Archive for July, 2008

The advertisements seem monotonous to the men who read them all. A complete story is always the same. But one must consider that the average reader is only once a reader, probably. And what you fail to tell him in that ad is something he may never know.

Some advertisers go so far as to never change their ads. Single mail order ads often run year after year without diminishing returns. So with some general ads.

They are perfected ads, embodying in the best way known all that one has to say. Advertisers do not expect a second reading. Their constant returns come from getting new readers.

In every ad consider only new customers. People using your product are not going to read your ads. They have already read and decided. You might advertise month after month to present users that the product they use is poison, and they would never know it.

So never waste one line of your space to say something to present users, unless you can say it in your headlines. Bear in mind always that you can address an unconverted prospect.

Any reader of your ad is interested, else he would not be a reader. You are dealing with someone willing to listen. Then do your level best. That reader, if you lose him now, may never again be a reader.

You are like a salesman in a busy mans office. He may have tried again and again to get entree. He may never be admitted again. This is his one chance to get action, and he must employ it to the full.

This brings up the question of brevity. The most common expression you hear about advertising is that people will not read much. Yet a vast amount of the best paying advertising shows that people do read much. Then they write for a book, perhaps – for added information.

There is a fixed rule on this subject of brevity. One sentence may tell a complete story on a line like chewing gum. It may on an article like Cream of Wheat. But, whether long or short, an advertising story should be reasonably complete.

Whatever claim you use to gain attention, the advertisement should tell a story reasonably complete. If you watch returns, you will find that certain claims appeal far more than others.

But in usual lines a number of claims appeal to a large percentage. Then present those claims in every ad for their effect on that percentage.

Some advertisers, for sake of brevity, present one claim at a time. Or they write a serial ad, continued in another issue. There is no greater folly. Those serials almost never connect.

When you once get a persons attention, then is the time to accomplish all you can ever hope with him. Bring all your good arguments to bear. Cover every phase of your subject. One fact appeals to some, one to another. Omit any one and a certain percentage will lose the fact which might convince.

People are not apt to read successive advertisements on any single line. No more than you read a news item twice, or a story. In one reading of an advertisement one decides for or against a proposition. And that operates against a second reading. So present to the reader, when once you get him, every important claim you have.

The best advertisers do that. They learn their appealing claims by tests – by comparing results from various headlines. Gradually they accumulate a list of claims important enough to use. All those claims appear in every ad thereafter.

At one time in the automobile business there was a general impression that profits were excessive.

One well-advised advertiser came out with this statement, “Our profit is 9 percent.”

Then he cited actual costs on the hidden costs of a $1,500 car.

They amounted to $735, without including anything one could easily see. This advertiser made a great success along those lines at that time.

Shaving soaps have long been advertised “Abundant lather,” “Does not dry on the face,” “Acts quickly,” etc. One advertiser had as good a chance as the other to impress those claims. Then a new maker came into the field. It was a tremendously difficult field, for every customer had to taken from someone else. He stated specific facts.

He said, “Softens the beard in one minute.” “Maintains its creamy fullness for tens minutes on the face.” “The final result of testing and comparing 130 formulas.” Perhaps never in advertising has there been a quicker and greater success in an equally difficult field.

Makers of safety razors have long advertised quick shaves. One maker advertised a 78-second shave. That was definite. It indicated actual tests. That man at once made a sensational advance in his sales.

In the old days all beers were advertised as “Pure.”

The claim made no impression.

The bigger the type used, the bigger the folly. After millions had been spent to impress a platitude, one brewer pictured a plate glass where beer was cooled in filtered air.

He pictured a filter of white wood pulp through which every drop was cleared. He told how bottles were washed four times by machinery. How he went down 4,000 feet for pure water. How 1,018 experiments had been made to attain years to give beer that matchless flavor. And how all the yeast was forever made from that adopted mother cell.

All claims were such as any brewer might have made. They were mere essentials in ordinary brewing. But he was the first to tell the people about them, while others cried merely “pure beer.” He made the greatest success that was ever made in beer advertising. “Used the world over” is a very elastic claim.

Then one advertiser said, “Used by the peoples of 52 nations,” and many others followed.

One statement may take as much room as another, yet a definite statement may be many times as effective.

The difference is vast. If a claim is worth making, make it in the most impressive way. All these effects must be studied. Salesmanship-in-print is very expensive. A salesman’s loose talk matters little. But when you are talking to millions at enormous cost, the weight of your claims is important.

No generality has any weight whatever. It is like saying “How do you do?” When you have no intention of inquiring about ones health. But specific claims when made in print are taken at their value.