Send out 'Teasers'

A teaser can be a great way to get people interested in your site before it exists. This can help to achieve advanced mindshare, and even get people to bookmark your site before it has any information. Many companies do this all the time for other purposes ("On August 4th, the way you view widgets will change forever—stay tuned"), and the WWW can be well served by such an application.

It is often the case with this type of publicity that the less you say, the better—thus the name "teaser." It's not teasing if you give full details on what it is you are planning. You're goal is to pique people's curiosity. It's best to use a permanent medium (print, direct mail, or distributed digital) for your teasers, as they can be kept by the individual for later reference. Here are some suggested steps and a sample teaser.
 

1. Make a schedule.
   Teasing will rely largely on timing. You will want to nail down the exact date you will be putting your site online and work backwards from there. Therefore, you will need to set an absolute deadline for being up and running, and stick to it come hell or high water.

   Your direct mail piece should be scheduled for delivery within a window of time that is not too early (so as to keep it fresh), and not too late (where it will lose its effectiveness). In direct mail, you are lucky if you can expect a delivery window of one week. Generally, the lower the cost, the bigger the window. (If you are placing teaser ads in magazines, you will know the exact release date—but you'll often have to nail down your Web publishing date months ahead of time.) A window between one and two weeks prior to posting your site should be just about right.

   
   
    
2. Prepare a pre-site.
   Since you will be giving your site address, you want to have something up that will reinforce the tease. Never, NEVER say "under construction." This is the sure sign of an amateur, and will give the impression that you haven't got it quite together.

   What you want to put on your site is something that mirrors your direct mail piece (we'll be using a postcard as an example), and possibly gives just a crumb more information. This site will also serve to tease surfers that pass by, without their ever having seen the DM (direct mail) piece. You also want to remind and encourage people to bookmark the site, so that they will have it at hand when the day of reckoning arrives.
   
    

3. Prepare your DM piece.
   Since we have little to say, a postcard suits our purposes just fine. We'll assume that we have a list of clients and prospects that we want to work off of (though we could also purchase a list from a list broker). So, now all we need to do is design it.

   You will probably want to work with a professional designer when developing your piece, since its quality will have a direct effect on the tease. Remember, less is more in this case—all you want on the postcard is the URL, the release date, and perhaps a little teaser copy—don't try to combine the teaser with another promotion to save a few bucks.
   
    

4. Ship it out.
   Remember your timing, and ship out your piece for delivery during your specified window. Also remember to make sure that there will be something for the viewers to see before the specified date.

   Be prepared to fend off some phone calls and e-mail. Even in our most cryptic teasers, a few people have put together the puzzle and have called us (or our clients) to see what was going on. Be vigilant, be vague, and continue to tease. Just don't let the cat out of the bag.