Lessons From Marketing Failure: Tree Service Marketing

“Only a fool learns from his own mistakes. The wise man learns from the mistakes of others.” — Otto von Bismarck

Today’s case study is about how NOT to do marketing; Lessons from Marketing Failure. There are several image scans here, so it will be relevant and important for you to review all of them. They all pertain to the direct mail marketing of tree services (a.k.a. arborists, tree removal, or tree trimming).

Direct mail is a great way of marketing tree services, and of course, it isn’t wrong to go to a firm (a tree service marketing specialist) that purports to know something about your industry.

We’re going to look at these EDDM flat mailers we received and then talk about the good, the bad, and the ugly. Rarely is something all bad, and there are some overall positive things to say about the commercial EDDM mailers that we collected.

Good Marketing Point #1: We got these mailpieces, we saved them, and we’re all talking about them. Job# 1 of any mailing is to get the recipient to look at, and then if possible save, your mailer. Here, mission accomplished! (Although we saved all these for perhaps the wrong reasons.). Bottom Line: the mailers hit an intended target, and the recipient remembered.

Good Marketing Point #2: There’s an interesting attempt to personalize the marketing (albeit generically). This is an approach we like, and try to use often, although with images and not text/copy alone (note to self: I feel another case study percolating here).

Good Marketing Point #3: Generally speaking, these mailers are uncluttered and get to the point. There’s a good use of white space (intentionally or unintentionally) and it’s clear what the tree services are offering. Being clear and to the point IS the point because, in direct mail marketing, you are trying to purchase awareness in microseconds.

Now, let’s look at what went wrong with all this. I bet you can spot some issues, but there’s a whole mess of problems on unwrap here.

Marketing Problem Point #1: If you compare the Top-Notch Tree Care & Removal LLC flyer with the Lemus Tree Service LLC flyers and Tree Pros Arborist Services, they are all the SAME letters! Undoubtedly, they went to the same tree service marketing “expert” who sold them not just the same style letter, but the same letter! And, for two of these firms, we received the same letter within 6 months! At least the names and phone numbers were different, but assuredly, you wouldn’t want your marketing campaign and branding to look similar, let alone identical, to some other firms.

Marketing Problem Point #2: Tree Pros used the same letter twice. Yes, they did this year-over-year, and not in the same year, but we have an internal marketing rule to make repeated mailers “the same but different” when hitting the same locations. You run the risk of having someone throw out the second mailer because they likely think they already know what it says (seen it before) and might not be worth seeing it again. When we do send the same mailer (and we have done this for clients), we usually give at least a three-year break between cycles — we want the mailer to appear somewhat fresh upon arrival.

Marketing Problem Point #3: All these letters are the same style, the perceived personal letter style. It’s not wrong, but when everyone is engaging in the same marketing, it waters down the overall effectiveness for everyone. At Cornerstone, we do our best to “mix it up” with different mail piece colors, sizes, etc., but nobody asked the obvious question here: “who else regionally is using this format?” It is also important to note that we didn’t even save all the mailers we received over a couple of years (I regret now tossing all the Anderson Windows EDDM letters because they also looked the same)! We just started saving them because it became apparent, we were getting so many!

Marketing Problem Point #4: There are no websites listed, except for one of Marvin Osorio’s mailers; and there, it’s only in small print at the bottom. This is a huge marketing failure because you can get “free” Google traffic (hence, higher ranking) if you make your web address loud and clear on your mailer. If they want to know more (because you can only fit so much on a letter), you make the recipient have to work to find you and get more info. Going forward into 2025, this should have been “Marketing 101” to include a website (but not Facebook… I know, I know… another blog to do here).

Marketing Problem Point #5: This saturation mailing was sent to both commercial businesses and residential customers. We don’t recommend sending tree service flyers to businesses and prefer to maximize the value of the outreach to residential recipients only. Now, to be fair, the USPS could have made a mistake (or not cared), but given how many of these we received, we’re pretty sure that at least in some cases, there was no thought of a smaller more targeted outreach. At Cornerstone (info@crst.net), we almost always ask “Who do you want to call you?” If 95% of your tree service customers are residential, then you might be throwing your marketing dollars away by including commercial destinations. Simply, just make sure you ask first and not assume — there is oddly two types of EDDM saturation: (1) residential only and (2) residential and businesses.

