(Reading time: 5 – 8 minutes)
NOW, let us be frank!
Let us look at this subject of Advertising squarely, and dissect it. Let us discard all prejudice or predilection, and accept only Evidence, in our final investigation.
Let us cut out sentiment, precedent, and “Popular Opinion,” and treat the subject as though we had never heard of it before and “came from Missouri.” If, for instance, we had a load of Hay to sell how would we attempt to sell it?
Would we show our customers the Daisies that grew in it, ask them to note the Style of the loading, the fine pair of horses that draw it, and the Vandyke or Otherwise beard of the Driver?
Would we tell him this is the same kind of Hay as was raked by “Maud Muller on a Summer’s day” in Whittier’s poem?
Guess not! – eh?
We’d tell him of the nutritious qualities that particular load of Hay possessed, for the feeding of horses, and then we’d name the price delivered, show why the hay was worth it, and let it go at that.
Now, if our customer lived at a distance, and we must sell him the Hay by letter, how would we proceed?
Quote “Maud Muller” to him – then refer to the Daisies, the Horses, the Beard? No, sir – not for a moment! We would confine ourselves carefully to the feeding qualities of our Hay, and to the advantages of buying while the price was right.
But, suppose we had five hundred loads of this Hay to sell, instead of one load, and did not know just where to write to in order to sell it.
That’s when we’d Advertise! But does the fact of our going into Print mean that we must go into Literature, Art, or Clever conceits in space-filling too, in order to sell our Hay through Advertising?
Are we not still trying to sell just Horsefeed? How can we expect the picture of “Maud Muller on a Summer’s Day” to help us close a deal with an unpoetical party who has Horses to Feed, and who must do it economically?
The Horse owner knows good Hay when he sees it, and he will know it from description almost as well as from sight.
When he needs good Hay then the most interesting thing we can tell him is a description of the Hay is a description of the Hay we have to sell, and why it is good, and why it is worth the price. No amount of Maud Muller picture, or “Association of Ideas” will sell him Hay so surely and quickly as plain Hay-talk and Horse-sense.
But the Advertiser will be told that “in order for an Advertisement to sell goods it must first be seen and read!” He will also be told that “in the mass of reading matter surrounding your Advertisement your Space must be made more ‘attractive’ than the rest, in order to be seen and read by the largest possible number.”
Now, at first sight this line of talk looks logical enough, but how does it dissect? Suppose you have a pretty Maud Muller advertisement about your Hay, with a fancy border or Daisies all around it, and a delicate vignette of “the Judge looked back as he climbed the hill!”
You would certainly attract the attention of many more Readers with that advt. than with the bald caption of “Hay delivered, at $8.00 a ton” But, the man who wants Hay is the only party you can get back the cost of your advertising from, and you can interest him more intensely with the Hay caption than with all the “Maud Muller” kind of advts. in the publication field.
And, you can afford to lose the “attention” of 400,000 Readers who have no use for Hay. If you can clinch sales for your fine hundred loads with the few people who do need it. Observe that it is not necessary to “attract the attention” of every Reader in a 430,000 circulation, in order to sell 500 loads of Hay.
But it is vitally necessary that you convince at least five hundred probable Purchasers that you have the kind of Hay they need, at the price they can afford to pay for it.
If an advertisement, in a circulation of 430,000 costs $60 and we have a profit of $1.00 per load on Hay, we need only sell one load each to sixty people in order to pay expenses.
But, if we “attract the attention” of 80,000 people by our advertisement, and sell only thirty loads of Hay to them, we would then be out $30, and must credit the balance of our Advertising investment to “General Publicity” – to “Keeping-the-Name-before-the-People” – etc., in the vague hope that some other day these people may perhaps buy Hay from us, if we then have it to sell.
That mistaken idea of “Attracting the Attention of the greatest number, for a given price,” is what costs fortunes to Advertisers annually.
The striving to “Attract Attention” instead of striving to positively Sell Goods is the basis of all Advertising misunderstanding.
So long as “Attracting Attention” remains the aim of Advertisers, so long will the process of attracting it remain in the hands of Advertising Men who affect the Literary and Artistic attitude, rather than the plain, logical, convincing attitude of the Reason-Why Salesman-on-Paper. And, great are the Advertising Writers’ temptations to use “Attractive” copy at the expense of Convincing copy. Because, great is the temptation to be considered “smart,” “bright,” “catchy,” “Literary,” “artistic,” “dignified,” “High-grade,” etc.
There is popular applause for the Writer of catchy “General Publicity,” which “attracts attention” even though it does not sell goods. But, there is no applause for the Writer of prosaic Salesmanship-on-Paper which is forceful enough, and convincing enough to actually sell goods in volume. This is one reason-why “Catchy” Advertising is so current, and true Reason-Why Salesmanship-in-Type so rare.
Another reason is the far greater cost to produce studied Reason-Why Salesmanship-in-Type than to produce four times as much catchy “General Publicity.”
A still further reason is that the Makers of “General Publicity” know they can never be held to account for definite results from the latter kind of Copy, because nothing definite is promised through it.
- To “Keep-the-Name-before-the-People.”
- To “Make a General Impression on the Trade.”
- To “Influence Sales.”
- To “Protect the Market.”
These are the vague nothings promisedto the Advertiser by the Makers of “General Publicity.”
These are the fractional parts of Advertising he gets in return for an outlay which could have brought him back 150 per cent instead of 30 to 90 per cent of his outlay for Space.
Remember that Reason-Why Salesmanship-on-Paper will do all that “General Publicity” can do.
Toward “Keeping-the-Name-before-the-People,” “Creating a General Impression on the Trade,” etc.
And, in addition to this, it can actually, positively, and conclusively Sell Goods, through Retailers (or by Mail), in sufficient volume to pay 50 to 300 per cent profit on the investment in Space it occupies.
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- Chapter V They Who Blindly Follow the Blind
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- Chapter III “The Responsive Chord in Advertising”
