to say will help strengthen the message.

The strength of well-picked colors is the fact that it can augment your message. Sometimes you cannot come right out and say certain things about a product as easily. If you want to imply a feeling of warmth and vibrancy, well, this is not something you can easily say your product has. However, if you use a strong orange coloring surrounding the product, you can get this message across without actually using the words.

Not everything in an ad is going to be immediately considered on the conscious level. If you are not aware of the messages different colors send you might end up undermining your own message by using colors that counter your claims. Make sure when using a brochure printing company, or any other kind of advertising, that you are aware of exactly what your colors have to say.

About the Author
Kaye Z. Marks is an avid writer and follower of developments in color printing industry and how these improvements can benefit small to medium-scale business.

I know I’m either going to show my age with what I’m about to say or, worse, brand myself as hopelessly anachronistic. Regardless, I’ve found our current business culture to be increasingly impersonal. If you have any doubt about this, feel free to pick up a phone, dial up any of your service providers and try to get an honest to goodness living, breathing human being to talk to on the line. Sure, you may indeed get one, but you’ll wear the skin off your index finger pushing the number pad trying to get through the automated prompts and you’re likely to spend the better part of an hour waiting on hold waiting.

I probably shouldn’t be using that example. I know, I’ve sold my fair share of those automated attendants in my time, but I wanted to make a point. We’ve become reliant on technology and doing business through computer proxy. It’s the norm. Exceeding limitations means breaking out of the norm, though. Expanding your business takes more than doing what the rest of the crowd is doing. With that in mind, let me make a radical suggestion that really shouldn’t be that radical, advertising with a personal touch.

No, you don’t have to personally answer every single call that comes into your office. What I’m suggesting is to print business cards (if you’ve got out of date or monotone cards, update your wallet with professional, color business cards) and brush up on your social networking skills. I’m not talking about knocking on doors and hitting people with aggressive sales pitches. What I’m talking about is actively engaging people in your community. You shouldn’t lead with your card, either. Save the business card for the tail end of your conversation, after you’ve made a personal connection. In the process, you’ll make some friends, find new customers and become a more prominent and recognizable face in your community.

That’s the key. When you put a human face on your business, people will feel more comfortable spending their money with you. Given the choice, most consumers would rather deal with someone they know in their community than another cold, faceless corporate entity. This works both ways too. Since your customers will be friends and neighbors instead of walking dollar signs, you’ll find that your levels of service and commitment to delivering on your promises will increase, which will further bolster your customer base.

It’s a win/win situation that requires a very minimal investment - just the cost of business card printing and a small expenditure of your time. It could be the thing that finally makes your business an enduring, local institution. Who knows, it might even inspire you to turn off the automated attendant and answer your phone when a customer calls. Hey, I can always dream, right?

About the Author
For more information, you can visit this page on business card printing and color business cards

So you have got a great medium to reach your audience. Your ad has all the graphics spiffed up to attract attention and you have a great eye-catching photo. You know people are looking at it. But no one is responding. What’s going on?

Your copy is falling flat, that’s what. You need to use active language, and powerful words that get and keep attention. Here’s how.

Use your headline. Headlines are the most important copy-related parts of print ads. If you have a dull headline, like the name of your business, you’re wasting precious space and money. That space could be used as a call to action or to give a benefit of your product. Keep your business address, phone number and other boring, but important, information in smaller font and towards the bottom of your ad. By using the space to brag about your largest, most impacting benefit, you could increase response by 300 percent.

Focus on the customer. Use “you” rather “we” or “I.” People want to know how you can help them, not about your great employees. Of course if your business is a service that employees provide, then yes, tout your employees. But tout what they can do for your customer, and what they’ve done in the past for similar customers. Show the customer that you have something that they need that will benefit their lives.

Include a call to action. People won’t visit your store if you don’t ask them to. They won’t be motivated to visit your Web site unless you tell them you have one and give them the Web address to get there. Word your call to action as a command: “Visit our Web site today.” “Call today.”

Use power words. Use sexy words that will stay with readers. Words that evoke movement and excitement work best. Concrete words will also give you a leg up. Use “erase wrinkles” instead of “get rid of wrinkles.” Use persuasive words such as “give,” “hurry” and “invite.” Use words that evoke trust: “tested” and “proven.” Use words that flatter the reader like “wise” and “special” when describing them.

Avoid overused words. Don’t use words that people have heard over and over again in advertising. Generally these words have only held false promises in the past. People remember words that burned them before. A few to avoid are “quality,” “value,” “service,” “caring” and “integrity.”

Do not waste your budget on commercial printing materials that are boring and that aren’t going to work for you. Spend more time and money on creating your message upfront, perhaps even hiring a freelance marketing writer or a consultant that can help you create a powerful message before you choose your color scheme or photo.

About the Author
Kaye Z. Marks is an avid writer and follower of developments in commercial color printing industry and how these improvements can benefit small to medium-scale business.

Author: lynne

First of all, let’s get this straight – all advertising campaigns work. Whether it’s postcard marketing or brochure printing materials, it works. The outcome now depends on how you fully understand the medium you’re going to use (its strengths and weaknesses) and to maximize its purpose to achieve the goals you’ve set.

Second, advertising costs a lot. Not only should you invest your money to your full color postcard printing ads, you should also put in as much time and energy as you can to make your postcard marketing successful.

Third, advertising is not a one time deal. You need to market continuously if you plan to sell to the public and to keep your clients thirsting for more of your business.

Now that we have these clarified, let’s talk about postcard marketing and how it can work to your benefit.

As I said earlier in the article, any advertising campaign works; so does your full color postcard printing campaign if you decide to go for it. What is even more appealing is that this type of marketing is so simple and easy that you can even do it yourself. In fact, the mechanics is so simple that you can do it over and over again without worrying that you won’t get it right every time.

So what do you do? Create your postcard in any graphics or word program that you are used to. Then insert mailing addresses to your print ad by utilizing the mail merge program in your desktop. The addresses will be automatically keyed in when you provide the details. When you’re finished putting in your information, print out your cards, stamp them and then post them out. It’s that simple!

What’s more, with its simplicity, you can send your postcards out continuously, even once a month. This is the best way to get your target readers to remember and recognize your name. When you consistently advertise and allow your prospects to see you every time, the easier it is for your prospects to get to know you and the products and services you are offering. This is truly an advantage on your part because you make it easy for your target clients to decide to buy from you. It’s all about repetition.

On the other hand, postcard marketing also has its weaknesses. Despite your eagerness to do your marketing continuously, it doesn’t guarantee you a tremendous outcome. Even if you get so many people to be interested, only a few would you be able to turn into definite buyers. Nevertheless, that’s not half bad.

So the next time you’re looking for a marketing campaign that works, stop. Remember, all marketing strategies work. You just have to completely understand the mechanics for you to make a success out of your ads.

About the Author
For comments and inquiries about the article visit: Postcard Marketing, Full Color Postcard Printing