Читать книгу Outrageous Advertising That's Outrageously Successful - Bill Glazer - Страница 11

The first mass-produced handwritten sales pitch I’d ever seen was a letter that was sent out by Dan Kennedy. He first saw this tactic used in a letter written by political candidate Ron Paul. As soon as I saw it, I knew that it was something different, and I’ve always looked for ways that others have used to cut through the clutter (see chapter 10).

It’s not easy. The clutter of advertising messages can be overwhelming, but you must cut through it and understand that of the three possible answers—yes, maybe, or no—you have the best chance of getting a “yes” or “maybe” if you do something OUTRAGEOUS enough to get noticed. So I decided to try it at my retail store, Gage Menswear.

Handwrite a letter to my customers? OUTRAGEOUS!

But mine was more than just handwritten; it appeared spontaneous with big letters and small, wildly drawn parentheses, scratch-outs, and hand-drawn arrows pointing to a side note. And it was on yellow legal pad paper. Plus, get this—it was five pages!

C’mon! No one sends out a five-page handwritten sales letter. No one! I mean, who would read it?

Well, it turned out that lots of people read it. But more on the results later. First, take a look at the letter.

As you can see, there is a lot of copy in a five-page handwritten sales letter. But here’s the thing: it’s not blah, blah copy; it all serves a purpose. And if you study the letter, you will see there is even more. I will summarize the approach.