As a consumer, sometimes I see the Money Mailer as something else to throw in the recycling bin and sometimes it’s an envelope full of discounts waiting to be discovered.
The other day I received, my envelop full of discounts. I opened the familiar blue envelope, addressed to “Our Friends At” and shuffled through the colorful coupons for everything from duct cleaning, to landscaping to dog groomers. It’s never a loss to open it. After all, I have found pretty good coupons for restaurants, tanning and even the occasional oil change.
However, in this particular Money Mailer packet I was troubled . . . My Money Mailer had 53 total ads and 21 of those ads were from dentists! How could this be? Close to half of the ads were from direct competitors, who were in relatively close geographical locations to each other.
There is a part of me that wants to call every dentist from the packet and ask the question “If you put your advertising in direct proximity to 20 of your closest competitors do you think anyone really sees it?”
The answer is pretty obvious to most of us; yet, the facts remains 21 dentists created special offers to discount their services, entered into contracts with Money Mailer and are paying to advertise to the exact same people, at the exact same time, in the exact same manner as their closest competitors.
I have said it before and I will say it again. Marketing is 2/3 common sense and 1/3 creativity. Common sense dictates that before entering into an advertising agreement of any kind, asking probing questions about the level of presence of your competition is just plain old common sense.
