This is Dan Rosenthal’s direct mail piece that brought in $12 million in orders in a few weeks.
The story goes that Dan went to the publisher with the idea, took two weeks to write and polish it and then walked away with 30% of the take.
What a concept.
No graphic design, no sidebars — just a 5-page paper-and-ink sales letter with a 1-page response form.
This is one of the all-time great sales letter openers for a financial newsletter. And with the price of gold closing in on three times the price per ounce when this letter mailed, it packs even more of a wallop.
Dan Rosenthal’s sales letter for the “Natural Resource Hunter.”
And here’s one of his print ads for the Silver & Gold Report.
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A friend brought this successful print ad to my attention about a year ago and sent it my way.
I recently wrote a post about it with the headline “Manufactured Proof,” based on the model disclaimer in the ad and the incorrect assumption that the photo was not that of the doctor, Meir Shinitzky, but a model.
The writer of the ad politely explained the purpose of the model disclaimer in the comments below and it’s clear that the man in the photo and Dr. Shinitzky are one in the same.
Lipogen PS looks like a first rate operation as the brief Hopkins’ style video expose of the production facility shows.
I was wrong and apologize for making a snap conclusion without digging deeper.
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Dan Rosenthal is not only one of the legends of financial copywriting but he’s one of my all time favorite print ad copywriters.
This space ad for the Silver & Gold Report had insertions 25 years ago. I could easily see this in print today with few modifications.
“Millions of gold coins in circulation today are counterfeits
…and it’s impossible to spot most of them with the naked eye.”
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Like a nice soothing cup of instant money?
Bank of America has got your fix.
This portentous Bank of America spot from the pre-Starbucks 1960s accurately captures the dual American dependence on caffeine and debt.
Decades later, BofA acquired Coutrywide Financial, one of the biggest instant money purveyors of our time.
(Transcript)
ANNOUNCER: Do you have money jitters? Ask the obliging Bank of America for a jar of soothing instant money. M – O – N – E – Y, in the form of a convenient personal loan, available now at Bank of America.
Of course, the junkie has hell to pay for all these “money fixes,” as this graph shows.
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Coming depression around the corner?
Who knows?
But with the price of oil ratcheting up week after week and the U.S. fast approaching its debt ceiling, it’s starting to feel slightly reminiscent of 2008 again.
As an avid history reader, I like to look to past events to interpret current ones.
Ditto as a marketer and advertising copywriter.
And I’m particularly fond of no holds barred ads like this one.
The year was 1980.
Americans sat in their living rooms and watched the following stories unfold on their TV sets.
- Mount Saint Helens erupted causing $3 billion in damage.
- War broke out between Iran and Iraq.
- The price of an ounce of gold skyrocketed from a low of $474 to a high of $850 — a price not seen again until 2008.
- And a “gloom-and-doom” space ad sprang up like wildfire in newspapers across the country.
Its right-brain-assaulting headline was: “Why You Will Probably Lose Everything In The Coming Depression.”
More on Why You Will Probably Lose Everything In The Coming Depression
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Unlike traders, marketers have the luxury of choosing a Plan A and a Plan B.
What I mean is we don’t have to pretend we’re smart enough to time the market. And we don’t have to make any pronouncements about what will or won’t happen next week — though it pays to be just far enough ahead of the curve.
All we have to do is figure out what people want to buy now and find a way to sell it to them. And one of the best facilitators for doing this is studying successful ads of the past.
More on Investment Ad #17: How To Prosper In The Coming GOOD Years
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The headline:
“Fortunately, most Investors think like losers. That’s how people like me get rich.”
The photo:
A smug, smiling Julian Snyder straddles his limo, across the street from the New York Stock Exchange.
It takes no more than two seconds to absorb his positioning, making this a most memorable investment ad.
The appeal of the book, The Way of The Hunter-Warrior: How To Make A Killing In Any Market is based on the power of metaphor.
Take the following:More on The Way of The Hunter-Warrior: Julian M. Snyder (Investment Ad #44)
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“Five disturbing facts…” was a widely inserted display ad from the early 1970′s, created by Richard Calderhead’s ad agency, Calderhead Jackson.
Though the agency, as its client, was only a few years from extinction at the time this ad ran, this was an example of the high level of direct response the agency put out.
The ad is one part product positioning statement, one part industry expose.
Though this is an ad for yesteryear’s obsolete product, the copy still shines through.
Of course, the speaker manufacturer, Rectilinear Research, produced a superior product which is the launchpad for all great copy.
Click on the thumbnail to download a PDF of the ad.
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Paul Michael was one of the major mail order players from the 1960s-1980s after a stellar start at Greystone Press.
Among other things, he pioneered the “lift letter.” I just dug up a few of his brilliant promotions and an article about him from the mid-1970s in The Capitalist Reporter.
Three lines stuck with me from this interview.
“I am only valuable when I am creating.”
“They [customers] all want the same thing – a magic button to push that will make them thinner, more beautiful, richer.”
“He [Michael] has already decided the precise shape and structure of the book which has to live up to his ad rather than the other way around.”More on Mail Order Magnate Paul Michael
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If you had to sum up just one rule of successful financial direct mail marketing, this would be a candidate:
“[People] walk around with their umbilical cords in hand, looking for a place to plug them in.”
As a copywriter and marketer, I always try to stay mindful of this, but the truth is, I’m as susceptible to this reality as anyone else.
There’s an old adage that salesmen are easy to sell to and since copywriters are salesmen in print, many of us spend a small fortune being persuaded.
Perhaps, you’re familiar with the above quotation via a well known marketing guru, who attributes the line to “a friend.”
More on Financial Direct Mail That Sells
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