I outlined how you gain a hidden gold mine when you acquire a customer with long-term buying potential. The way you mine (look for gold, that is) the book and magazine industry - is that you match your pms/a (photo marketing strength area[s]) with buyers who need photos in those specific areas.
Finding those buyers (gold nuggets), however, is not simple. You will find yourself spending time going down the wrong paths. You will also spend a lot of money, unless you teach yourself how much (and no more) that you afford to spend to acquire a new photobuyer customer. Gauging the long term net worth to you of a photobuyer will figure in the arithmetic you use to determine how much you can spend to mine the book and magazine industry for customers.
A direct mail package is one of the best methods to acquire new photobuyers. Make certain you are delivering a professional-looking package. For example, deliver your sell-sheets and other information about yourself in a white mailer, not manila, kraft or brown. 
Once you have made several mailings to potential buyers, figure your response rate by dividing the "scores" by the total mailing count. If for example you mailed 100 pieces and got one positive response, your response rate is 1%.
This may at first seem gloomy, but in our stock photography industry, you can expect that one new customer to stay with you an average of 10 years. Here's where the gold mine comes in.
By including the long-term value of that one customer, whether it be one to two thousand dollars over a 10-year period for a low-budget buyer, or $30,000 to 50,000 for a high-end market, you can figure that the cost of not scoring on 99%, will be compensated by the 1% of customers who do come aboard.
INSURANCE AGAINST BAD DECISIONS
Your response rate may be 2%, 3% or .05%. When you get your average response rate, balance the cost of your mailings against a conservative estimate of the total net worth of each customer you pull in from those mailings. You'll find you can more closely determine how much you can plan to invest in direct mail campaigns for new customers.
Awareness of the long-term net worth to you of your customers provides insurance against making bad business decisions.
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