Postcard advertising is an effective form of reaching out to customers that also trims expenses neatly for small businesses, so it’s no wonder it has a long history in a few industries. It’s especially effective for essential services like insurance, and realtors have found it a strong lead generator. If you’re considering postcard marketing real estate in any niche, you need to know how it differs from other forms of print advertising, especially larger mailers and periodical ads, which share the most design characteristics with postcards.
Concise, Direct, Effective
Postcards do not give you a lot of space, but they do give you predictable space and there’s a long genre of postcard design for a variety of roles. Make your ads follow the same practices as the best collector’s travel postcards and recreational well-wishes with balanced visuals that communicate your goals to the prospective customer and brief but engaging text that lets a reader know what you want them to do and provides them a point of contact for your services.
Fast Appeal, Durable Cardstock
In principle, your postcard works like a print ad on a billboard or in a magazine. You need instant appeal and fast communication of the information because you only have a moment to make an impression. Where things differ is in the next action. Print ads usually have to count on a call to action that is general and easy, like an appeal to buy. Postcards can provide a little more detail, like a choice between email and phone contact, social media links, or other resources for outreach. If you’ve got an app, a QR code can even take recipients to a direct download.
Avoid Clutter in Final Designs
As you decide what extras to include and what to leave out, remember the goal is fast visual processing. That means you’re not going to want a cluttered visual landscape. You can give viewers more than a print ad, but you need to make sure it’s ordered, easy to take in, and easy to understand.
