Boron - Chapter 11

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Nearly everybody who receives this envelope will open it. Why? The answer, as a copywriter would say, is simple. A person who gets this envelope will open it to find out what is inside. Because it is intriguing. Because it looks personal. Because it might be from someone he knows. Because it does not OBVIOUSLY contain a personal message.

Yes, my dear son, for all these good reasons, the person who gets this envelope will open it in order to find out what is inside.

You see, the "B" pile envelope let's the recipient know right from the jump that it contains a commercial message. And, of course, the recipient ALREADY KNOWS that this envelope does not contain any sort of personal communication.

Too bad. Too bad for the mailer, that is. Because, and this should be painfully apparent, because if only half as many people open your envelope, only half as many even have a CHANCE to order!

So obvious, so simple and so OVERLOOKED!

Yes, it's true. As obvious as this should be, it is missed by almost every advertising agency and nearly every so-called "direct mail expert" in the country.

So, I'll get off my podium. If I haven't made my point by now, shame on me. And, now, let's assume that we have designed an "A" pile envelope and we are relatively sure that our envelope will be opened. What's next? What's next is that we must now get our potential customer to begin reading our sales letter.

How do we do that? Well, let's start by getting his attention. And intriguing the heck out of him right from the start. Let's try this: Let's get a little plastic baggie and put some dirt in it and then attach it to the top of our letter. Here is what the letter will look like: