Everybody wants to be a writer - to write best-selling books - and to become famous as well as rich. On the plus side of such ambitions, just about anybody could and/or can become a published writer - but, the big thing seems to be that not everybody knows how to “survive” until they hit the big time.
To be successful as a writer, you’d better know the rules of the game - whatever it is you write about has to have “mass appeal” and a certain uniqueness that makes it stand out brighter than similar works - you had better know how to string words together in such a manner that your readers find what you’ve written to be interesting, informative, and/or of definite value - and you should have your marketing/sales program all worked out before you get too deeply involved. In this day and age, it is not enough to write something and send it off to a publisher or two, hoping that they’ll “discover you” and life will be luxuriously happy for you ever after.
Assuming that you know all of these rules, and that you’ve dedicated yourself to eventually getting your manuscript on the best-seller lists, the basic thing you’ve got to worry about between now and then is how you’re going to survive until the big day…
First of all, take time out for a trip to your local public library and ask for a copy of the national directory of publications. In this great volume, look up the names and addresses of all the publications that carry for sample copies of these publications - look them over and when you see an article that you could do a quick follow up on, or perhaps you’re stimulated with an idea for an article along the same lines; knock out an article and submit it to them. If they like it, they’ll get in touch with you and send a check. It’s as simple as that and you can easily make $50,000 per year in your spare time, just submitting articles as a free-lancer to magazines.
Very definitely, be sure to pick up a copy of Writers’ Digest. In each issue, you’ll find any number of publications soliciting material from free-lance writers.
If you’re into writing “How-To” information, look up the addresses of the publications purporting to offer How-To information, and submit your materials to them. You’ll find that most mail order publications will welcome mail order self-help/better-profit articles and be glad to give you advertising space in exchange.
Probably the easiest way to go is via mail ord… Say you’re writing/putting together a best-seller on mail order business financing…
I would recommend that you take your writer’s outline - table of contents - and from this list of chapters you’re going to include in your book, you write short 2 - 3 page “reports” than can be inexpensively produced and sold for a couple of dollars each. Indeed, a short information report such as this one.
By all means, weave into the text of these reports, some sort of commercial/advertising that promotes the book you’ve either written or are writing; and of course, your address so they can order it from you.
The next thing is to make up an advertising circular for these reports and to get it out to all the mail order dealers. What you want to offer is a chance for them - these mail order dealers - to buy the complete set of reports from you - 10 reports that sell for $2 each, with reproduction rights, for $15 or $20…
Be sure to offer your reports package to all the mail order catalog houses such as Mitchell Enterprises, Copely Mail Order, Allen Publishing and Southern. Don’t worry about them making all the money - if you’ve written your reports as I’ve instructed, the promoters of your reports packages will be promoting the sale of your book for you, with all the orders for the book coming direct to you. Besides, you’ll be making a “ton of money” from just the sale of your reports package.
One thing you really should do though, is send all your reports package offers out at the same time. In other words, get the whole reproduction offer together, about 50,000 strong and drop them off in the mail on the same day. Don’t mail them out a couple of hundred at a time because if you do, your buyers will be competing with you before you’ve covered all your prospective buyers.
Without a doubt, if you put together a reports package with reproduction rights selling for $20 and get it out to 50,000 mail order dealers on the same day, you’ll pull in at least $50,000 form that mailing. The bottom-line secret is to offer all new titles - have patience in getting everything altogether - and then “dump” them all in the mail on the same day - the more you send out in that first mailing the bigger your return will be…
Don’t just glance at your junk mail and throw it away! Save it - it can put extra money in your pockets! As a matter of fact, you can make some “easy” extra money with all your incoming mail…
First off, take a pair of scissors and clip off those cancelled postage stamps. Put them in a shoebox or envelope box and save them until you have a box full, and then send them in to either Fun Mates, PO Box 6466, San Francisco, CA 94101; DuVall Press, 920 West Grand River, Box 14, Williamston, MI 48895; or to any of the stamp collection outlets you see advertised in all the magazine and gossip-type papers. They’ll pay you $15 to $20 for each box of stamps you send to them, and if they should find a “truly valuable” stamp in with those you send in, they’ll pay you even more.
