5 Key Elements of an Effective Marketing Strategy with Catalogs

Tanya HCatalog

Even though we live in a digital era where online marketing has taken the world by storm, offline catalog marketing continues to be the pivotal sales initiative for many businesses around the world. More precisely, carrying an effective marketing strategy with catalogs will bring your business numerous benefits, if done right, that is. After all, not everyone is always browsing the Web nor does everyone need to be online-conscious, right? With that in mind, it is not unusual that even modern businesses are using catalogs as a marketing strategy as it’s giving them the opportunity to bring their business in front of their offline target audience (literally!).

Let’s talk about five key reasons why catalog marketing is an effective way to boost your business relevance:

  1. Print Catalogs Cater to Your Target Market

Successful catalog design allows your target audience to enjoy reading about your business while enjoying the relevant and informative aspect of your content. Branded graphic design provides catalog recipients with a pleasing and exciting flow, and – in doing so – encourages them to get more information. Catalog spreads tell a story and this is often hard to replicate online.

  1. Feature the Best-Selling Products/Services

The practicality and efficiency of print catalogs lie in the fact that they allow you to promote and market your most popular products and services to your target market. Essentially, products and services that are already best sellers are more likely to catch the interest of your audience. As they’re already drawn to your catalog thanks to the practical design, this type of product and service placement plays a crucial role in your sales. Our tests have shown that customers and prospects will go online and discover other merchandise not featured in the catalog.  Our analysis of shopping cart checkouts usually show a mix of both.

  1. Create More Interest and Engage Customers

To promote your featured products and services, it’s also essential to create a particular interest in them. In that respect, don’t hesitate to include additional information and emphasis on them so that you allow the audience to learn as much as possible – as fast as possible. One client included catalog copy about how factory workers had creative control to create custom, limited edition bags by using remnant fabric and colorful zips.  Their approach to sustainability really resonated with their target catalog audience.

  1. Market Your Print Catalog Properly

Once you create an effective catalog marketing strategy, it’s time to distribute and market it properly. Otherwise, no matter how successful your catalog design was, it won’t reach your target audience. There are several ways for you to help your audience find your catalog. For instance, you may want to mail it out to existing customers and/or prospects, email PDF versions to your opted-in subscriber list, display them in the store, or include one with every purchase as a bounce-back stuffer. You can also offer the catalog for download on your business website and promote it on social media too.

  1. Don’t Forget to Measure Your Catalog Success

One of the most significant benefits when it comes to offline catalog marketing strategy is the fact that it allows you to review and track its performance to measure ROI. Always measure performance for each catalog segment.  Understand your catalog sales attribution rate – especially if you’re primarily an online business.  If you’ve never run a direct mail hold-out test, do it now.  If you prospect, make sure you understand how much you can spend to acquire a customer.

While digital presence is essential for every business that wants to succeed, offline marketing tools (such as print catalogs and postcards) are still relevant for driving incremental revenue.  Keep them exciting and add a little bit of traditional flair to your impressive digital presentation.