Discussion:ValPak Advertising
From TaxAlmanac
Discussion Forum Index --> Business Growth Community --> ValPak Advertising
| 29 November 2006 | |
| Hi folks. We're a new tax prep service -- lots of years of experience among us, but our firm is entirely new. As the season barrels down on us, we're making critical decisions about how to promote ourselves. We've just made a small initial commitment to advertising with ValPak for January and February. ValPak are the people who mail the brightly-colored envelope once a month, jammed with "buck slips" (3-1/4" x 8") advertising different businesses, often with discount coupons included on the slip.
A LOT of national companies advertise this way, including dish TV, pizza chains and local pizza parlors, Netfliks, etc. I've occasionally seen Jackson-Hewitt in there too. Plus, a good selection of local companies (but no tax offices). I'm curious if any local tax offices have tried ValPak or similar services. If you have, what was your rate of response (total sales divided by total number of pieces distributed)? Thanks in advance for any information. | |
Www.cpa1.biz (talk|edits) said: | 1 December 2006 |
| Yes,
I am currently trying Val Pak to get clients. I will find out this tax season how it goes. I am also Google and The Community Phone Book. I will keep you informed. Thanks, Bj | |
| 3 December 2006 | |
| I use coupons extensivly they work well for me glad to talk about it with you | |
| 4 December 2006 | |
| Thanks Bj and John. Bj, I'll love to hear how they work for you once you can read the results. I'll let you know if it works for us, too. Did you design your own coupon or use the design services of an ad agency or the ValPak folks? (I designed our own, just uploaded to them today. We'll see if they think it's okay, or if they instead think they need to design a new one for us). John, I would like to talk to you further about it, and will send a back-channel note. Thanks again to both of you. | |
| 9 December 2006 | |
| Hi PDXTaxman
Some of the keys to the Coupons you want to make points that sets you apart from the others For example we have Accuracy guarenteed "If we don't have it right you don't owe us one red cent" Same day service Ask about our express drop off discount You want to make a strong offer $20 off $99 New clients $69 for our innotive My Tax Coach in America You get the idea Keep us posted | |
| 4 January 2007 | |
| I've used Val-Pak twice in past years and in my experience they are not worth the paper they are printed on. Just my opinion. I won't use them again. | |
Bottom Line (talk|edits) said: | 7 January 2007 |
| I advertised one year and the ad cost four times what it generated in fees. Would never do it again. | |
Hellothere (talk|edits) said: | 15 January 2007 |
| I used them last year and gained 12 clients. My ad ran Jan - April and cost about $1,600. I will use them again this year, but I skipped January as most of the responses I received were in Feb & March. Also, I will not use them in April this year. | |
Bottom Line (talk|edits) said: | 16 January 2007 |
| Hope you charged more than $135 per client. | |
| 19 January 2007 | |
| I am trying them this year and I hope they work. A lot of it probably depends on the market and the types of households to whom they send the envelopes. I will have to let you know. | |
Bottom Line (talk|edits) said: | 20 January 2007 |
| Keep track of what your ad cost was and how much you made. If you made money with this, the thing to look at after next season is how many "stuck". | |
Www.cpa1.biz (talk|edits) said: | 2 February 2007 |
| Flyers would seem to be good since that what taxpayers look for is convenience.
What do you all think? | |
| 2 February 2007 | |
| I am telemarketing to local businesses. Offer a free tax and financial accounting review. I thought about going after the 1040's but decided to go after businesses for now. | |
Victor1530 (talk|edits) said: | 2 February 2007 |
| Has anyone else used the fliers? I am in a Suburb of a Metro area with a local weekly paper. town is about 40,000 but only 6000 subscribers to the local paper.
