This another phase of advertising which all of
us have to consider. It enters, or should enter, into all campaigns. Every
business man receives a large number of circular letters. Most of them go direct
to the waste basket. But he acts on others, and others are filed for reference.
Analyze those letters. The ones you act on or the ones you keep have a
headline which attracted your interest. At a glance they offer something that
you want, something you may wish to know.
Remember that point in all advertising
. A certain buyer spends $50,000,000 per year. Every letter, every circular
which comes to his desk gets its deserved attention. He wants information on the
lines he buys.
But we have often watched him. In one minute a score of letters may drop into
the waste basket. Then one is laid aside. That is something to consider at once.
Another is field under the heading "Varnish." And later when he buys varnish
that letter will turn up.
That buyer won several prizes by articles on good buying. His articles were
based on information. Yet the great masses of matter which came to him never got
more than a glance.
The same principles apply to all advertising. Letter writers overlook them
just as advertisers do. They fail to get the right attention. They fail to tell
what buyers wish to know.
One magazine sends out millions of letters annually. Some to get
subscriptions, some to sell books. Before the publisher sends out five million
letters he puts a few thousands to test. He may try twenty-five letters, each
with a thousand prospects. He learns what results will cost. Perhaps the plan is
abandoned because it appears unprofitable. If not, the letter which pays best is
the letter that he uses.
Just as men are doing now in all scientific advertising.
Mail order advertisers do likewise. They test their letters as they test
their ads. A general letter is never used until it proves itself best among many
actual returns.
Letter writing has much to do with advertising. Letters to inquirers,
follow-up letters. Wherever possible they should be tested. Where that is not
possible, they should be based on knowledge gained by tests.
We find the same difference in letters as in ads. Some get action, some do
not. Some complete a sale, some forfeit the impression gained. These are
letters, going usually to half-made converts, that are tremendously important.
Experience generally shows that a two-cent letter gets no more attention than
a one-cent letter. Fine stationery no more than poor stationery. The whole
appeal lies in the matter.
A letter which goes to an inquirer is like a salesman going to an interested
prospect. You know what created that interest. Then follow it up along that
line, not on some different argument. Complete the impression already created.
Don't undertake another guess.
Do something if possible to get immediate action. Offer some inducement for
it. Or tell what delay may cost. Note how many successful selling letters place
a limit on an offer. It expires on a certain date. That is all done to get
prompt decision, to overcome the tendency to delay.
A mail order advertiser offered a catalog. The inquirer might send for three
or four similar catalogs. He had that competition in making a sale.
So he wrote a letter when he sent his catalog, and enclosed a personal card.
He said, "You are a new customer, and we want to make you welcome. So when you
send your order please enclose this card. The writer wants to see that you get a
gift with order - something you can keep."
With an old customer he gave some other reason for the gift. The offer
aroused curiosity. It gave preference to his catalog. Without some compelling
reason for ordering elsewhere, the woman sent the order to him. The gift paid
for itself several times over by bringing larger sales per catalog.
The ways for getting action are many. Rarely can one way be applied to two
lines. But the principles are universal. Strike while the iron is hot. Get a
decision then. Have it followed by prompt action when you can.
You can afford to pay for prompt action rather than lose by delay. One
advertiser induced hundreds of thousands of women to buy six packages of his
product and send him the trademarks, to secure a premium offer good only for one
week.
Table of Contents
Chapter Twenty