Marketing Problem Point #6: Two of the 8 1/2″ x 11″ flyers – one for Top Notch and one for Lemus Tree Service – were likely printed on 70 lb. paper stock, which is the minimum acceptable thickness for folded self-mailer flyers, but is against DMM USPS standards for EDDM. The printer/mailer here, was of course, trying to save money, but the mailer jeopardized the clients mailing. Had a BMEU clerk examined the paper thickness (even without the use of a micrometer which none of them likely have), this would have resulted in a rejected mailing. As per USPS Domestic Mail Manual (DMM) Section 201 “Physical Standards for Commercial Letters, Flats, and Parcels”, Sub-Section 5.2.2 “Dimensions for USPS Marketing Mail Flats with Simplified Addresses“, the minimum paper thickness for Every Door Direct Mail (EDDM) printing is 0.007 inches which is also about the thickness of three sheets of printer paper. This might seem like we’re being persnickety here, but everything is fine until you get audited and your mailing gets rejected. If you don’t want your mailing held for quarantine, simply follow the rules. For people who self-mail, there is some forgiveness. Yet for said-industry specialists, there’s really no excuse.

Marketing Problem Point #7: You can’t see this, but one of the Osorio Tree Service Cards has the same letter on both sides (but with a postal permit on one of the sides, and even there, the return address in non-compliant with USPS DMM regulations for EDDM mail piece design). It’s not a fatal flaw, but it distracts the recipient and makes them curious for the wrong reasons. Again, you have only microseconds to deliver your message so don’t blow it with an odd approach where you haven’t put your best foot forward.

Marketing Problem Point# 8: Really, we’re not trying to pick on Mr. Osorio, because in a way, I liked his letter the best – he’s personal and sincere with his writing! However, he uses a long copy here when he ought to have used icons or images that represent what he does. Here, on the longer card (again both sides!), I dare say that few people read the letter. In an era of what Lord Maurice Saatchi called C.P.A. (Continuous Partial Attention) whereby marketing could be reduced down to a single word (think: America has “Freedom” and Volvo, in automotive marketing, owned “Safety”).

Marketing Problem Point# 9: None of these mail pieces showed images that captured the services that they were attempting to promote. This graphical loss again makes the recipient “work” because a long copy requires one to apperceive via a mental process rather than allowing for an immediate intuiting of what is presented. All of us, it could be said, are fatigued with promotional stuff, especially unexciting commercial services that may, or may not, be of immediate interest. We all have input from so many directions, vying for our attention (radio, smartphones, smartphone ads, Facebook, let alone regular life commitments), so having to read something non-essential because just that… non-essential.

Marketing Problem Point #10: In a residential upstate market like New Paltz or Kingston or Red Hook and Rhinebeck where housing prices are high, the tree companies might wish to stay clear of hitting many City Routes where there are many apartment dwellers and fewer homeowners. For marketing in city areas, Cornerstone usually recommends using homeowner data and not EDDM saturation so that we are reaching only the homeowners and not the renters. EDDM is often a “one size fits all” marketing tactic, and depending upon what you are marketing, that one size might not fit.

We’re left with a final question that even we could not answer… how did everyone, over just a few years end up using the same format? Well, we don’t know. We guess that there are niche marketing firms that must have been feeding their clients the same marketing approach, and for each tree service company, it must have looked good and tasted good.

Yet, as Otto von Bismarck also once said, “hounds follow those who feed them.” If you’re a tree service provider (or landscaper, contractor, or similar service professional), in the hunt for solid direct mail marketing advice, we’re not going to feed you the same thing that everyone else got. Please reach us at info@crst.net or call (845) 255-5722 and someone will call you back right away.