About Offers, by Denny Hatch

"Success in direct mail," wrote the legendary guru Ed Mayer many years ago, "is
40 percent lists, ?40 percent offer and 20 percent everything else."
On the Internet, lists count the least. Names are so cheap, you can blitz the wo
rld practically for free.
For example, a 2010 study revealed that to sell $100 worth of Viagra, a spam pro
vider needs to send 12.5 million messages. In direct mail, 12.5 million messages
at 60 each would cost $7.5 million. In a medium where lists are basically free,
who needs arithmetic and ROI?
A more reasonable ratio for Internet direct marketing success would be more like
70 percent offer, 10 percent lists and 20 percent everything else. So let's tal
k offers.
If you want a response to a marketing effort, you must make an offer. No offer,
no response.
If the offer is not clear or difficult choices must be made the mailing, email or ad
will be set aside for later consideration, and you have lost the order.
To further make my point, here are some takeaways from direct marketing greats:
"Nothing is more profitable than the right offer powerfully stated to the right
person at the right time." Gary Kauffman
"If you want to dramatically increase your response, dramatically improve your o
ffer." Axel Andersson
"It's the offer, stupid! If you do not get the results you need or response is f
lagging, check the offer first." Bob Hacker
"The right offer should be so attractive that only a lunatic would say no." Claud
e Hopkins
"The offer should be so clear and simple that an idiot can understand it." Malcol
m Decker
"A special discount to customers as compared to outsiders will increase response
by more than the discount." Dick Benson
Maxwell Sackheim on Offers
Give the prospect a chance to make a deal with you not tomorrow or next week, but
RIGHT AWAY.
Make it easier to say yes than say no.
It must be a bargain in one form or another.
Max Sackheim
When you make an offer in any medium broadcast, print, direct mail or Internet alway
s, always, always have a reply mechanism order form, 800 number or clickthrough. Q
uite simply: No reply mechanism, no reply.
Walter Weintz, circulation director for Reader's Digest in the 1950s, created th
e famous "penny mailing," in which two shiny new pennies showed through a second
window in the carrier envelope.
People could not bear to throw out U.S. currency, so they opened the envelope. W
eintz called these pennies or variations, such as tokens, certificates or cents-of
f coupons hot potatoes. The reader is forced to make a decision whether ?to take t
he requested action or throw the thing away and take the chance on losing the ac
tual or perceived value of the goodie.
In print, mail or online, consider using a hot potato a certificate or coupon that
must be returned to take advantage of the offer.
As well as encouraging action, a returned certificate, properly keyed, shows pre
cisely what the person responded to. This closes the marketing loop. For online
replies, use a landing page devoted to that offer only.
Know your arithmetic. In the early 1990s, a number of big agency account executi
ves conned some gullible, inexperienced package goods brand managers to use dire
ct mail to promote their shampoo, soap or cereal using solo ?direct mail.
Quite simply, at $600/M, solo direct mail cannot be used to promote low-cost ite
ms. (Nor should it be used to build brand.) For inexpensive items, use co-ops, f
ree-standing inserts or the Web.
If you use a general agency, don't be surprised if the account people pooh-pooh
the idea of closing the loop with an order mechanism. It's only direct response

practitioners who love accountability; their brothers and sisters in general adv
ertising are scared to ?death of it.