Ram rumps and direct marketing success
Celebrating the New Year is an ancient tradition. Like people today, our ancestors marked the New Year by watching parades, making resolutions, and drinking themselves into a stupor.
That should warm the cockles of any direct marketer’s heart because it’s further proof that people don’t change much over time.
Another thing that hasn’t changed is the desire to find ways to improve business in the coming New Year. One ancient method was beheading a ram and rubbing the rump of the poor beast against the temple walls.
Now I can’t say whether ram rump rubbing worked or not. But if you’re thinking about your direct marketing business, I would suggest trying a few ideas that are a bit more pragmatic, none of which involve farm animals or their rumps:
- Start testing carefully and regularly. Establish goals. Run tests. Track your results.
- Stop shortchanging the creative budget. You can spend a fortune researching and developing your product. So why get cheap when you hire copywriters and designers?
- Start collecting testimonials. You can use them for inserts, headlines, teasers, letter stories, and dozens of other promotional applications.
- Stop stealing copy. We should all learn from successful advertising. But simply lifting headlines, letter openings, and other copy is a sign that you simply don’t know what you’re doing.
- Start developing some freebies. Offering free stuff is the best way to generate inquiries and sales leads, but freebies also can be useful for premiums, gifts, handouts, and testimonial incentives.
- Stop hiding the guarantee. Make it visible. Flaunt it. Your guarantee is proof that you are reputable. It lowers your customer’s perceived risk and can, therefore, boost your response.
This is based on an article I wrote several years ago titled “Ram Rumps and New Year’s Resolutions.” I suggest you read the entire article.
By the way. You’ve noticed that I don’t use illustrations much in this blog. This is mostly because I’m lazy and finding great photos takes time. But I’ll bet you’re particularly relieved that I didn’t try to illustrate this post, eh?
Who is the greatest marketer in history?
Henry Ford? Montgomery Ward? Bill Gates?
I have another person in mind. You know him. You love him. His name is … Santa Claus. And he operates the oldest and most successful toy and gift manufacturing and distribution business in the world.
How has he done it? I can’t reveal all his secrets, but I’ll tell you a few.
Santa’s Secrets of Marketing Success
And yes. That’s me on Santa’s knee. I’m one of his best customers.
Merry Christmas.
Is the government monopoly on mail a good thing?
It may sound odd to talk about the United States Postal Service (USPS) as a “monopoly.” But that’s exactly what it is.
Article I, Section 8, Clause 7 of the U.S. Constitution affirms the ability of the government to “establish Post Offices.” And various laws give the USPS a “statutory monopoly” on non-urgent First Class Mail and the exclusive right to put mail in private mailboxes.
Translation: It’s illegal to deliver most types of mail, including letters, postcards, catalogs, magazines, and bills, if you’re not the USPS. That’s virtually everything any business would mail to customers or prospects. Yes, you can send something via an “urgent” service, such as FedEx, but the law stipulates that what you send must be urgent. Plus the law forces the delivery service to charge at least $3.00 or offer the service for free and place the thing you’re sending on your porch or somewhere other than in your mailbox.
There might be good arguments for such a powerful monopoly in the early days of the U.S., but what about now? Should the USPS continue to hold a monopoly on all “non-urgent” mail? Or should businesses be allowed to compete for whatever sort of delivery service they want to offer?
Book Review: The Wizard of Ads
I picked up The Wizard of Ads many years ago on a whim. I’d never heard of Roy H. Williams, but the book intrigued me with chapter titles such as “Velcro, the Ad Writer’s Friend” and “Idiots Are Out to Get Me.”
When I had a chance to sit down and read the book, I found myself mesmerized by the series of inventive contemplations on pretty much everything under the sun, all related one way or another to advertising and selling.
Unlike most books on advertising, this one isn’t filled with tactics, so you won’t find any how-to advice. It’s not a book on strategy either, so it’s not full of buzzwords. It’s really a collection of thoughts about basic principles. Most chapters are no longer than a page or two. And what makes the book special is that Williams uses stories, memories, history, and trivia to make his point.
The first chapter, titled “Nine Secret Words,” is a good example of the style:
“Lean down so that I may speak into your ear, for the thing I am about to tell you is not for the others to know. I share with you now the secret knowledge known to only a powerful few. I give you the Nine Words which, if held in your heart, will transform Success and Failure into mere coins that you may pull from your pocket and bestow upon those you would favor.”
Leaning closer, I could feel his weak and ragged breath on my ear as he whispered:
“The risk of insult is the price of clarity.”
