Daniel's notes on Scientific Advertising

Advertising was then a gamble, a speculation. One man's guess on the proper course was as likely to be as good as another's. The condition has been corrected. Now the only uncertainties pertain to people and to products, not to methods. It is hard to measure human idiosyncrasies, the preferences and prejudices, the likes and dislikes that exist. We cannot say that an article will be popular, but we know how to sell it in the most effective way.

Advertising is salesmanship. The only purpose of advertising is to make sales. It is profitable or unprofitable according to its actual sales. It is not for general effect. It is not to keep your name before the people. It is not primarily to aid your other salesmen. Treat it as a salesman. Force it to justify itself. Compare it with other salesmen. Figure its cost and result. The difference is only in degree. Advertising is multiplied salesmanship. It may appeal to thousands while the salesman talks to one.

Advertising involves a corresponding cost. Some people spend $10 per word on an average advertisement. Therefore every ad should be a super-salesman. A salesman's mistake may cost little. An advertisers mistake may cost a thousand times that much. Be more cautious, more exacting. A mediocre salesman may affect a small part of your trade. Mediocre advertising affects all of your trade.

Fine talkers are rarely good salesmen. They inspire buyers with the fear of over-influence. They create the suspicion that an effort is made to sell them on other lines rather than merit. Successful salesmen are rarely good speech makers. They have few oratorical graces. They are plain and sincere men who know their customers and know their lines. So it is in ad writing. Many of the ablest men in advertising are graduate salesmen.

Mail order advertising tells a complete story if the purpose is to make an immediate sale. You see no limitations there on the amount of copy. The motto there is, "The more you tell the more you sell." And it has never failed to be proven wrong in any test we know.

curiosity is one of the strongest human incentives. Puffed Wheat and Puffed Rice were made successful largely through curiosity. "Grains puffed to 8 times the normal size.” "Foods shot from guns." "125 million steam explosions caused in every kernel." These foods were failures before that factor was discovered.

We learn that people judge largely by price. They are not experts. In the British National Gallery is a painting which is announced in the catalog to have cost $750,000. Most people at first pass it by at a glance. Then later they get farther on in the catalog and learn what the painting cost. They return then and surround it. A department store advertised at one Easter time a $100 hat, and the floor could not hold the women who came to see it.

An advertiser offered a set of books to businessmen. The advertising was unprofitable, so he consulted another expert. The ads were impressive. The offer seemed attractive. "But," said the second man, "let us add one little touch which I have found effective. Let us offer to put the buyers name in gilt lettering on each book." That was done, and with scarcely another change in the ads they sold some hundreds of thousands of books. Through some peculiar kink in human psychology the names in gilt gave much added value to the books.

an offer limited to a certain class of people is far more effective than a general offer. For instance, an offer limited to veterans of the war. Or to members of a lodge or sect. Or to executives. Those who are entitled to any seeming advantage will go a long way not to lose that advantage.

An advertiser suffered much from substitution. He said, "Look out for substitutes," "Be sure you get this brand," etc., with no effect. Those were selfish appeals. Then he said, "Try our rivals' too"-in his headlines. He invited comparisons and showed that he did not fear them. That corrected the situation. Buyers were careful to get the brand so conspicuously superior that its maker could court a trial of the rest.

Being specific PLATITUDES and generalities roll off the human understanding like water from a duck. They leave no impression whatever. To say, "Best in the world," "Lowest price in existence," etc., is at best simply claiming the expected. But superlatives of that sort are usually damaging. They suggest looseness of expression, a tendency to exaggerate a careless truth. They lead readers to discount all the statements that you make.