The next thing is to save all those envelopes after you’ve clipped off the stamps. Be sure that each of your envelopes has a return address in the upper left hand corner - if it doesn’t, and you know the return address, write it in. Save these until you’ve accumulated a box full, and then send them in to either Prime Source Lists, 103 Washington St., Morristown, NJ 07960 or to the List Buyers Group, Manalpan 1000 Office park, Manalpan, NJ 07726. These companies will pay you $10 to $20 for each box of envelopes with return addresses - and a visible postmark - that you send to them.
From here, you simply save all the sales letters, advertising circulars, and other materials you receive - later on, you simply package it into 9 x 12 envelopes and send it out to people who pay you to send junk mail to them. Indeed, there are literally “millions” of people out there who will pay you to send them package of junk mail!
Here’s how you make it work: Pick up a copy of all the mail order publications you can find - check the classifieds section specifically for people “selling big mails”. When you spot one of these ads that looks especially appealing, clip it out, take it to the near-by print shop and have them type-set some kind of name, and your address “in over” the name and address on the ad you clipped out. Run the finished product through the copy machine a half dozen times - clip out and paste enough of these onto an 8 1/2 x 11 sheet of paper to fill up the whole page - and then have 50 or a hundred of these sheets of ads either printed or copied for you. Take these home and save them until you’re ready to advertise.
When that day comes, you simply clip out one of these ads, and along with your letter and payment requesting advertising space, you send it in to the publication you want to advertise in.
Back to all those mail order publications, you’ve collected… Check all those listings of “Big Mails Wanted”, jot their names and addresses down on 3 by 5 index cards and file these in zip code order and alphabetically within zip codes. You then write a letter or make up a sale circular stating that you would like to supply these people with “Big Bundles” of Big Mail on a regular basis - about once every other month for $20 a year. Have a supply of these letters printed or copied for you, fold them up and send them off to each of the names you’ve collected of people interested in receiving Big Mails… Nothing to it, once you start the ball rolling, the orders will come in and all you’ll have to do is: Keep looking for names of people wanting Big Mails; keep sending out your sales letters offering to send them bundles of big mail on a regular basis in exchange for whatever fee you want to charge; and then, fill up envelopes to these people with junk mail you’ve received and accumulated…
Once you’ve got your first orders, take some of the money and use it to place your ads in the mail order publications you’ve seen or know about. At the same time, besides getting your name on as many mailing lists as possible, send in a letter to the publications carrying lists of people wanting Big Mails and request that your name/address be added to their regular list.
How do you get your name on mailing lists? Take a stack of postcards and type or write out: Please send more information, and either print or type your name/address below it. Then you go through the ads carried in all the publications you want to wade through, and address one of these cards to each of these advertisers. Within just a few days after dropping these cards in the mail, you’ll be inundated with all kinds of offers and opportunities - what most people call junk mail.
You can develop and/or refine this program even further by collecting/compiling and selling or renting the names from the people sending things to you in the mail - this is how many people compile the mailing lists they rent/sell - or you might want to make up a dynamite sales letter, offering to send a couple of hundred names per month to people interested in receiving names for their mail order business, for $50 to $100 per client per year. If you opt to pursue this line of development, your best bet will be to concentrate on selling all the small mail order publishers - again, much of the who and where can be compiled from your incoming mail…
Of course, if you’ve got a “red hot” line of products you’re trying to sell by mail order, this little operation can just about pay for all your postage costs. You simply include one of your advertising circulars with each Big Mail package you send out. It works - Anyone can do it - So have at it, and the best of luck to you!!!
Just about anyone can offer recipes for sale, and make a few extra dollars. Believe it or not, almost anyone who sells recipes through all the “chain letter” recipe clubs, National Inquirer and similar efforts, makes money.
Not many of them make the proverbial “bushel basketful” of money, but the majority of them make enough money to at least break even for the money they spend in promoting their offers. That’s a lot more than a lot of people involved in most other types of mail order selling can say for themselves.
Here’s how a recipe club is usually started: An enterprising homemaker or man with visions of super wealth dancing before his eyes, thumbs through one of his mother’s or grandmother’s old recipe books… He notices an unusual or interesting recipe for say, chicken ‘n dumplings… He says to himself, I’ll bet not too many of today’s housewives are aware of how well most men like chicken ‘n dumplings - so what if I run an ad along with these lines: Delight your man! Win the pride of your kids, and the praise of your friends! Serve then chicken ‘n dumplings from my old world recipe. Yours for just $1 plus SASE…
He runs that ad in the National Inquirer or one of the other national publications that cater to people interested in cooking - his cost: about $100 - and in response, he receives six or seven hundred one dollar bills in the mail. Like wow! And he never thought it could be so easy!
So he writes up a little letter stating to the effect that “we’re starting an “old world” recipe club - send us $10 per year for membership dues, plus one of your favorite ‘old world’ recipes, and we’ll set up a program not only for a monthly newsletter in which we talk about ways to ease the grocery bill while feeding our families wholesome meals, we’ll also kick off a program that will allow each member to pick up a bit of pin money on the side.
If he mails these “membership solicitation” letters to all the people who responded to his recipe ad, and to all the other people he sees interested in recipes in the homemaker-type publications, he’ll have his recipe club.
So what he does is file all the incoming recipes - uses the incoming cash for operating expenses - and copies one of the better incoming recipe club chain letters to fit his own program. He types his own name in the number one position, and the names of three or four of his members and one of their recipes in the numbers two, three, and four positions. Generally, his instructions will advise the recipient to send $10 to the name of the recipe club, and it’s post office box address for a lifetime membership which gives member a free copy of the club newsletter once every so often - and then to send $1 to each of the names listed in the pyramid - positions 1-2-3-4… When the club gets his membership fee, 100 copies of the solicitation letter will be “printed” up with the new member’s name in number four position - these will be mailed to the new member - and he or she will be able to send them out to his or her friends and collect $1 for their recipe, which of course can be reproduced for about $3 or $4 per hundred…
What actually happens with the initial mailings is that the “club president” is dealing from a stacked deck. The club gets $10 from each new member - costs about $3 or $4 to print up a hundred copies of the membership solicitation letter - and the “club president” as the club, pockets at least $5 profit from each new member. Then, his or her name is always in number one position for each new member, so if everything goes in reality as it’s designed on paper, he makes another $1 from everyone participating. So far so good, but wait, he’s enlisted the help of his relatives, neighbors and friends to “catch” and save for him, any and all recipe club mail that comes to their addresses. So, positions number two, three and four are taken up on this initial mailing by people who turn the money received, over to him.
Think of it! If 5,000 letters were sent out and only 1,500 people joined up and sent $1 to each of the names/addresses listed on his letter, he’ll come out about $6,000 ahead before he even begins counting the income from new memberships.
Okay! The next time around, he “lops off” his number 4 name and inserts a new member’s name - but he’s still got $3 from each participating member coming in to him on each mailing; and then it’s $2, and eventually only $1 - but he still gets that $10 from each new member… You can believe without a doubt he’s getting rich fast, and you will too as you progress up the ladder from the number 4 position, but you’ll never make as much money as he does - simply because he’s in the “control” position.
As for “publishing” the newsletter, there’s really nothing to that - he simply checks out a book on “helpful household hints” from the public library and copies them from the book onto the pages of his newsletter, attributing these hints to “made up” names of fictitious club members. You’ll notice that he always “tag-lines” his household hint or bit of club news with something along these lines: Remember, if your local group or organization is doing something newsworthy, if you have a special recipe you’d like to share with all the club members - or if you have a helpful household hint, be sure to send it in to us and we’ll try to include it in our next issue. At the bottom line, everybody is meeting new friends ,discovering old recipes their grandmothers used to use, and everybody involved is helping to make the “club president” rich!
What I’m saying is simply this: Here’s how some of them do work, and how you can put it together to serve your own purposes with you as “club president”. When you’re dealing with recipes, the postal services generally do not bother you - so long as you “maintain” that you’re just exchanging recipes amongst your club members, and no one really involved with a primary motive of getting rich.
