I own a small business owner in Richmond, VA and I am thinking of a
marketing campaign to home consumers using mailed postcards. I want a
targeted marketing area specifically a zipcode (i.e. I want the
postcards mailed to homes only with zipcode 23233). How do obtain a
mailing list of valid addresses? Is there a direct marketing/mailing
company that provides such services in my city? I always receive
advertising postcards from different companies in my mailbox and I
want to know how they got my address and my neighbors if we haven't
actually bought their product/service yet. I am bootstrapping and
trying to maximize my marketing dollars with minimum costs. Aside from
going door-to-door and handing out flyers, I figure this another cost
effective method. I would love to hear any other suggestions on
"cheap" marketing methods.

Hi,

You can rent or buy mailing lists. They are not cheap, but they can be
very cost effective. According to the 2000 census data there are
20,430 housing units in the ZIP code 23233. You'd be looking at about
$2000 minimum for the list plus the cost of printing and mailing that
many post cards. A regular post card is $.23 and a large one is $.37.
You can get a bulk mail permit and that would reduce the postage
costs, but you'd be adding labor because bulk mail has to be sorted.
That means you're probably going to be laying out between $8000 to
$10,000 by the time you figure in labor costs, etc. What do you
estimate would be the amount of sales generated by that cost?
Normally, direct marketing has a top return of 2% -tops! - so if you
got that you'd generate 408 customers. More than likely it would be
substantially less. Do the math and decide if this is a good idea for
you to work on. If it is...

Just do a Google search for purchasing mailing lists and pick any of
the links on the side.

Microsoft has just entered the market and offers a 50 lead for free
option to see what their product delivers. After that it's between
10-50 cents per record.
http://www.bcentral.com/products/cl/default.asp?LID=33033

Here is an article about direct mail.
http://www.bcentral.com/articles/demographics/126.asp

What you're looking for - low budget, highly effective marketing
strategies - is called Guerilla Marketing -

My advice would be to talk to the Small Business Administration people
in your area.
http://www.sba.gov/
http://www.sba.gov/va/
They have plenty of good advice and resources. You can talk to other
small business owners to find out what they are doing and what works.

SCORE is a great resource that affiliated with the SBA. These retired
executives have tons of experience and good ideas that have been
tested and found to work.
http://www.score.org/
http://score-peninsula.org/
http://hometown.aol.com/scorerv/Index.html

You need to build name recognition. 

Taking out sponsor ads in school and religious organizations
publications is usually not expensive and there won't be a lot of
competition for viewers.

Donating prizes for a charity raffle or local event gets names
recognition and builds community loyalty.

After Thanksgiving, get a Santa Claus in to give each child a balloon
with your store name and a goodie bag. Fill the goodie bag with candy
canes and items that have your name and logo. Use flyers to promote
the event around the neighborhood. Go to your local grammar schools
and preschools and let them know about it. You might even consider
asking them if there are a couple of PTA parents who'd like to earn a
few dollars before the holidays by walking the neighborhood and giving
out the flyers. Without promo, you'll be sitting alone with Santa.

None of these will cost as much as a mailing - and the response rate
will probably be about the same.

I'm not sure what your product is, but community outreach goes much
further in building a customer base than another piece of junk mail
and it costs less.


search terms used: Purchase rent mailing lists and 

marketing tactics for small business owners

Hope this helps.

bcguide-ga

You may also want to contact a company called ADVO.  They are the ones
who send out postcard-type advertising with the "Have you seen me"
solicitation on the side with the address, and your ad on the other. 
It's very cost effective compared with what the answerer gave you.