Let’s suppose that two years from now, you would like to be perceived as an expert within a certain industry. Right now, however, you’re a nobody. To build a reputation, you could write and publish a ground-breaking book. That’s a lot of work! You could put a PR firm on retainer and have them get you into the spotlight. That’s expensive. Or you could carry out an inexpensive postcard campaign that gets you noticed and talked about by the most important people in the industry.

Postcards?

Yes, but not the kind of postcards you are probably thinking of. I don’t mean either the tourist type of postcards, with a colorful scene on one side and space for your message on the other, or advertising postcards, where there’s a cute attention getting message on one side and a special limited-time offer if you do such and such.

I’m referring to content-rich postcards that you may not ever have seen but that have worked really well for some consultants, authors and entrepreneurs that I know. Think of them as a mini-article or mini-newsletter fit onto a postcard. This content positions you memorably in the minds of the postcard recipients, and after they receive 4-6 of these, you become a known and recommendable expert in their minds.

With appropriate design, you can fit up to about 300 words readably and attractively on a postcard. Design guru Chuck Green has a terrific article explaining and showing this kind of postcard design:

http://www.ideabook.com/tutorials/print_design/get_the_news_out_with_a_postca.html

Chuck Green’s sample is modeled after a newsletter, and this sort of a postcard brought in $242,000 in new projects for a client of mine, who sent out just 200 postcards. Note that the newsletter-style postcard does not explicitly sell anything. It merely spotlights the person sending it as a knowledgeable (and creative) expert.

Your content-rich postcard could feature advice, a case study, tantalizing statistics you’ve collected or perspective on an industry problem. You could invite readers of the postcard to learn more by downloading a fuller treatment of the topic at your web site.

The optimum frequency of the postcards is four to six times a year. One expert I know plans, writes and designs a year’s worth at one time so that he is certain to stay on schedule.

Who should receive the postcards? Create a customized list of recipients who fall into these categories: