Posted or hand-delivered letters

[Ashley_Price]

If you are contacting businesses in your own town, do you think it looks less professional if you hand-deliver letters (dropping it through the letterbox) compared to a stamped and posted letter?

Is a hand-delivered sales letter less likely to be taken seriously? Even though it may be in an envelope, does it get treated the same as say a hand-delivered leaflet?

 

[Darren_Ssc]

I sometimes get junk mail disguised to look like it's been hand delivered - so, on this basis, it probably makes no odds?

 

[estwig]

I think anyone who has time to waste delivering letters by hand, is a numpty and not someone I want to do business with.

 

[The Ecom Guy]

I think anyone who is willing to put the effort in themselves hand deliverying letters by hand is someone determined to make a success of their business and is willing to put in the effort required.

One thing i would say though is there is zero different in posting it through normal mail service and delivering it via just walking up a posting it through letter box. Hand deliver is exactly that, ring the bell, knock the door, press the buzzer. You are already ahead of everyone else before they even see what you are offering as you are face to face with a member of their business. Most of the times it is secretaries / receptionists who answer - and these more often than not have a lot more pull / say in a business than we give them credit for.

 

[saythisinstead.co.uk]

Depends what business you are in.

Dont try to sell to lawyers with a hand delivered letter.

A hand delivered letter to a small retailer would however likely get you some great responses and potentially will put you face to face with the business owner.

Paying someone to deliver a sales letter would not be a great idea as there is no benefit to you.

 

[Mark T Jones]

There are many ‘it depends’ here, but overall I’d say a stamped (not franked) letter is most efficient

That said, several years ago I landed a £1.5 million deal (by far the largest I’d done at the time) on the back of a Dear Financial Director letter, hand-dropped to an office in central London.

 

[Opinion87]

The first thing that strikes me is that you don't have a website. The domain in your signature goes to the web host, one.com

I personally wouldn't hire a virtual PA that didn't have a website. It doesn't exactly scream "virtual."

 

[Ashley_Price]

I personally wouldn't hire a virtual PA that didn't have a website. It doesn't exactly scream "virtual."

I am not exactly sure why working virtually (i.e. away from a client's premises) means you must have a website. What happened with Virtual Secretaries before the internet?

 

[FD Capital]

Personally I prefer normal post as I don't like to deal with unexpected cold callers so it just comes down to the cost vs benefit of the time to deliver against the post of posting and what % return you need to make it stack up.

 

[DRDR]

You should only hand delivery letters if you plan on trying your luck to talk to someone that can make a decision. If that is what you are looking to do, then practice your elevator pitch for the event that you get to them. If you are going to drop it into a postbox then it doesn't matter at all how its delivered so its better you save your time and mail it.

I get people dropping by my premise to try and talk to someone that can make a decision. I dislike any sales agent dropping by unannounced. but they at least get a chance to talk to me while a letter or email will just get no response unless their followup mail/email strategy is brilliant.

 

[Prime81]

When I get 'junk' through the door it doesn't matter if it's hand delivered or through the post, if I don't need it, it's ends up in recycling. What someone said earlier about junk being disguised as something more personal also doesn't work , as it's usually from a campaigning MP, also goes in the recycling. I have to say I can't remember the last time I used a leaflet through the door for any service. I go through recommendations from people I know or more often from Facebook locally.

 

[DRDR]

I go through recommendations from people I know or more often from Facebook locally.

Slightly off topic but RE: recommendations. I've just recently joined those local group looking for recommendations but it turns out they are filled with people spamming their business whenever someone is looking for a recommendation. Its the same accounts constantly commenting on the company they work for. I think they hire people to sit there to wait for these recommendation posts and immediately comment to try and get business.

 

[antropy]

I tried it a few years ago and then followed up with a phone call but a lot of the 'recipients' didn't get the letter. It was a complete waste of time so wouldn't do it again. Alex