When is the best time/day to deliver leaflets (door to door) for
selling high price electronic goods such as computer systems?

I operate in the UK and am trying to target local customers.

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Clarification of Question by jaspsoft-ga on 13 Mar 2005 00:51 PST

This is simply putting a leaflet through the persons
letterbox. Not trying to sell them something at the door.

I would probaly think Monday to Wednesday between 11am and 2pm. Hope this helps.

LOL! When do people in the UK eat? Here in the US, I'd think "after
supper" would be a GREAT time. Like 7 pm. However, as a person, I'd
rather have my door knocked on Saturday at 2 pm.

Just to clarify: This is simply putting a leaflet through the persons
letterbox. Not trying to sell them something at the door.

It probably does not matter much what time of day.

Unless people are home based, they will be out before the mail delivery
- and they'll just pick up the bundle when they get in at night.

Since the GPO reckons that it makes money out of delivering junk, your
leaflet will be on top of theirs, and probably under a few pizza
leaflets.

I wish you luck selling computers, it is a tough market with very low margins.

A local guy I know has been doing something similar for computer
maintenance, he dropped off the leaflets himself.
I'm not sure how he is getting on - I must find out.

Thanks for all the advice. It is much appreciated.

I would also reconsider leaflets.  You have a very high sales cost
because someone has to go out there and distribute 500 leaflets to
maybe get one sale.  Here are a few sales resources I found:

http://www.answers.com/topic/sales-1
http://www.dunningadvertising.com
http://erc.atdc.org/cat_sales.asp?cat=sales#2

Hope these help point you in a good direction.

Thank you.

I can delivery 10,000 leaflets in with free newspapers for about £300.
I think though with computer purchases, people either use the
Internet, or ask a friend. Or just pay over the odds for one from
their local hypermarket.

I used to do this and used this method to start my first computer company.
First I wouldnt put them in a newspaper, stuff from a paper tends to
get thrown away rather than read.
Trying newspapers was expensive for me, and I would get maybe 3%
enquiry return and 1% sales. It NEVER paid for itself.
I used to do weekends and deliver leaflets myself,I found that at
weekends i could talk to people as they were washing cars, mowing
lawns etc. This would build up a relationship. I would also target the
private houses and the higher value houses. As well as that I used to
add to the leaflet that I did fix price repairs on computers £30 no
fix no fee. On more than one occasion I got calls before I had left
the street, and once you were through the door and gained trust you
would usually get their next PC purchase. although you quite often
make more profit on the £30 fix than you do on a pc.
There is no better way than to walk the streets yourself, if you look
to hire people it costs money and you have to find that return
straight away.
It did work for me, I fought a long time and did long hours and lots
of weekend walking, but eventually I built up a nice bunch of about
500 regular customers who would recomend me to their friends.
Dont expect to ever get rich though, there is NO money to be made in
computer hardware, but the experience that you gain will really set
you on your way. It did for me as I now sit at board level with a
large media comany :)