Believe it! It works almost every time, and it’s so simple that most people never stop to worry about who’s helping whom.
Sooner or later the names of the new members will reach the number one position - a lot of them will circumvent the $10 membership fee and have their own “chain letter membership solicitation letters” printed up with their own names and mail drops in every position - and when that happens, you either make them “chapter presidents” of their own members and exact fees from them for the membership/newsletter program, or you wait a few months and start all over again from scratch with a stacked deck again.
The basic problem is that too many people see and understand exactly how the program works, and they use your materials as well as ideas to launch their own recipe club. If you can’t get your well-planned, and theoretically good for everyone program running full-speed ahead from your first mailing, just bow out and relax for awhile. Let things settle down for a couple of months or so and then try it again.
Almost all profitable recipe clubs have a newsletter - a gossip sheet in reality - but it’s that newsletter that carries the ball in bringing in the dough for the “club president.” Remember, your “pyramid participation” letter should emphasize the benefits of becoming a member of your recipe club, complete with club newsletter - and, the opportunity to make a little extra money by helping to recruit new members.
As explained earlier, in response to each person sending in a $10 membership fee, you agree to put them on the mailing list for your newsletter - and to send them 100 copies of the “pyramid participation” letter which is thinly disguised as a sales letter recruiting new members in your program.
Reread this whole thing over - make sure you understand each step - and then, if you want to really make it big with recipes - line your pockets with gold instead of somebody else’s - initiate the steps to become “club president” of your own recipe club!
Everyday more and more people are jumping on the “mail order” bandwagon - starting their own, or getting involved in some kind of mail order selling endeavor - and hoping to get rich. At the same time, there are just as many people “giving up and throwing in the towel” because they can’t even make expenses in mail order.
The bottom line is simply this: If you don’t have the “right” product, and know how to promote it properly, you’re doomed to failure before you begin!
People are stimulated to become involved in mail order selling by advertising. These people are for the most part, looking for a vehicle that will enable them to supplement their present incomes, and or an angle that will enable them to get rich quick. In times of economic hardship, the people promoting and selling these plans and/or schemes become unbelievably rich.
Selling ideas or plans on how a person can make extra income - without really working - or become rich almost overnight, is a billion dollar a year business! Most of the buyers of these plans as disappointed, but their ambitions and desires for more money are not thwarted. They continue to look for new plans, ideas and help that will fulfill their dreams.
If you fully understand what I’ve told you thus far, then you now know “the secret mail order product that can make you rich!” What I’m talking about is the follow-up information and how-to reports that explain in precise detail all that’s involved, and how to make one of these “plans for ideas” work profitably.
In other words, books and articles that tell how other people make their fortunes are almost worthless because they really explain the point-by-point details involved in starting, operating and keeping a business profitable. Someone buys a book, How To Get Rich In Mail Order, and it tells how the author made a fortune, but it doesn’t tell the reader explicitly how - without a lot of money to begin with - can build a mail order empire.
The very first thing to know, and never to forget, is the fact it takes money and time to build a successful business. Besides money and time, it also takes business acumen or know-how. This is where most people fall down. They just don’t have the proper know-how to start and run a successful business. And this is “the secret mail order product” that you can sell and become rich from selling. Everybody want to become rich - most people have some sort of vehicle - but they’re lacking the “inside secrets” to make these plans work profitably, and as a result, they will stand in line to buy this information from you.
My suggestion is that youtart by selling business success reports. These reports have always been the staple of the direct mail business, and appeal to a large audience of eager buyers.
Say you run a small classified ad and a hundred people buy just one of these reports from you for $30 each - with that, you’ve just made a cool $3000 (less the cost of the reports).
The thing to do from there is to take this money to place more classified ads in more publications. Remember, the more people who see your ads for your reports, the more people you’ll have “standing in line” to buy them from you.
If you were to sell just 1,000 copies of one of these reports each year - that would give you an annual income of $30,000 and that ain’t chickenfeed…
Don’t worry about competition in selling these reports. Unless you’ve got enough money to reach the 60 million opportunity seekers in this country all at once, there will always be people wanting to buy the inside secrets you have to sell.
