The 4 Great Laws of Marketing
Issue #2465
- WEALTHY: After AIG, Freddie, and Fannie, who’s next? (Charles Delvalle)
- HEALTHY: Stop cancer in its tracks (Shane Ellison)
- WISE: Leo Burnett on advertising
ALSO IN THIS ISSUE:
- The 4 Great Laws of Marketing (Herschell Gordon Lewis)
- The missing ingredients (Bob Cox)
- It’s Fun to Know… about the best-mannered city
- Add “lacuna” to your vocabulary
== Highly Recommended ==
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The Next Bailout Is Old News
After the recent bailout of AIG, Freddie Mac, and Fannie Mae, investors are wondering if the Big Three - Chrysler, GM, and Ford - are next. Sorry to tell you, but they’ve already been bailed out.
It happened without much fanfare last December, when Congress approved a $25 billion loan package for the Big Three (about $8.3 billion per automaker). This loan was passed in part to help spur the development of fuel-efficient engines, designs, and technologies.
While a bailout is never good news, it does give the Big Three more than enough capital to keep operating past 2010. With the lowered default risk, GM and Ford bonds are very attractive (and safe).
You could get into GM or Ford bonds maturing in 2010 at a great discount to par (and interest payments in excess of 7 percent). To find them, simply go to the Yahoo screener (screen.yahoo.com/bonds.html) and enter your criteria.
[Ed. Note: As investment analyst Charles Delvalle points out, you need to understand what you're doing when you put your money into a company. We've put together a surprisingly simple system that can help you make the best choices. Learn more here.]
“Advertising is the ability to sense, interpret… to put the very heart throbs of a business into type, paper and ink.”
Leo Burnett
Sorry, Mr. Bumble, Not These
“The law is a ass,” says Mr. Bumble in Charles Dickens’ 19th-century novel Oliver Twist.
Okay, okay. Mr. Bumble, by his very name, didn’t know what we know - that the indefinite article preceding a word starting with “a” should be “an,” not “a.” But since his observation has spawned grins, nods, and piracy for 170 years, we have to admit he probably had something there.
The word “law” has power. That may be why it generates so many attacks. But not every law is a ass. The following 4 Great Laws of Marketing, for example, should be immune.
Too many recruits into our sacred world of marketing aren’t properly indoctrinated. Their instruction - ergo, their background - centers on technique, not results. With that background, they can’t compete with those who recognize the purpose of our sales messages: to cause the message recipient to perform a positive act as the direct result of exposure to the message.
How can we be sure that will happen? By observing the 4 Great Laws.
(Note, please: Although they’re simple, easy, and obvious, these laws give you no assurance that you will create a brilliant sales message. Rather, they give you assurance that, by observing them, you cannot create a rotten one.)
The first Great Law gives direction: Reach and influence, at the lowest logical cost, the most people who can and will respond.
Don’t mistake the meaning of this law. It isn’t an imperative for cheap production. Rather, it’s an imperative against overproduction. Technicians value production value. Genuine marketers value response.
Unlike the Madison Avenue mantra “Reach the most people,” we don’t want to reach the most people. We want to reach the most people who can and will respond to our sales message. Shooting blindly for high circulation, much of which is pure waste, isn’t for us.
The second Great Law is a caution for sanity.
In this Age of Skepticism, cleverness for the sake of cleverness may well be a marketing liability rather than an asset.
This law is the bane of young “creatives” who are so eager to show how bright they are that they lay their egos nakedly on the line.
Cleverness for the sake of selling something? Yes. Cleverness to show off? No.
Watch for the signs. A copywriter who wants you to admire the writer, not the message… an art director who wants you to admire the design, not the message. Both attitudes betray amateurism.
The third Great Law is an equation: E2 = 0.
No, this isn’t Albert Einstein’s secret formula for intergalactic travel. It means when you emphasize everything in your marketing copy, you emphasize nothing.
So if you have been writing and/or running headlines such as “32 reasons why you should buy now,” stop. You’re not isolating the key selling argument and subordinating the rest. You’re telling the reader, “What interests you is in here somewhere. I’m not sure what it is, so fish for it.” That’s unprofessional.
The fourth Great Law is the payoff: You tell the reader/viewer/listener what to do.
Curiously, although this law should be the easiest and the most obvious, it’s the most violated.
We see advertisement after advertisement, mailing after mailing, e-mail after e-mail, rhapsodizing about a product or service but never making the compelling point. Is the creative team afraid to sell? Is that why they fall back on descriptive poetry?
The whole point of salesmanship is lost if we don’t tell our targets what to do.
In combination…
These 4 Great Laws of Marketing are deceptive. If you’ve been nodding your head as you’ve been reading them… if you’ve been saying “Of course”… if you recognize how each one builds impact… then don’t forget the next step:
Be sure your own marketing messages are congruent with the 4 Great Laws. You may not always have a winner on your hands, but you’ll know you haven’t created a loser.
[Ed. Note: This article was adapted from AWAI's e-zine The Golden Thread. Herschell Gordon Lewis - one of the best-known direct-response copywriters today - is a world-renowned speaker, AWAI Board Member, and author.