I am having inserts printed up. Going for the 1040's since I still have my day job, and feel I can give better quality and service on those instead of businesses. RickCPA1 are you using anyones marketing program? I have looked at 2 or 3 NCI "Build your firm" and one more can t think of the name. | |
| 2 February 2007 | |
| Victor:
Frank Salman's. He is out of Victorville, CA. Bought the program 3 or 4 years ago. Have done it 2 or 3 times over that time. | |
Www.cpa1.biz (talk|edits) said: | 13 February 2007 |
| Anyone try Sale's Genie...This is something new... | |
Victor1530 (talk|edits) said: | 14 February 2007 |
| Thanks Rick, sorry to be so late responding. My day job with a corp tax return is getting in my way of getting my practice started. I have heard of Frank as well. the one i was thinking of was The AFD center. "Accounting Firm Development" Never heard of Sales Genie. Rick was your response better than 1 or 2 percent? Handcuffed to this desk and find it hard to do any networking with other CPA's espcially the mid size firms who I have found thru a couple of telephone calls have minimum of $500 ot $600 for a personal return but still get referrals because the prospective client wants a CPA not H & R. I enjoy this site and it as someone else also said it is very humbling. | |
| 14 February 2007 | |
| I am going to be giving a presentation called "Beyond 250" about marketing and promotion techniques I have used to grow 2 businesses beyond the typical 250 returns at which one typically plateaus. The presentation will be at the National Association of Tax Professionals' annual conference this July in Las Vegas. NATP Conference
Lots of stuff I've done works. The Val Pak doesn't work for me. Neither do newspaper ads. | |
| 20 February 2007 | |
| Victor - This year the response has not been that good. I had a man doing the calls for a while... but it was not for him. I just brought on a mid 50's lady that can grow in to a bookkeeper. With both it seems like maybe their personalities were/are like mine... that of an accountant. Maybe the person should be more bubbly.. but then they may not support a bookkeeping position. Most responses are Happy With Their CPA. There are some to call back on. I have actually made 4 appts out of about 2000 calls.
Kevin - If we don't go to the NATP - will you give any clues what you have done or have you written anything? DZCPA - I have a picture of Monte Carlo too from a cruise we did about 10 years ago. Do you do promotions or work your database for more referrals? Thank you and Have a terrific tax season! | |
| 20 February 2007 | |
| Rick, I haven't written the text yet, but I plan to use a lot of real life examples (letters, coupons, flyers, etc.) When I started in this tax business about 20 years ago, I subscribed to some sort of marketing newsletter which was mainly for Dentists (it might have become Mostad & Christensen, I don't remember, because I ended up using some of their stuff the first 5 years). Anyway, the newsletters taught dentists how to write effective yellow page ads and effective "welcome to the neighborhood" letters. I thought "why does this apply to dentists but not to me?", and adapted many of the ideas to my own use. I have tried things that worked and many things that didn't. Through the years I have stopped doing the things that didn't work (once in awhile I would try to tweak them, and try them again, only to find out that "Tout ça change, tout c'est la mème chose".
I also joined the NAEA Large Tax Practice Group as soon as I qualified, which allowed me to compare notes with others who have done the same thing. I learned from their marketing mistakes, they learned from mine. I can't tell you how happy I was to not waste tens of thousands of dollars in "advertising" that doesn't work. Of course, that meant that some other CPA or EA had spent those tens of thousands. I am bound by promise to the LTPG not to reveal what works for others, therefore I can only share what I have done (much of which were not my original ideas, I just adapted them). I will also tell you that another member of the NAEA LTPG started his own marketing materials company, Image One, which he later sold. Some of their materials are strangely similar to what I use, wonder why. | |
| 20 February 2007 | |
| OK, here is a secret. Publicity. Get your name in the paper (hopefully for doing something good). Get your name in trade publications, and frame the articles. Can you read this article? | |
| February 21, 2007 | |
| What worked the best for me, way back in the late 70s and early 80s, was to give $5 credits to current clients who referred others to me (and I prepared a bunch of amended returns for new clients during those years to add Sch G, Income Averaging). I did that for a few years, in addition to placing one ad in the local shopping guide during tax season, until I had more clients than I wanted. Now I'm trying to figure out how to jack up the prices and lose some clients (in the next few years), since age and health are starting to be factors in the number of hours and days I can work continuously, except when I'm sleeping. | |
| 10 March 2007 | |
| My sister has done TV commercials the past 2 years... running for 2 months on spanish TV in Orlando, runs ~20-30K each year. I told her HEY u gotta stop that crap, it's not worth it. She has a magnetic sign on her car, 90 dollar. I drew it up on photoshop and we got it digitalized. Hopefully thatll work well. | |
Bottom Line (talk|edits) said: | 10 March 2007 |
| As you know we have a lot of hispanics in Tampa. Seems to be a fairly close knit community since it seems like everyone knows each other. Some of the spanish churches here are doing tax prep seminars and "how to handle your money" seminars of course spoken in spanish. Don't know if you can do some cross-marketing there. | |
Fort Wayne CPA (talk|edits) said: | 27 April 2007 |
| So how did you advertising go in 2007?