You can make a million dollars or more in mail order, but it’s going to require a complete understanding of the business as well as a little bit of know-how on your part. New millionaires are made every day in mail order, but not before they’ve “paid their dues”, and put up a sizeable investment.
Profitable mail order operations are money-makers because of three basic things: 1) They offer a product that costs very little to produce; it’s something that once produced, can be reproduced in quantity at little or virtually no cost; and it costs very little to deliver it to their customers - not withstanding the fact that this product must be something “everyone would like to have”. 2) They promote their products with first class advertising - reaching their potential customer via every means possible. 3) They use good business management and/or cost control to keep their production, advertising, printing and shipping costs at a bare minimum.
With these things in mind, let’s talk about the product…
In selecting a product to sell, one should always to his homework, or market research, before investing too much of his time or money. This simply means “finding out” what the people “want to buy;” determining his costs to produce and sell this product to them; and ultimately, knowing what his true profit picture is going to be.
Thus, the important thing to remember “BEFORE” you get going with a mail order business, is that if you don’t have the “right” product, you’ll never do much more than break even. To much money, time and effort is wasted by people trying to sell something that no one wants to buy!
The second thing to know, and fully understand about profitable mail order operations is advertising…
Advertising is the “life-blood” of any business, but particularly so with a mail order business - otherwise how are your potential customers going to know what you have for sale? The better your advertising, and your abilities to use it profitably, the more money you’re going to take in. It’s just that simple, but there’s a whole lot more to it than just a quick reading of these words would imply.
Mail order advertising means the ads you place in all the publications catering to your potential customers. It also includes the sales letters and/or circulars you send out via direct mail or as follow-up materials with your orders. And, it also encompasses any radio/television as well as word of mouth or free publicity blurbs you might get.
In order to turn a profit with a mail order business, you’ve got to know how to write a good classified ad - how to put together an order-pulling display ad - how to write/design a winning advertising circular - and how to create an image of credibility, as well as “angles to play” in order to get free publicity.
The bottom line here is simply that if you don’t understand advertising, and in particular, mail order advertising - and you can’t afford to pay a proven, professional mail order advertising copywriter to do it for you - then you’re either going to have to learn how to do it for yourself or forget the dream of making a fortune in mail order. Remember, you’re going to have to invest advertising dollars to make money in mail order, but unless your advertising pulls in the orders for you, you’ll just be wasting your time and money. Finally, let’s discuss profitable business management and cost control…
Very few people invest money in a new car, a new house or the selection of a doctor without “finding out” as much about their contemplated investment as possible. Starting or getting involved in a mail order business should be taken just as seriously. It’s imperative to learn all there is to know about running a mail order business - to know your actual investment in time, money and actual profit…
The point is that before you invest, you should figure out the costs of producing the product or service you’re offering for sale… You should know how much it’s costing you to sell each unit of your product and get it to your customers - And you had better have a follow-up line of products to sell after you’ve made that first sale…
Some of the “Insider Secrets” used by successful mail order operators include setting up partnership investments - you offer professional advertising copywriters a percentage of the business in exchange for their help with your advertising needs… You offer printing shops a percentage of the business in exchange for supplying you with your printing needs… Besides offering your potential customers with things to buy, you include other things such as mailing lists, print and mail services and product dealerships…
It’s important that you know what your costs are to sell your products; to use your imagination to get other mail order operators to share your costs with you; and to reduce your expenses as much as you can. This means that if your costs per sale amounts to $1.50, leaving you with a profit of 50 cents per sale, you’re going to have to make 200 sales before claiming $100 in profits. Considering you were able to pull in a response of 3% from a mailing of 1,000 offers, you’d end up with ninety sales and a profit of less than $50…
What we’re trying to pass along is simply that before you get involved in a mail order business, be sure that you select a product that the whole world “wants” to buy - then make sure that your advertising reaches the people “standing in line” and wanting to buy whatever it is you’re trying to sell - and finally that you’ve got all of your costs reduced to the bare minimum…
Too many people wanting to “get rich quick” in mail order sales, jump in without knowledge of whether or not the product or service they’re offering will sell. They invest money in pre-furnished advertising materials, envelopes, a rubber stamp with their name and address, time to fold and stuff these advertising materials, mailing lists and postage. From there on, it’s an unending “rat race” to recoup their money and time.