Then he was gone.
Williams then briefly explains how most ads fail because advertisers are more interested in not ruffling feathers than in being clear and direct.
Admittedly, taken in large doses, Williams’ style can get monotonous. But this isn’t a book to read start to finish. It’s meant to be sampled a few thoughts at a time. And it can be very inspiring. In fact, Williams has built a small training empire on the back of this and subsequent books using whimsical stories to help people understand the principles of effective advertising.
I keep The Wizard of Ads handy for a quick mental pick-me-up and it never fails to do the job. It’s smart, creative, and far ranging, covering subjects such as multiplying the effectiveness of ads, understanding the tug-of-war between mind and feelings, seeing opportunities, and creating new ideas from old ones.
Williams is not a direct marketing guy. He’s an advertising guy who, I seem to remember, used to specialize in memorable radio ads. But most of the principles he talks about translate nicely to any sort of advertising, marketing, or business. It’s even good for general advice about living life.
If you’re looking for actionable information, don’t bother. And if you have no patience for anything but direct advice, the whimsy of this book isn’t for you. But if you want a unique book that you can dive into again and again for inspiration, I highly recommend The Wizard of Ads. Keep it near your desk for a quick lunch read, use it as a bathroom book, or put it on your nightstand for a five-minute business devotion before you go to bed.
Call Guinness. Here’s the dumbest Web site design on Earth!
I know you’ve seen stupid Web site design before. But you’ve never seen anything this absurd.
Take a look at the site for the Leo Burnett Advertising Agency. If you dare. I can’t even describe it. You have to see it for yourself.
What the blue freakin’ blazes were they thinking?
I challenge you … no … I DARE you to find a site that is less user friendly or more self-indulgent.
Okay, the pencil thingy is fun to play with. But c’mon. This is the main site for a major worldwide ad agency? Really?
If this is how they advertise their own agency, what can clients expect for their millions of dollars? And if this was their best idea for a Web site, what sort of ideas did they reject???
The boobs who designed this site couldn’t learn a thing from my article on killing Web site traffic. Maybe you could, though.
Eye-tracking studies reveal design secrets
I stumbled onto a fascinating list of design tips based on eye-tracking studies.
The studies referred to here focus on Web sites. But there are lessons to be learned for advertising design. Here are few takeaways:
- Text is more important than images. People are looking for information.
- You have to design with people’s expectations in mind. Money-making ads aren’t the place to experiment.
- People tend to ignore ads that are obviously ads. The radar goes up. Flying “under the radar”gives an ad a chance to be noticed.
- Simple formats work better than complex formats. Complexity get in the way of clear communication.
- Clear, relevant photos work better than artsy fartsy photos. Real people relate to real people better than pretty faces and visual “concepts.”
- Headlines draw the eye. They are the engine of your copy train. Yeah, I know … duh. But many copywriters and designers don’t get this simple idea.
- Lists hold people’s attention. People love lists. Like this one. They provide lots of information fast.
- Short paragraphs perform better than big blocks of text. Most people aren’t strong readers. They want reading to be easy, not hard.
I think every designer should be a student of reading and legibility theory. In case you’re interested, here’s some additional info on reading, legibility, and ad design.
The history of branding
As someone who makes a living creating direct mail and other forms of direct response advertising, I don’t spend much time thinking about branding. In fact, I’ve developed a reputation for ignoring branding guidelines when I think they’re getting in the way of making sales.
I’ve embarrassed my share of marketing managers with ugly direct mail that beats the snot out of more attractive, heavily branded mail pieces. I even got one product manager fired when a direct mail package I created to launch a computer game produced such high response that it shattered corporate records and shamed every other manager in the company.
But I have no beef with branding. In fact, I find it fascinating. One site I recently discovered on the history of branding provides fascinating details about many of the most famous and successful brands. This is one of those sites you have to bookmark for future reference.
Sometime I’ll elaborate on why I think that branding and direct marketing are not incompatible, as long as you understand the purpose and proper application of each.
Note: The site I’m linking to should really be named “The History of Brands,” rather than “The History of Branding.” It doesn’t discuss branding as a strategy. Still, it’s interesting.
Happiness drives consumer behavior
People-centered marketing always outperforms product-centered marketing. And ultimately, all marketing comes down to one thing: making people happy.
An article at MarketingProfs talks about how happiness is the driving force behind everything Americans do and that it’s the “who not the what” that really matters.
Think about this. Think about it hard. It’s one of the core ideas behind the very best copywriting. Here’s an article with some practical applications for the idea of people power.
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