What is Direct Marketing all about?

Different types of marketing are appropriate at different stages of the buying process. A company should design their marketing mix accordingly. There are situations where direct marketing isn’t appropriate or effective but many companies rely on direct marketing to generate qualified sales leads. In many cases, a company can generate $20-$50 in directly measurable sales for every $1 spent on direct marketing. With that kind of ROI, direct marketing is an integral part of many marketing plans.

Direct marketing means personalized not broadcast. Examples could be mail, flyers, Mailing Lists, email, etc. They are intended to communicate one on one.

Direct marketing works best when you know your target audience is, then have a great list with that target on it, then a great offer. Creative is important - but if you don't have the first 3, you are throwing money away.

Many people say that Direct Marketing brings a Negative impression on the Brand. I will say Not at all. Does Avon, AMC, Tupperware or Amway have a negative brand image? These are all direct marketed products.

It all depends on the product. One of my good friend sells Amway and I think, especially in the wellness industry direct marketing is the perfect vehicle. It gives the client one-on-one interaction, more information and better resources than simply picking it off the shelf.

Good luck if you decide to join a direct marketing company. Just do your homework first - that'll be my personal advice. Hope this information helped.

Windows Live Writer Beta 2 Released : A cool tool for Bloggers

There's a new tool for the ardent blogger from none other than Microsoft today. Windows Live Writer is a tool for composing blog posts and publishing them on many of the popular blogging platforms like Blogger(like this one), Windows Live Spaces, SharePoint, Community Server, WordPress, LiveJournal, TypePad, Moveable Type, and many other weblog services. I have always been a fan of Microsoft products especially their Live Beta line-up. But that doesn't mean that this review will be biased.

Windows Live Writer is designed as a desktop application built to enable users to publish rich content to their blog. I just installed this cool product on my Laptop and have been truly liking the Vista look and feel. Also I have explored most of the features available. It was a jiffy to get set with my Blogger account (which BTW runs on Google's platform) in less than 2 min's.

One cool feature I found with Windows Live Writer is that it allows for custom plug-ins to be installed from Windows Live Gallery that extend its publishing abilities amongst blogging platforms.

Another cool feature I found that was lacking with most of the Offline Blogging software's that I tried before was the ability to import my Categories from Blogger. looks like the developers of at Microsoft have done a great job by filling this gap. The new beta of Windows Live Writer comes with features like inline spell checking, the ability to add categories(as I said before), table editing and easier image insertion.

Windows Live Writer’s new beta will be available in the following localizations: US (English), US (Spanish), India (English), UK, Spain, Germany, Japan, China and France.

BTW, I have written this post from my Live Writer. Below is a screen-shot of the same.

I must now admit that although this post was initially posted directly from my Live Writer, but I had the following issues:

• Unable to post images into Blogger - It ask's me to set up an FTP server to upload images.
• Unable to format the text well, like I didn't have an option to Justify the text.