Our advice is simply to investigate everything before you get involved - be assured of how many sales you can make relative to the number of offers you send out - your printing and mailing costs to bring in orders, as well as how much time you’re going to have to devote - and finally exactly how much of a real profit you can claim…
The more you know about mail order sales, the easier it’ll be for you to select a product or service that you can use to pile up a fortune for yourself. So, it is just everyday common sense to “look into the possibilities” before committing yourself - laying out a complete plan for a mail order business on paper - getting all the helpers or services lined up at absolute minimum costs to yourself - and then launching your business with confidence as well as dedication.
Don’t get involved in a mail order business without market research, plus complete awareness of all costs needed to launch and/or sustain your business; and of course the kind of profit you can count on. At the bottom line, it’s going to cost you an investment of time and money, regardless of what you try to sell by mail order - check it out before you get involved…
These last couple months have been crazy on Wall Street. Stocks are behaving weirdly. On the other hand, it has provided a very good opportunity to make money because of the volatility. Want to make big money? Try day trading options.
In any event, you can be online stock trading in minutes. I’m not just partial to the guys at oexoptions because they are from Chicago. They can cut through the fluff.
The stock market has shown
• How wild the market can behave
• How negative sentiment can affect money
• How the traders can easily get burned
• How to put perfect stock market management strategy in place
• How the bull market strategies do not work in bear markets
• How losing money is more easy then making it
• How drastically the positive can turn negative
• How non-fundamental stock fall heavily
The stock market is showing its ugly face and you need help to navigate it. This is a down market and making money today is even tougher. If you implement proper and perfect strategy, you can still make money.
You have to assume that stock market will follow predictable patterns and trust greater experts. They will allow you to make money. Leverage their skill and knowledge so you can pull out the money from the stock market by online trading.
If you’ve got a mailing list of at least a thousand names or more, you’re sitting on a gold mind. All it takes is for you to get the word out that you’ve got a mailing list for rent, at a competitive price, and you should be home free!
First of all, you’ve got to have a bonafide list of customers - a list of names of people that have responded to an ad or bought from you.
You can accumulate such a list simply by noting on 3 by 5 index cards - the names and addresses of each person sending you something in the mail. If it’s in response to an ad you’ve ran, not that on your file card with the date you received the response. If it’s an order for something you’re selling, not that on your file card with the date, and dollar figure relative to what they bought from you. If it’s just an incoming offer for something they’re selling, not the date and what they’re selling on your index card.
Keep your cards filed by zip code, and in alphabetical order within the zip code numbers. When you have a thousand or more of these cards on file, either type or have these names and addresses types onto full sheets of mailing labels. Be sure to number your lists, and each page of your lists.
From this point, you simply make up an advertising sales letter stating that you offer mailing lists for rent - a brochure or circular you can make up from the best features of all the incoming offers you get. Be sure to write your sales letter or put your circular together in such a manner that it makes the would-be buyer feel that he’ll make money from the use of your list - for instance, one of the current more popular headlines being used these days, asks the reader if he would like more orders and/or money in his bank account. These letters then go on to explain just how the use of the advertised mail_ing list should be able to multiply his investment.
Send this letter or brochure out to all the people sending you offers in the mail, and also to all the people you see advertising in mail order publications.
In addition to these people, you should also check in your local Yellow Pages under “mailing lists” and get a copy of your sales letter or brochure off to them. You might also drop by your local public library and look up the names and address of all the “mailing list brokers” in the Standard Rate & Data Service books, and send them a copy of your sales material. Finally, take down the names and addresses of all the mailing list houses you might want to send a copy of sales materials to, from the Standard Rate & Data Service books.