Mike | |
| 29 April 2007 | |
| last year did 321 returns between 1/1 and 4/17. This year did 452 returns in the same period. Doesn't count extensions. 40% increase in business and income. | |
| 28 August 2007 | |
| Hello,
those of you who have used Frank Salman's practice development program would you share your experience. | |
Lmcdon9822 (talk|edits) said: | 8 September 2007 |
| Hello all:
I started my tax practice this past tax season in a strip mall, store front office. My advertising campaign started late (last week of Jan, begining Feb). I used an ad in the weekly free local community paper (about 16,000 homes and businesses) for 6 weeks totaling $240. I got 3 clients from that generating $495, no referals. I also used direct mail, sent to 1000 targeted individuals which resulted in 1 phone call, no business. That cost me about $600. I don't think I will use direct mail again. As for referals from previous clients, walkings and word of mouth, 11 clients, NO advertising cost!! I will advertise in the free weekly paper and just use direct mail post cards to send to my previous clients thanking them for their business and if they were satified with my service, please send referals. Happy Hunting... | |
| 9 September 2007 | |
| I came right out and asked my family, friends, and existing clients to refer me. The response was terrific! My preseason letter always includes $10 coupons for referrals. I've gotten some response from that. More response from calling and asking than sending postcards.
Wonder what would happen if you mailed out $10 referral coupons to targeted individuals? I'd get friendly with the other occupants of the strip mall if they seem likely to refer their customers. Try to get the neighboring store owners' tax business. Leave your business card with the tip at restaurants - I've picked up a bunch of business from doing that. Lots of teachers work part time at restaurants. Best of luck! | |
| 9 September 2007 | |
| LMCdon, your direct mail piece must be terrible. Have you read any of Dan Kennedy's books on how to write a good direct mail piece? You should have gotten a 1 to 2% response rate (calls to your office) from which it is your job to convert to appointments, then to convert the appointments into clients. What did your mail piece say? | |
Lmcdon9822 (talk|edits) said: | 10 September 2007 |
| Kevinh5 - I used a 4x6 template from www.directmail.com. On the front, it had blocks that toddlers use, spelling the word TAX...I placed words saying, "Do you know the ABC's of the TAX code..." On the back I had, "Using tax software just does not cut it sometimes. With constant changes in the tax code, you may miss valuable deductions. Let us help you keep what you deserve, your hard earned money!" Then 5 bullets stating 1)30 minute consultaion, 2) Multi-State filing, 3) Electronic Filing/Instant Refunds, 4) Review of 2005 taxes and 5) YEAR ROUND SERVICE! I offered to save $20 before April 1st and of course my contact information.
Any ideas how I can improve on this? Thanks! | |
Lmcdon9822 (talk|edits) said: | 10 September 2007 |
| Kevinh5 - I looked at Dan Kennedy's website. With product talks about direct mail? I was reading about Magnetic Marketing. Is that the one? | |
Jonathan57 (talk|edits) said: | 24 April 2008 |
| Victor1530 - I have experienced using the NCI system. Save yourself the $30k. Their value proposition is blatantly false. They say they will hire and train professional marketing staff. They hired bozos, and didn't train them. Then, they left me with a bunch of headaches and wouldn't refund any of the fee so I'm having to go after them. It's been an entirely negative experience and I hope you'll spare yourself from it despite their highly skilled (and dishonest) sales staff. | |
