Marketing Collateral is anything used within a sales cycle to turn potential customers into paying customers. This differs from advertising which attempts to draw in people to a business and have them become potential customers.
Marketing collateral is important because it provides more detailed information about your business and what it provides—it’s product line, what sets your business apart from its competitors, why using a specific industry is important.
The most popular pieces of marketing collateral that you can use are business cards, brochures, and websites. Business cards provide your potential customers with a point of contact and information about how to reach your company and a little bit about what type of work it does.
A website is usually the first place your potential customer will look for information about you company. It needs to encompass the major details of what your company can offer including detailed information on products, examples of work, and reasons to hire you. If appropriate for the industry, pricing information can also be included.
Your brochure needs to be a printed version of your website. It has to include all the same information that your website includes, but in a condensed format that can be encapsulated into an 8.5 in by 11 in piece of paper.
Also fairly popular pieces are postcards and rack cards. Postcards are great because they can do double duty as both a customer recruitment tool and a conversion tool to turn your potential customers into paying customers.
A rack card is piece that is a hybrid between a postcard and a brochure. It is sized like a brochure, but is flat and two sided like a postcard. They fit in the standard brochure racks, but are a condensed version of your company’s message.
All of these pieces are ultimately first impressions of your company. They need to be visually attractive, unique looking pieces. Your marketing pieces need to tell people what your company does and provide a reason for a potential customer to hire you!