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Selling Your Products Through Catalogs

When it comes to putting great ideas on paper — and innovative products in customers' hands — few things are as effective as mail-order marketing. Catalog companies, including big guns such as SkyMall, Spiegel and Sharper Image, represent a $75 billion market, and enterprising small-business owners are ideally positioned to win a piece of it. The keys to successful catalog sales are:

Perfect products
Extended exposure
Reliable relationships

Choose a catalog-worthy product

The best products for catalog sale are those that are unique, photograph well, have a year-round market and can be easily shipped.
Selling by Mail Order" for an extensive checklist of what makes up the ideal mail-order product.

Price your product

When pricing your merchandise, be sure to account for the advertising, freight and photography costs that some catalogs might ask you to pay. Consider offering discounts, too, for high-volume purchases.

Promote your product

Get noticed by making news with your new product. Display at trade shows and send out press releases in order to generate buzz around your merchandise.

Find — and pitch to — a catalog

Contact buyers at selected catalogs and send them a written proposal that includes pricing, pictures and a detailed product description.

Make a deal

Once you've secured interest in your product from a buyer, negotiate a deal to include it in his or her next catalog. Make sure your lawyer looks over any contracts you're asked to sign.

Protect your bottom line

Catalogs often withhold payment until many months after placing their order. Consider offering a small discount to clients who issue prompt payment — the slight loss in profits might be worth the huge gain in speed.

Some companies charge for product placement; catalog-based advertising will cost you, but generally results in greater returns, too.
Make sure you can produce enough supply to meet demand; catalogs typically order only 25 percent initially of what they plan to sell.
Be sure to give customers a toll-free number they can call with questions or problems, along with instructions for returning faulty merchandise to you.
You may be asked to pay a small percentage of a catalog's printing costs; offer to pay with free goods — a larger order than was made — instead.

Tips & Advice for Catalog and Mail Order Retailers

If you want to open a retail business without having to worry about the hassles of brick-and-mortar-stores, consider mail-order marketing. Catalog and mail order retailers can provide consumers with a tremendous variety of products. The biggest advantage of choosing to sell in the non-store retail industry is that you will not have money going toward rental space for a store location or toward sales workforce salaries.
Owning and operating a mail order business does not mean that you must keep a warehouse fully stocked with all types of merchandise from your catalogs, ready to be shipped as it is ordered by customers. In fact, you really do not need to have any inventory at all. Instead, you can develop relationships with reputable drop ship companies. Drop ship companies can fulfill the orders that are placed by your customers. Depending upon the drop ship company, you may need to pay a shipping fee per item or a percentage of the cost of the items ordered. But, you can build these costs into your pricing for the merchandise.
Would you like to learn more about catalog and mail order retailers and how to go about entering the non-store retail industry, click on the links on the left. Compiled by Business.com, these links will provide you with valuable information regarding starting your own mail-order marketing business.

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Resources for Catalog and Mail Order Retailers