A good mailing list “all customers” will rent form $50 per thousand, and will be in use as often as you care to rent it out. The best way to go is through a reputable list broker. He does all the promoting for you, and handles everything, more or less sending you a check - minus his 10-15% commission - at the end of each month. This is definitely the kind of business you can set up on almost any home computer,
and so long as you keep the “nixies” to a bare minimum, you can realize an unbelievable income.
If you’re promoting/renting your own list, you should set up a working relationship with either a copy shop of lease/buy your own photocopy machine. Look in the Yellow Pages for wholesale paper houses in your area, explain to them the kind of labels you want, and then buy your supplies in quantity lots. Then as you receive orders for your list, just run your master copies through the machine onto the labels and send the labels out to your customers.
Be sure to keep a log on the front of each list, and note the date - name - and kind of offer sent out by each renter. Try to find out as much as you can about each of your list renters, and the type of materials they’re sending out - and then ask them to check back with you on their results. By all means, you’ll get more renters if you offer some sort of compensation for any nixies returned to you - and at the same time, you’ll be able to keep your list free of undeliverables. Such an offer might be one new, and guaranteed fresh name for every undeliverable returned to you within 60 days from the date of their order.
If you want to drastically improve the look of your home, try getting an automatic gate. Having a nice electric gate installed will do wonders for your property value. This is one of the few home improvements that adds much more value to your home than it costs to implement.
The key is to have it professionally installed by knowledgable experts. You don’t want to blemish your property by paying a novice to go to Home Depot. You can find experts online, but the place to start is easily gateoperator.net. They offer a full array of products from the top brands and they have the expertise to make sure it is done correctly.
Obviously, a gate provides security. You want your home to be secure. One of the peripheral benefits of having a gate in place is just how great it feels to have the gate opener in hand when you drive up to your residence. It transforms your home from just another house into your own private castle. My only regret is that I didn’t get one sooner!
Mail forwarding services are emerging into their own as big business. Basically all that’s involved is setting your home address or post office box up as a mail drop - the receiving station - for anyone wanting to use your address as his own.
You receive all tis incoming mail, check it against your files, and forward it on to your customers. For this service, most mail forwarding services 25 to 30 cents per letter forwarded. Ten letters per month at 30 cents per letter is only $3 per month, but the secret is in volume. For instance, if you had 300 customers, each of them paying you $3 per month, you’d be grossing $900 for little more than rubber stamping a forwarding address on envelopes. Some companies of this type charge a $10 registration fee, and then 20 to 30 cents per letter.
All you need to set up a business is a card table in your garage, a rubber stamp that says: Forward to - and a ballpoint pen with which to write your client’s proper address on the envelope. We suggest that you set up your place of operation in your garage in order not to interfere with the “living space” in your home, but if you’re lacking in a garage, there’s no reason why you can’t set this business up in a corner of your living room.
People use mail forwarding services for a wide variety of different reasons. Some people are “on the road” much of the time and don’t want their mail piling up in their home mail boxes; some people “just want” a different address from their own; some people want certain kinds of mail delivered to an address other than their home address; and then, some people are trying to “hide” their true addresses.
To get people to use your mail forwarding services, the easiest way is to run a small classified type ad in some of the national tabloid publications. Such an ad might read something like:
USE OUR ADDRESS AS YOUR BUSINESS ADDRESS!
Complete mail forwarding service. Confidential, same day
service, $10 per month. Register today. ABC Mail Forwarders,
123 Main Street, Anytown, USA 30136
Of course the above ad is just a quick example of how your ad might read, but this is an ad we’ve ran successfully for a number of years and have enjoyed great success withÉ The main thing is to write your ad so that it solves a problem - gives the reader an idea - for the person in the market for these kinds of services.
A lot of people use this business as the basis for any number of other mail order programs they’ve got going - other related businesses that pretty much coincide without a great deal of extra space or work, include: Co-Op Mailing Services, Commission Circular Mailing, Private Mailbox Centers, Wrapping, Packaging, and UPS Services; and even Copy Centers. It’s an easy business to operate, inexpensive to start, and definitely a source of never-ending supply of extra cash.
