Valassis offers a wide range of marketing products, many of which are delivered directly to the doors of potential consumers. With RedPlum Direct Mail Sampling, for example, companies are able to deliver samples of their products to customers in a targeted market. The design of this sampling program allows for specific households to be targeted, guaranteeing the maximization of results and ensuring that this method is cost-effective. Recipients are able to test the new or promoted product firsthand, and the personalized message feature included in the packaging relates them to the company and product itself. Additionally, results from this type of marketing can be analyzed after the samples are delivered, in order to verify its effectiveness.
Similar to sending out samples, is RedPlum’s Newspouch. This may be used for anything from encouraging consumers to try basic samples, to generating a researched-based trial run of a new product. Encasing the consumer’s newspaper, the polybag engages them via colored advertisements printed on the exterior. A heat-sealed pouch is attached to the bag as a sort of “ bonus” for the consumer, and contains a sample of the actual product. Alternatively, www.
redplum. com is an e-marketing product that gives companies the option of offering coupons and promoting themselves directly online. Printable coupons are available for a wide variety of products, including restaurant deals, and beauty products. With a growing number of viewers, specifically women, redplum. com has become a tool that heightens product and brand awareness amongst consumers.
Benefits With the growing awareness of health and fitness amongst today’s Americans, health products and diet foods face increasing competition. Supermarket aisles are teaming with 100-calorie snack packs, protein bars, and flavored “ diet waters”. Although saturating the market with countless brands and diet products offers consumers a wide variety to choose from, it also breeds confusion and indecisiveness when it comes to which brand to purchase. A current trend in the health food market today is flavored drink mixes, which allows consumers to add flavor to their normal bottled water and makes it that much easier to drink the recommended eight to ten glasses of water per day. Novartis, a European-based health company, is the owner of one of today’s most popular drink mix brands, Benefiber. Originally marketed as a flavorless powder that adds soluble fiber to water, Benefiber now offers to-go drink mixes in four new flavors, as shown on their website (www.
benefiber. com). Utilizing RedPlum’s Newspouch would give Novartis a competitive edge by introducing their products directly to potential consumers. With so many other drink mixes by the South Beach Diet, One-A-Day, and Crystal Light, it would be beneficial for the company to ship samples of their products to consumers, allowing them to try the product firsthand while simultaneously raising brand awareness.
Success Story Proof of the effectiveness of the RedPlum Newspouch is illustrated by Quaker, and how the company was able to generate consumption by new consumers, as well as boost consumption by regular customers. After sending out single samplings of the cereal to 1. 4 Million households, Quaker experienced a 26% increase in its sales. This success rate is due to the fact that newly targeted consumers were able to try the product without any cost or risk to them.
Providing a free sample of cereal in the Newspouch was a simple and hassle-free method of encouraging customers to try the product, whereas typical coupons require the customer journey to the store, and spend money on the cereal without ever tasting it. In regards to existing customers, the Newspouch cereal sample served as a sort of “ reminder”, as they were allocated a portion of a product that they already consume. Retention of current customers is as critical as obtaining new target markets, and the Newspouch served to reinforce its product in the respective households.
