How I Plan to Grow my Paperly Business

If you were to ask me earlier this year about how I would grow my future business, I would have looked at you sideways!  I had no idea I would be selling Paperly products.  I stumbled onto Paperly because someone approached me about selling a different product line but I was not passionate about the product assortment.  It got me thinking, “What am I passionate about?”  One of the things I am very passionate about is staying in touch with people in a meaningful way.  I love to send birthday cards, thank you notes, anniversary cards, and handwritten notes of any kind.  On that same note, I also keep a personal blog, Facebook page, and chat via AOL Instant Messenger/Gmail Chat/Facebook constantly.  I feel like I do a pretty good job of staying in touch with the people in my life while putting my personal touch on everything.  I stumbled onto Paperly’s website during all of this soul searching and had a "light bulb moment"!  I already use 90% of the items Paperly sells and could easily find a use for the other 10%.  Getting set-up as a Paperly Consultant was very easy and quick.  Paperly’s staff was extremely helpful along the way.  So the next thing I knew I was a Paperly Consultant!

One of the things I spent some time thinking about was how to promote my new business venture.  I have a huge network of family and friends many states away and a medium sized network where I currently live and then a few smaller groups of people in other states.  How was I going to promote my business to my entire network, spread out across the U.S.?  The best way for me to do that is to really promote and push my Paperly online business.  I knew right away that I would be using the personal online website that Paperly offers.  Along with hosting parties, the website offers an alternative to the response, “I don’t have time to throw a party.”  You can now set-up Online Paperly Parties where the Hostess earns credit towards Paperly merchandise for every item sold at her Online Party.  How great is that!?

But I wanted to take that one step further and try to reach beyond my network.  I wanted to reach the masses and communicate my passion for staying connected.  I started a blog, www.SavvySentiment.com.  This blog will give tips, ideas, and product suggestions to help people stay connected and stand out.  Savvy Sentiment features a “Paperly Pick” item to correspond with the most recent blog post and has a “Shop Now” link to direct people to my Paperly website. I also set up a Facebook and Twitter pages for Savvy Sentiment to reach even further beyond my network.  In today’s world of social networking, the sky’s the limit when it comes to promotion of online sales.  I am excited to see where my blog and my Paperly business takes me!

AlanaK, Paperly Consultant (http://mypaperly.com/alana)

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Alana's current "Paperly Pick"

Paperly Promotions: The Good & The Bad

Save 25%!

Double your Hostess Rewards!

Starter Kits reduced to $149!

All of the above are examples of promotions Paperly either has offered in the past or could offer in the future.

Typically, Paperly offers such promotions once per month.  Some target customers who are interested in purchasing Paperly products: e.g. “save 25%” or “buy 2, get 1 free”.  Others target Hostesses who wish to maximize the free or discounted products they can earn: e.g. “double your Hostess Rewards” or “book a party at your current party and earn a $20 credit”.  And lastly, some target Consultants who either run, or wish to run a Paperly business: e.g. “Starter Kits reduced to $149” or “double the Paperly dollars you earn”.

Given that brief summary, most would say “Paperly promotions are good!”  But there are downsides to promotions.  First, promotions “train” customers, Hostesses and Consultants to “wait for a better deal”.  Like a bad drug, promotions are habit forming.  Plus, folks constantly expect better and better deals.  For example, a customer might say, “last year you gave 25% off, what are you going to do for me this year?”  To combat this behavior, Paperly purposely attempts to announce its promotions as late as reasonably possible, often just 7-14 days prior to the beginning of that promotion.  This purposeful tardiness lessens the likelihood of customers, Hostesses and Consultants delaying their actions while awaiting the next best thing.

A second negative is that Paperly’s promotions typically target only one constituent – either customers, Hostesses or Consultants – and the 2 remaining groups feel “left out”.  To be fair, Paperly tries to evenly rotate the promotions it offers.  However, certain promotions simply work better at certain times of the year.  For example, hosting a Paperly party in May can sometimes be challenging because the seasons are changing, schools are ending and sports leagues are in full gear.  Therefore, it may make sense for Paperly to offer a Hostess promotion in May.

All-in-all, Paperly will continue to offer monthly promotions, assuming it remains prudent, because we believe promotions are greatly appreciated by customers, Hostesses and Consultants.  Yet, Paperly also acknowledges that perhaps tomorrow, or some time far into the future, we may need to dampen the reliance on promotions.  Until then, I urge to take advantage of the promotions we offer… you never know when, or if it’ll come again.

Regards,

Jay Rudman, CEO * Co-Owner, Paperly

Ins and Outs of Stationery

Without question, Paperly is committed to delivering a quality product.  However, because Paperly’s brand is relatively unknown (even though we’ve been in the stationery business for 10+ years), I feel it’s important to spend a few minutes highlighting the “ins and outs” of Paperly’s stationery.

Paper Weight

·         To be honest, paper weight is more about “how it feels” than “cover weight, pounds, text weight or points”.  Suffice it to say, Paperly’s exclusively-designed stationery is the “right” weight: our flat notes are 80# and our folded notes are 60#.  (Folded notes need to be less weighty so the page can fold easily.)   Of course, memo sheets and notepads are thinner, since memo sheets are sold by the hundreds and notepad sheets by the dozens.

Printing

·         Paperly’s exclusive designs are printed using flat ink – i.e. think laser or digital printing.  Some of our outsourced products are printed with raised ink (called thermography) or are embossed.  Paperly carefully balances the cost/benefit of each print style to determine if it’s something that fits our product line.  For example, letterpress is beautiful, but expensive, and so we’ve decided it doesn’t fit our “social stationery” demographic.

Stationery Type

·         Paperly offers folded notes, flat notes (large and small), memo sheets, notepads, enclosure cards... well, you get the idea; there’s lot to choose from.  So how do you pick the “right” stationery?  Some say folded notes are for formal occasions.  Others say folded notes are best for kids because they provide extra room to write.  To be honest, we believe you pick the style you like best.  There’s no “right”, it’s simply what you love.

Personalization

·         Paperly is a BIG believer in personalization.  There’s something special about a product with your name on it.  A note with a generic “thank you” printed on it just isn’t the same as one with your name on it, especially when they’re priced similarly.  It doesn’t matter if you put your first name, your first & last name, your family’s name, your initials or your monogram – whatever works for you is perfectly fine with us, as long as it’s personalized.

As you can sense, I (and hence, Paperly) am passionate about stationery and proud of the products we offer.  In fact, I’m happy to mail loose samples to anyone interested in feeling the quality of our products firsthand.  Simply email your mailing address to info@paperly.com and we mail you a packet ASAP.  I’m confident you’ll LOVE what you receive.

Regards,

Jay Rudman, CEO * Co-Owner, Paperly

P.S. Since I’ve spent so much time discussing stationery, I wanted to at least mention the following.  One of the most common mistakes I see is misspelling the word “stationery”.  Stationery (with an “e”) is what Paperly offers.  Stationary (with an “a”) means not moving.