Contribution by Mark Jackson Precision Ceramics Montclare California

I have built my business on direct mail. I find mail order dentists take betterimpressions, and more careful when selecting shades, and will be more carefulmaking adjustments if they are necessary.

This makes perfect sense. If they know they will be sending the case threethousand miles away to add a contact, change a shade or redo the crown, theyare infinitely more careful in the first place. As if those qualities are not enough,my delivery costs are more predictable, and I never have to leave or send atechnician to their office.

There are a number of contact management packages available, and your localpost office can send you a schedule of free classes to learn how to get started indirect mail advertising. The United States post office has lost a lot of business tothe internet and express carriers, and are more than willing to help you with yournew venture.

If you decide to do a direct mail flier, consider having a perforated business replycard incorporated into the piece to save stuffing and preparation costs, and offersome incentive to encourage immediate response. If you dont have a lot ofexperience with this type of marketing, you may want to solicit the help of aprofessional. I have worked with Almaden Marketing in Ft. Collins, Co, and wasvery pleased with their work, and their fee was reasonable. Because theyspecialize in designing fliers and brochures for dental laboratories, theirexperience is invaluable.

In some cases, a well written letter can be just as effective as a full color directmail piece. Again, the secret is to be creative. Write a letter that has a "hook" topull the reader in. I have attached a few examples of letters that have workedwell for me.

Dear Dr Smith:

There is an old saying that a stone in a hunters shoe will cause more griefthan a grizzly bear.

Nothing better illustrates how important the "little" things are. At PrecisionCeramics, we believe it's the little things that count. This can be clearly seen inour cast partial denture frames. For example:

Articulation. Unlike some chrome labs, we fully articulate all models, and runthem through lateral and protrusive excursions. This will eliminate unnaturalocclusal interference and reduce chairside adjustments.

Harmony. Since we are a full service lab, combination cases will have betterresults, and metal occlusals and aprons will have more natural looking, functionalanatomy.

Attention to detail. All clasps are thin and tapered to provide resiliency andcomfort, and highly polished internally to reduce the likelihood of wearing toothenamel.

Quality and consistency. By casting with electronic induction, we carefully controltemperature, preserving the alloy's physical properties and improvingconsistency.

Esthetics. Since we are an authorized Flexite and Valplast laboratory, we canalso fabricate beautiful, combination partials with strong metal frames, andcomfortable, esthetic Flexite clasps. We are also experienced with a variety ofpopular attachment systems.

We offer free in-bound shipping through Airborne express, and can process andfinish your cases if you choose. If partial frames have been a pebble in YOURshoe, try us out. Send this letter with your next case, and receive a 10% discounton your next partial frame!

Dear Dr. Smith:

Did you ever drop a stone over the edge of a cliff and wait for the echoingsound to come back to you?

If you heard nothing at all, then your curiosity really was aroused and you wantedto find out what was at the bottom of the cliff, and how deep it was.

We are in the same position today, but the stone we dropped was a discounted

crown for a patient named XXXXXXX XXXXXXXXXX. Since then it's beenawfully quiet.

Frankly, the crown was intended to be a sample of our work. A gift to help arouseyour interest, and inspire you to send us more of your day to day crown andbridge restorations or removable appliances. Perhaps you weren't aware that weeven offer so many different types of products and services, so I've enclosed acomplete service guide, price list and prescription sheets.

If you need a pick up, you can use our mailing labels and call Airborne for freeovernight shipping, or call us directly, and we'll arrange to have your packagepicked up.

Dr. Smith, we really want your business, and thought our gift to you would help tomake that happen. Now that a second stone has been dropped your way, we willlisten intently for the echo. Can we have another case?

This is one of the all-time best producers for our lab. A small plastic bag aboutone inch by one inch is stapled to the letter. The bag has two kernels of pop corninside:

Dear Dr Smith:

In the little bag are two grains of seed corn. Look at them ever so carefully andyou will not see anything that makes one grain any different from the other. But,there is a difference of great importance. A difference of RESULTS. One of thegrains is a sample of ordinary seed corn, the other is a Hybrid variety andproduces from 6 to 36 more bushels an acre.

A lot of values are like that. They may not be noticeable on the surface, but theyare indisputable when comparative results are checked. It isn't easy, for example,to SEE the difference between a beautiful crown, and a beautiful crown that fitswithout time consuming adjustments or costly delays.

In your practice, seeds of productivity can be planted...seeds which will bring you"bushels" when the results are weighed. This is no idle thought. Any laboratorycan make a nice looking crown. We make nice fitting crowns that are asfunctional as they are beautiful.

If you have any questions or if I can be of any service, please feel free to give mea call.