Aside from advertising, the biggest expense involved in a mail order business is postage. This means that virtually everyone involved in mail order is on the look-out for ways to save money getting their sales offers out to prospects. The answer is in co-op mailings.
Here’s how typical co-op mailing service works: A person with something to sell via mail sees an advertisement inviting his or her to send their circulars or brochures to a co-op mailing service. The co-op mailing service receives these circulars or brochures and hires housewives or handicapped people to fold and stuff them into envelopes and then mails them. For this service, they charge anywhere form $10 to $100 per thousand - and it’s a good deal for the mailer.
The mailer doesn’t have the bother of folding and stuffing envelopes, nor the expense of renting a mailing list to send his offers to, and he doesn’t have to worry about either a bulk rate mail permit or the costs of postage. All of this is included in the fee he pays the co-op mailing service.
Now, quite naturally, the co-op mailer can not do this and make any money unless he’s got a number of circulars or brochures from several customers in each envelope he sends out. And that’s precisely how he makes his money - by including 10 to 16 such circulars in each envelope. Look at it from a mathematical point of view: Say he’s charging 12 people $50 per thousand to fold and stuff their circulars in with his own outgoing mail. Twelve times 50 dollars comes out at 600 dollars - he uses his own mailing lists, so there’s no big expense involved there - but he does have to pay people to fold and stuff envelopes unless he’s got it organized where he and his family do this. The going rate of pay for people to fold and stuff circulars is about $20 per thousand. And to bulk rate mail 1,000 envelopes is going to cost $167.00. Add to that about 121,000 envelopes and you’ve got a total overhead of $199.70. Subtract that amount from the $600 he took in, and you have him realizing profit of $400.30. Not bad for one mailing.
The best thing of all about starting and operating a co-op mailing service is that you can include your own circulars or brochures with each envelope you send out. You stuff circulars or brochures from 12 different paying customers, and at the same time, include at least two of your own.
So how do you get started in such an easy and highly profitable business? The simplest way is to have an advertising coupon - 3 1/2 by 6 inches - made up and include one with everything you mail out. Another sure-fire method of pulling in orders is to run a simple classified ad in as many of the national coverage mail order publications as you can afford. Such an ad might look like this:
Co-Op Mailing! Best customers in the
country. Just $50 per thousand - you
supply the circulars - we mail! (your
name & address).
A couple of things you should do in order to handle the orders you’ll be getting. Be sure to have a number of people lined up/available to do the folding and stuffing of envelopes for you, and also, be sure to get yourself a bulk rate postage permit.
With those details out of the way, all you really have to do when the orders come in is drop off the circulars to be folded and stuffed into envelopes, with the envelopes, your return address can be rubber stamped on the envelopes as they are applying the mailing address labels as well as your bulk mail permit indicia, and you’re on your way.
By including a co-op mailing advertising coupon with each piece of mail that you send out, plus regular advertising in most of the mail order publications, you’ll be pleasantly surprised at how fast your profits will grow. Once you get organized and have all the bugs worked out of your system, you might also want to expand your busi_ness to include your local area.
To do this, you either call on your local area businesses and professional people, or else hire commission sales people to do the selling for you. Most small businesses are interested in sending out regular sales flyers or catalogs, so you or your sales people simply call upon these people and offer to do the job for them.
Contact with a good printer in your area will also be to your benefit. You can offer to have the circulars printed - you collect a commission from the printer, and make a bundle of profits with your mailing services.
If you sign just 5 different stores in 5 different shopping centers, you could really be rolling in money within just a very short period of time. At $50 per thousand - times 5 stores - you would have $250. And when you multiply that times 5 different shopping centers, you’re talking about $1,250. Then if you get all of these people to go with your services on a regular basis - say once a month, you’ve got yourself a very respective monthly income that will certainly keep you from the Poor House.
Whenever you send out mail, you should always include your co-op mail advertising coupon, plus at least two advertising circulars of your own. By doing this, you’ll continue to pull in more business for your mailing services, and at the same time make money from whatever you’re selling on your advertising circulars.
Finally, this opportunity is available to anyone in almost every city and hamlet in the country. We’ve told you how it can be done, and the rest is up to you!
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