Today we’d like to introduce you to Sharon Grimm.
Sharon, please share your story with us. How did you get to where you are today?
My journey started with a problem. It was about eight years ago, and I was getting ready to send out Christmas cards when my printer making the labels jammed. I send out a lot of cards, and I was doing them the old-fashioned way: designing & ordering online, crafting the mommy brag letter, stuffing the envelopes and printing the labels. My husband Cliff was screaming in the next room that next year we either weren’t doing cards, or we were going to address them by hand. Neither was an option in my mind.
Thankfully, I came across two angels, who showed me SendOutCards. When I heard: “Send Out Cards, prints it, stuffs it, stamps it, mails it …I was sold. I LOVED the idea of getting my holiday cards faster and easier.
I thought SendOutCards was great not only for sending out holiday cards, and also great for marketing, which I was doing for a living. The SendOutCards concept was an inspired one, I thought: You go online, choose from 17,000 different cards, decide on the look you want, the message, which you can write, and you can personalize them with a picture or pictures you choose, and then add your name, or, if you have a business, your business name, logo and contact information. You choose exactly what you want online, and SendOutCards mails them for you. All you must do is interact with the SendOutCards website or app. No printers and labels, no hand-written messages, no stuffing envelopes, and no going to the post office. You can even choose a gift from the website, like brownies, cookies, or other items, that will go out with your card.
My 18-hour yearly Christmas card extravaganza turned into less than two hours.
Eight months later, when my employer at the time announced she was selling her practice and that I would need to find employment elsewhere, I knew I wanted to get paid to connect people as I had been her PR person and I really enjoyed marketing via networking. Network marketing was the industry for me. I researched various companies and SendOutCards came to the top of the list as the product is one-fifth the cost of the competition and has both a business and personal use. That’s when I decided to upgrade from a customer to a distributor and I started my SendOutCards business in November of 2011. I was thrilled to be in a business that I could grow and have a flexible schedule to be able to be with family members, travel on my own terms and still do business, because this is a mobile business.
Today, I’m an Executive Distributor in the organization, and I’m helping my clients make sale after sale through the effective outreach SendOutCards.
Has it been a smooth road?
Going from a full time stay-at-home mom to doing some marketing work on the side to becoming a SendOutCards distributor with a successful business certainly did present challenges. I wanted a business that was flexible for a family lifestyle and one that was mobile. I learned to do things I had never done before. I had no choice, really. To be successful, I had to meet a series of challenges head-on.
Shortly after I joined the organization, I signed up to go to their annual convention in Las Vegas by myself. I didn’t have a team at the convention, and I’d never flown on a plane by myself before. I flew to the convention and after I checked in to the hotel, I visited the poolside hot-tub. That’s where I met Anneliese, who is part of a large top Canadian team in the organization and aligned myself with her at the convention. Next year my first distributor, Carol Ward, came on board and she’s been my key business partner as we work our businesses together side by side supporting each other. Suddenly, we were making great connections with top leaders that really helped our business flourish.
I’ve had a lot of challenges along the way, each of which have helped me grow, learn, and build my business. For example, SendOutCards came out with an app so you could use the service from your phone. I had never even had used an app before, but I learned how to download it and use it, so I can do SendOutCards from anywhere now – at home, in a coffee shop, even from a mountaintop, if I wanted to.
I’ve also learned, from that Las Vegas convention, to align myself with the leaders in the business. Because of that, it’s been full speed ahead as my team grew and especially with my team mate Carol Ward! So important to have a partner to share and grow together plus align yourself with leaders to grow with. Carol and I have grown New England together and it’s been a total blast. A short time ago, I became an Executive at SendOutCards, one of the leadership positions in the organization, and we are putting together amazing networking events for SendOutCards, using our networking ability to enlist top-flight headliners. A featured speaker at a recent event was Ivan Misner, the founder of BNI, the largest networking group in the world. Close to 200 people attended!
We’d love to hear more about your business.
SendOutCards are greeting cards, for personal or marketing purposes, that you can personalize and have mailed out, very easily, by going online, either through your computer, tablet, or phone. They’re inexpensive, you can make each one unique, and they really do help drive sales for your business. There are 17,000 designs to choose from, 400 gifts you can include with them, you can personalize your message or choose one already written, and you can add photos. Many of my clients use them to follow up after an initial sales meeting, or as an appreciation marketing tool.
They cost about $1.17 each, plus postage and tax, which is about one-fifth the price of a greeting card bought in a store, and they really do work.
I have a client who took a “gratitude challenge” and sent out two cards a day. She added a gift of brownies to the card from time to time, and she kept on doing that afterwards, spending about $250 total. That $250 investment landed her two new $10,000 clients, for a total of $20,000 in new business.
The great thing about them is that because they are sent through the mail, and often as a package, if you send a gift, you get almost a 100-percent open rate. By comparison, the open rate for emails is about 10 percent. Another unique quality to this business is that others can join your team. I got lucky with my first distributor, Carol Ward! She has strengths that I don’t have. Her lack of fear about technology is a big one. We are meeting some many amazing and talented folks which is fulfilling our passions to help all that cross our paths. Together we have more than 70 team members across the United States and Canada. We travel together to events, learn and challenge ourselves to grow and be successful. Our spouses have even started to help at events, which is fun! We just completed our fourth major networking event and have two more in the works for this year! Our CEO and founder, Kody Bateman, has promised to come out for his signature Relationship Marketing workshop. It will be the first of its kind in New England! We are super excited!
Is our city a good place to do what you do?
Yes, I believe Boston and the Metro West area have tremendous amounts of opportunity in my line of business. I know personally there is opportunity for SendOutCards distributors and a need for those in business in our area to use our service as a unique appreciation marketing tool that will help them stand out from their competitors.
Pricing:
- The cost starts at less than $2 a card, including postage and card. The price varies depending on what plan you are on. I always offer free demos, which include sending a free card on the system and going over pricing. I do this virtually or in person.
Contact Info:
- Address: Sharon Grimm
978-618-2479 (cell)
card.lady.shar@gmail.com - Website: www.sendoutcards.com/sharongrimm
- Phone: www.facebook.com/SharinCards
- Email: https://www.linkedin.com/in/sharongrimm
Image Credit:
Janet Cathcart for the two in the coffeeshop. For the one with the presentation.
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