In his latest program, Creative Rules for the 21st Century, Herschell shows you how to be in command of every word of your copy... every nuance... and every reaction from your reader. Learn how you can boost the power of your copy.
For more marketing advice that can help you build your business, attend ETR's 2008 Info-Marketing Bootcamp. Find out how ETR's expert panel can help you make $1.2 million in 2009.]
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Reader Feedback: “There are so many lessons that I’ve learned, it was hard to pick just one.”
“You asked for feedback on one important lesson learned from ETR. There are so many lessons that I’ve learned, it was hard to pick just one. I have a whole range of pieces that I’ve pulled out of ETR and kept separately from the rest, little gems of info that I can view at a glance. I guess the one I consider the most important would be to focus on making money before doing anything else, and then breaking things down into manageable pieces of time. (Perhaps that’s two important lessons.)
“Now I don’t remember which issue or issues that was from, but I do know there were times when I was overwhelmed with all I had to do, and some days I’d have so much of importance to do that I didn’t know where to start. I’d open my folder and there were all those little gems from ETR, giving me direction. I’d work out from there what it was I needed to accomplish that day. From there, I could focus on what I needed to do to make the most out of my time, remind myself to make money first, and that’s where I’d start.
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Hill Top, New South Wales, Australia
[Ed. Note: What's the most valuable lesson you've learned from ETR or an ETR expert? Let us know at AskETR@ETRFeedback.com.]
Talents and Abilities Don’t Mean Much
By Bob Cox
When I was young, my teachers, friends, and family always commented on my natural gifts. I had charm, intellect, athletic skills, and (what a surprise!) little or no modesty. Their words were reinforced by my good grades, awards, and trophies. So I decided that I was one of the “chosen few.” The sun was always going to shine on me.
As I finished high school and started college, I partied with my friends and studied less…. things I thought I could do since I was a gifted “chosen one.” Meanwhile, my contemporaries began to have more success than I was able to sustain. If I was really as smart and clever as I thought I was, I would have figured out immediately that talent and natural abilities are only two ingredients for success. Sadly, it took me several years.
The thing is, there’s no real difference between you and me and the guy on the bus. All of us have the chance to screw up big time - or make it big. Sure, someone else might have more natural talents than you. And someone with fewer talents might have more money or power. That’s because success isn’t a matter of who’s the most talented. It depends on how hard you work and how well you master the simple skills it takes to climb the ladder.
We all have to stretch ourselves and grow regardless of whatever natural talents and skills we possess. Hard work, the willingness to learn, and the ability to form relationships - those are the ingredients that really count.
[Ed. Note: Yes, some people become billionaires while others end up working at low-paying jobs. But that's not because of some fundamental difference in their genes. You can achieve any level of success you want - just by mastering a few simple skills. Learn 30 goal-setting strategies from Bob Cox in as little as 5 minutes a day.]
4 Aggressive Approaches to Warding Off Cancer
By Shane “The People’s Chemist” Ellison
Everyone has cancer. Johns Hopkins recently reminded us of this fact while studying how most of us beat cancer’s deadly outcome: the immune system. When it identifies a cancerous cell, it attacks and eliminates it from the body. But every now and then, this system gets hoodwinked by rogue cancer cells.
Rogue cancer cells have the ability to become invisible and, therefore, overcome our immune-system defenses. This superpower of theirs helps them invade other regions of the body. Internally, we become a playground for cancerous infection and disease. Slow death ensues.
To beat rogue cancer cells, you need to eliminate their ability to become invisible to your immune system. What keeps cancer cells out of sight? Trophoblast cells. You can expose cancer for what it is by boosting your pancreatic enzymes. Pancreatic enzymes eliminate trophoblast cells and thus reveal to your “immunity radar” any underlying cancer cells for eventual eradication.
Several natural medicines that attack trophoblast cells have been identified. The most effective are flavonoids found in broccoli, whey isolate, B-17 from the apricot seed, and curcumin.
Considering their aggressive attack on invisible cancer cells, boosting pancreatic enzymes should be a daily habit for anyone who wants to ward off the everyday occurrence of cancer.
[Ed. Note: Cancer is a legitimate concern. But if you take a few simple measures, you can protect your health and live a longer, more satisfying life.
Most people are confused about what it means to be healthy... or whether those prescription drugs or supplements are REALLY good for their health. Author and organic chemist Shane Ellison can help you clear up the confusion with his Foundational Health Education program. Learn more here.]
It’s Fun to Know: The Best-Mannered City
Charleston, SC has been named the nation’s #1 Best-Mannered City for 11 years in a row on an unofficial list compiled by etiquette expert Marjabelle Young Stewart. The good manners of this city don’t stop with the genteel behavior of its citizens… you can see it even in the city’s architecture. Decorative pineapples - the Southern symbol of hospitality - appear everywhere.
(Source: Associated Press)
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Word to the Wise: Lacuna
A “lacuna” (luh-KYOO-nuh) - from the Latin for “hollow” - is a gap or missing part.
Example (as used by Moses Isegawa in Abyssinian Chronicles): “The exodus of wives, relatives, friends and hangers-on had left a big howling lacuna which wrapped the homestead in webs of glorious nostalgia.”
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