Business Postcards - 9 Best Design Tips for Great ROI

Business Postcards - 9 Best Design Tips for Great ROI

By Jill Flores

December 05, 2023

13 minutes read

Sending business postcards is a fantastic way to reach out to your target audience, as they are effective and cost-efficient. Use postcards to trigger fast responses and conversions, achieving real results for your business. Whether marketing or transactional, your postcards captivate the attention of your target audience.

Business Postcards – What Are They?

Postcard marketing is a form of direct mail marketing. Brands market their services or products via a promotional custom postcard which is delivered to their target audience’s physical letterbox. Postcards can include content such as reminders, announcements, invitations, new product showcases, coupons, and time-sensitive special offers.

Why are business postcards so effective?

In short, it’s because no action is required by the recipient. They need not click on a link, open an envelope, flick through a catalogue, or open an email.

A postcard’s message is front and centre at first glance!

  • 86% of consumers prefer direct mail marketing over telemarketing calls.
  • Direct mail has better response rates than email, paid search, social media, or online display advertising.
  • Postcards stand out – compared with email, SMS, and other forms of digital marketing, postcards are few and far between.
  • Postcards can be easily kept at hand.

The key to success with this form of marketing lies in its presentation – and the design of your postcard is intrinsic to reaping the rewards of your efforts.

What Do All Great Business Postcards Have in Common?

As a business owner or marketer, you need to understand your target audience, as well as your goal with your postcard to drive its design.

Every detail of your custom postcard counts. This includes:

  • Colour
  • Font
  • Finish
  • Message

These must all appeal and captivate from the outset to compel attention and action. The best performing marketing and transactional postcards are always:

  • Eye Catching
  • Visually Appealing
  • Concise
  • Memorable
  • On-Brand

9 Postcard Design Tips to Use Now

1. Consider Your Purpose

Your postcard’s purpose is not to convert! It is to drive action that will lead to conversion. Your postcard needs to grab attention so that your audience is driven to contact you, explore your website, or visit your business.

2. Quality Counts

Business postcards are not just visual; they are also tactile. Use card of the highest quality, ideally of a thicker weight and feel. At ClickSend, we use premium 300GSM paper to ensure our postcards are of the best quality.

3. Layout

Consider your custom postcards in terms of dimensions and layout. Use a font that is easy to read and which stands out from its background. A neutral background will be more visually appealing than a busy background, and leaving empty space between elements helps focus attention on what matters most.

4. Brand Identity

Incorporate your logo prominently on the front of your business postcards and on the back as well. Ensure your chosen colour scheme complies with your overall branding, so extend your brand identity into all aspects of your design – tone, imagery, font, etc. Is it playful, professional, elegant, amusing, conservative, or cutting-edge?

5. Colour

As well as complementing your unique branding, you need to also understand the power of colour – to grab attention, appeal, and provoke a response. It is also memorable when used well. Be consistent!

6. Images Count

You may choose a photographic background, another type of graphic, or simply your logo. Whatever you elect to use, the imagery must be of the highest quality, striking, and original. It must also be relevant to your business and your campaign message – remember that this can be in an unexpected way!

7. Headline

Compose a short, sharp headline with text that is simple and informative. There are some great online tools for optimising headlines. Your postcard headline should instantly convey the purpose of your message and inform just enough to trigger further action. Use as few words as possible and do not crowd the space.

8. Call to Action

Make this very clear and easy to read at a glance and have a single call to action per postcard campaign.

9. The Back of Your Postcard

Your main offer and most important details plus a call to action are on the front of your postcard, but the reverse is important too! Include more details, benefits of your offer, and reiterate your call to action. Make sure it is all easy to read, concise, and on-brand.

Postcard Printing at ClickSend

ClickSend takes the stress out of creating and sending business postcards! We make it easy for you to have your transactional and marketing postcards printed and delivered to your target recipient list with the click of a button. Our gold standard postcard printing service is a cloud-based service that requires you to simply send us your design and recipient address list. If you need help with your postcard design, we have the creative team to get this done on your behalf, with results we guarantee you’ll be delighted by.

We work with clients worldwide, so no matter whether you’re in the UK or the USA, Australia or Argentina, New Zealand or Nova Scotia, Singapore or Scandinavia – ClickSend has the tools, techniques, and talent to get your message out there like never before!

Use business postcards to:

  • Promote a new product or service to entice existing customers
  • Re-establish connections with prior customers (“we’ve missed you”)
  • Inform of events or reopening, new hours, etc
  • Trigger action with appealing images (e.g. “before and after”, “wish you were here?”)
  • Generate new leads with refer-a-friend
  • Re-engage with seasonal campaigns
  • Connect with birthday, mother’s day, father’s day special offers or vouchers

Whether you have a design ready to go now, need some advice on your postcard idea, or are starting from scratch, contact us today to avail the very best business postcards printing and delivery service available.

This blog was originally posted on April 09, 2021