A CYBERMARKETER WITH a newfangled method for designing and marketing logos and the like is moving to make its mark.
MadeToOrder.com, in Redwood City, CA, opened its online doors last October, billing itself as a service for designing and procuring premium logo apparel, promotional items and business gifts. The firm (www. MadeToOrder.com) works through partnerships with suppliers. Its systems allow users to design and use logos and art more quickly and cheaply than conventional methods.
Just last month, the firm acquired Harwood Co., said to be one of the largest distributors in the field. The purchase will help MadeToOrder reach its goal of dominating the $20-billion-a-year industry, notes marketing vice president Maurice Voce.
The company has a sizable client base, including IBM, Pacific Bell, 3Com and Cisco, and a 40-person sales force trained in the premiums and incentives industry. Since its founding, it has been targeting these types of companies through direct response ads in trade magazines, newspapers and national business publications like The New York Times, the Los Angeles Times and The Wall Street Journal.
Late last year, MadeToOrder sent 100,000 “traffic-generating” catalogs to a portion of this market and racked up some 500 orders, says Voce. The catalogs prominently featured the site’s URL, plus a toll-free number for customer service.
In addition, the company is engaging in co-marketing deals with related Web sites like Marketing Central and others.
Later this year, it will aim at smaller prospects through DM campaigns and sales calls.
>From all these various efforts, MadeToOrder hopes to pull in more than $17 >million, or as much revenue as any company ranked among the top-10 >advertising specialty companies.
On the site, users can select business gifts, pens, mugs, incentives, awards and clothing – initial clothing suppliers include Hanes and Champion. They can also review their accounts and order status.
MadeToOrder’s online method allows customers to procure, store and work with the materials they want for their own logos through features incorporated on the site. This, notes Voce, saves companies the time and money involved when rounding up material suppliers and artists via telephone and fax.
“The cost of a $2 coffee mug emblazoned with a company logo is [about] $9 when you take into account all the phone calls you have to make to line up suppliers, decorators and others,” says Voce. “If we can, we’d like to halve that cost.”
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