Joe Girard is listed in the “Guinness Book of World Records” as the “World’s Greatest Salesman.” He sold more cars than anyone in history.

One of the things he insisted on is mailing to his previous customers every single month. The dealership wouldn’t pay for it. But Girard knew the power of repeat and referral business, so he paid for the mailers out of his own pocket.

The tool he used was personalized greeting cards. Personal greeting cards tug at the heart. They are always appreciated by the receiver. But sadly, very few people use them. The reason? It takes lots of time to write, stuff, and stamp greeting cards. And Girard sent 16,000 cards every month! Every month, anyone who bought a car from Joe got a personalized greeting card. Obviously, to send that many cards each and every month, he had to have an entire staff stuffing, stamping, and sealing envelopes. There had to be a better way.

Enter the age of the Internet. Joe Girard discovered a powerful tool. And today, you can send full-color, printed greeting cards through the mail without ever having to touch the card. You can choose from thousands of cards and never have to walk into a card store. Someone else will do the stuffing, stamping, and sealing of the envelopes. It will take you about 60 seconds to send a personalized greeting card to a special client, a friend, or a referral source.

These are not e-mail greeting cards, but a card just like you would buy in a store. They are sent through the mail with a real stamp on them.

Here’s how it works:

Go online and get an account with a company specializing in this service (e.g. www.sendoutcards.com). Once you have your account, you can choose from thousands of cards. On the inside of the card you write a personal message; you can even upload any photo from your computer! Put in the name and address and send the card. The card company will print the card, stuff it, address it, stamp it and send it (with www.sendoutcards.com, if you have a distributor account, your cards are less than $1, including postage and printing, and you make money each time you enroll someone).

It gets better. You can upload a list of names and addresses and send the entire list a card. Let me give you some examples:

• Send a “Thank You” card to all of your clients who used your service last month.
• Send a card to all of those who referred your business last month.
• Send a card to those in your networking group.

It gets even better! You can insert a gift card (such as a Starbuck’s card); again, the card company does it for you.

And it gets even better! You can create a campaign of cards. For example, let’s say you want to have a way to stay in constant contact with people you meet at networking groups. You set up a card campaign. Perhaps the first card is “Nice to Meet You,” the second is “Let’s Get Together,” the third, “Thinking About You” and so on. Each time you drop a new contact into the system it automatically starts them off with the first card in that campaign. You can even create your own custom cards.

Happy marketing!