What next after you've used direct mail, newspaper ads and Yellow Pages advertising?

Now it depends on what type of product you're offering.

First off those aren't the only channels that I would consider viable for most businesses. Have you looked at Facebook PPC(I love that you can choose your exact demographic to target), Google PPC, MSN adcenter? How about radio ads? Radio seems to be gaining steam as a pretty cost effective market if you can get the right ad at the right price in the right demographic.

Then I would try to reactivate any old customers. Can I get them to buy again? Can I get referrals from them? How can I monetize that list? Can I JV and offer something else to my customers that I don't provide but I can get a cut if someone else does?

I'd look at trying to put some sort of continuity program in place? Does there exist a way to make that happen?

I would try to find out why they didn't buy. Who did they do business with if not me? And what is different about what they do that I don't do. I'd try to identify when they fell out and they were more likely NOT to do business with me than to take action and do business. I would then try to JV and sell those leads to a competitor for a cut. Alternatively you can do the same thing for your competitors. Just JV with them. Hey Edwin, if most of your guys don't do business with you after two weeks, why not pass them on to me, and I'll give you 50% of the profit that I make, and we both win. If they've contacted me already I'll let you know within 24 hours of when and how they contacted me so we're really clear. I made a ton of money in one of my B&M businesses by being the one competitor who was willing to work with all of my competitors. I took a ton of overflow this way. Everyone else makes it so adversarial, I chose a different tactic. I made a 100% sure that I acted with integrity and never poached any of my competitors customers.

I would look at every aspect of the funnel and see where it can be improved. One way that we've made radical changes is in paying very detailed attention to the approach. What does it look like when a company is first starting to do business with me? Especially the first line of contact on the phone. You need to meld every "touch" with your business so that it is designed precisely to suck the customer deeper into the funnel. That might mean getting rid of Battle Bertha and replacing her with Helpful Upbeat Jane.

I'd look further into the funnel. Are there any steps missing? Where am I missing steps? Can I implement a tripwire if that works in the business. Can I add other steps, telemarketing, personalized postcards, and voice broadcasts have been very effective for me. Can I put them in the funnel somewhere? How are my referral programs organized? What am I implementing to get repeat business and increase referrals?

What can I do to increase the purchase size of my average customer? Can I do upsells, crosssells, continuity programs, 2 for 1's. etc. What is the average order size in my industry and am I in the top 20%? If not, why?

What about geographically? How difficult would it be to take my system to the next county over and recreate it there? Speaking of that, if my systems are maxed out how can I sell that system to other locations that aren't in competition with me and get a fee or a cut of what they are doing?

I would look to see who upstream or downstream I can JV with. Are there other people doing business with my customers that I can get access to? Can I rent a list from them? What would it take to do an endorsed mailing? Can we package our stuff with their stuff somehow? This one is huge, and can make a massive impact on the bottom line if you really take action.

Can I partner with other advertisers to lower the cost for all? I love Bob Ross' EDDM stuff. How can I fit that in my marketing? What other forms of advertising are other people spending big money on that I can ride the coattails on?

What alternative forms of advertising can I use? Can I rent window space in a radius around my business? What would that cost?

How can I expand what I offer? Let me talk to my customers that are already doing business with me and try to find out what other things they need that they wished I would provide. How difficult would it be to expand my lines of business? And if I can't provide it, can I JV with people who can?

What about my channels? Am I selling to all of the channels that work for my industry? Can I sell on Craigslist, or ebay, or Amazon or Alibaba? Am I looking at the way I sell too narrowly? How can I sell differently than the way I'm selling now?

Here in my state, they have listings of all of the NAIC codes, and they list the top 50 in my state. I'd call the top companies up and find out what they are doing differently that I'm not doing. I'd try to find all of the biggest companies in my niche and try to interview them to see if I'm missing something.

On that note, I'd do research in other geographic markets. What are other people in my field in other markets doing that I haven't tried. If they have an ad up that is being run month after month can I mock that? What can I learn from similar markets to mine, do they have ads that seem to be effective and what can I poach from them?

What about creating a second company that solves the problem that the main business is not. For instance there are customers that don't want to pay me what I'm worth for my SEO/websites whatever. Normally they are just lost. What if I created a second company that serviced the cheapo clients. That way I still end up making some money. But it's in a second company that I am barely involved with.

Anyway those are some of my thoughts.