SUPER PROFITABLE NEW TECHNIQUES
FOR SELLING BOOKS BY MAIL!
The total number of books sold by small, part-time mail order
entrepreneurs is growing each year. Total sales each year for the
past five years have increased by almost 30 percent over the
previous year's sales. Two "new angles" have greatly contributed to this phenomenal
growth in total sales. One is the practice of offering a wide selection of books via
"mini-catalogs" to prospective buyers as "inserts" imprinted
materials the prospect has already ordered. Mini-catalogs are usually printed on 8 1/2 x 11 sheets of
paper, then folded in half along the length, and simply slipped
inside the covers of a magazine or the folds of a newspaper.
Often-times, a mini-catalog is folded and sent out as a self-
mailer. Both of these methods of obtaining circulation are very
profitable. A book-selling "mini-catalog" is made up of a "full-page
commercial" on the front page. This is your mail sales thrust,
or primary attempt to sell a "featured" book with each of your
mailings. The second, third, and half of the last page of the
mini-catalog should be two columns of listings of other books you
have to offer. Each listing should consist of the title of the book offered,
followed by a short description of either the book itself, or how
the book can benefit the buyer. This is then followed by the
catalog number of the book, and the price. The bottom half of the last page of your mini-catalog should
be devoted to your customer order coupon. The "mini-catalog"
should be typeset, and printed on a different color paper for each
mailing. Recent sales analysis results indicate that the better
quality paper your mini-catalog is printed on, the more sales it
brings in for you. Once you have got a mini-catalog with which to advertise your
books, you must bring all your efforts to bear on the problem of
obtaining maximum circulation of your mini-catalog among the
prospective book buyers. The easiest and least expensive method is as follows: check at
your area newspaper offices for a listing of all their
distributors and/or route carriers. Contact these people and ask
them to give you a price they would charge to include one of your
mini-catalogs with each paper they sell or deliver. Determine
how many "mini-catalogs" you will need for this kind of
distribution, have that number of mini-catalogs printed, hand
them out to your contracted distributors and newspaper carriers;
then sit back and prepare to fill book orders. It's simple and
easy, but best of all it really results in big profits for your book-selling business. Another simple method would be to line up students from
difference junior high schools in your area, and pay them each $10
per thousand to deliver your mini-catalogs door-to-door. If you
have junior high school age children, this could be the easiest
and least expensive method of distribution for you. Major cities also have professional distributing services
which deliver advertising material to the residents. Check your
local phone directory yellow pages for their names and addresses. The orders which you develop through the local distribution
method can be filled by mail. To expand your market beyond the local area, you need to
solicit the business by mail. Several excellent books are
available on methods of developing sales by mail, however, I
won't attempt to steer you toward any particular publisher or
author in this report.