Wide Format Imaging

I started writing last month about how an open house can help you build your business, and one of the key points was that a successful open house will develop through four stages: the planning stage, the invitation stage, the big day itself, and the follow-up stage.

One of the first key issues in the planning stage is to determine a budget.

How Much?

There's no "standard" on how much you should budget for an open house, but I would suggest this as a starting point?an amount equal to one day's average billings over your previous year. For example, if you billed $1,000,000 in 2005 over 253 billing days, your budget starting point would be approximately $4000. Now, I'm not saying that you have to spend $4000, or that you can't spend more. I'm just trying to suggest a reasonable starting point.

I'm also suggesting that part of your objective is an acceptable return on investment, and with any marketing investment, I want to see something in the 5:1 or better range. That means that in order to consider this open house a success, a $4000 investment needs to produce a minimum of $20,000 in new business (defined as business from new customers or new business from old customers who were influenced by the event?or in other words, orders you wouldn't have gotten except for something a customer or prospect heard/saw/learned at your open house.)

Planning Considerations

Here are some other things to consider in the planning stage. Let's say that one of your objectives is to get 100 customers and/or prospects to attend. How many people will you have to invite in order to get 100 to come? If you do it right, it might be reasonable to expect 25 percent of the customers you invite, and 10 percent of the prospects you invite to actually show up. So if you're looking for a mix of, say, 80 customers and 20 prospects, we're talking about a total of 520 invitations. (80 customers at 25 percent means 320 invitations, and 20 prospects at 10 percent means 200 more.)

What do I mean by doing it right? I mean a multi-pronged invitation strategy, starting with a nice invitation card sent through the mail, but then followed up on by phone, fax, e-mail and/or face-to-face contact! If all you do is mail out a single invitation, I'm pretty sure you'll be disappointed with the response!

By the way, let's note that we've just spent some of your budget. If we assume $60 for paper and envelopes, and first class postage on 520 invitations, that adds up to about $250 for the invitation stage alone.

Next Month: More on the "major expense" considerations of your open house.

David M. Fellman is the president of David Fellman & Associates, Cary, NC, a sales and marketing consulting firm serving numerous segments of the graphic arts industry. Contact him at 919-363-4068 or visit his website at www.davefellman.com.