To attack a rival is never good advertising. Donβt point out others' faults. It is not permitted in the best mediums. It is never good policy. The selfish purpose is apparent. It looks unfair, not sporty.
If you abhor knockers, always appear a good fellow. Show a bright side, the happy and attractive side, not the dark and uninviting side of things. Show beauty, not homeliness; health, not sickness. Donβt show the wrinkles you propose to remove, but the face as it will appear. Your customers know all about wrinkles.
In advertising a dentifrice, show pretty teeth, not bad teeth. Talk of coming good conditions, not conditions which exist. In advertising clothes, picture well-dressed people, not the shabby. Picture successful men, not failures, when you advertise a business course. Picture what others wish to be, not what they may be now.
We are attracted by sunshine, beauty, happiness, health, success. Then point the way to them, not the way out of the opposite.
Picture envied people, not the envious. Tell people what to do, not what to avoid. Make your every ad breath good cheer. We always dodge a Lugubrious Blue. Assume that people will do what you ask. Say, βSend now for this sample.β Donβt say, βWhy do you neglect this offer?β That suggests that people are neglecting. Invite them to follow the crowd.
Compare the results of two ads, one negative, one positive. One presenting the dark side, one the bright side. One warning, the other inviting. You will be surprised. You will find that the positive ad out pulls the other four to one, if you have our experience.
The βBefore and after takingβ ads are follies of the past. They never had a place save with the afflicted. Never let their memory lead you to picture the gloomy side of things.
This is another phase of advertising which all of us have to consider. It enters, or should enter, into all campaigns. Every business man receives a large number of circular letters. Most of them go direct to the waste basket. But he acts on others, and others are filed for reference. Analyze those letters. The ones you act on or the ones you keep have a headline which attracted your interest. At a glance they offer something that you want, something you may wish to know.
Remember that point in all advertising A certain buyer spends $50,000,000 per year. Every letter, every circular which comes to his desk gets its deserved attention. He wants information on the lines he buys. But we have often watched him. In one minute a score of letters may drop into the waste basket. Then one is laid aside. That is something to consider at once. Another is field under the heading βVarnish.β And later when he buys varnish that letter will turn up.
That buyer won several prizes by articles on good buying. His articles were based on information. Yet the great masses of matter which came to him never got more than a glance.