Business Correspondence, Anonymous [classic reads .txt] 📗

who has never bought goods by mail; to pull him out of the rut of established custom it is necessary to present facts and figures to convince him that the direct-to-the-consumer method is to his advantage.

To get this to the eye and mind in a striking way is the first requisite.

A Cincinnati firm selling buggies uses a comparative table at the bottom of the first sheet of the first follow-up, as follows:

 

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COST OF RETAIL PLAN COST OF OUR PLAN

Actual factory cost of buggy.. $43.00 Factory cost….. $43.00 Factory selling expense……. 4.00 Selling expense.. 4.00 Salesmen’s expense………… 4.50 Our profit……. 6.75 Factory profit……………. 7.00 OUR SELLING –— Retailer’s selling expense…. 5.00 PRICE………… $53.75 Retailer’s profit…………. 15.00

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DEALER’S SELLING PRICE $78.50

 

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This makes the prospect stop and think if not stop and figure.

Another carriage manufacturing company uses a somewhat similar method of comparison but introduces it at a different point. Between the first and second pages of a three-page follow-up, a sheet in facsimile handwriting is introduced forming a marked comparison, mechanically, to the typewriting preceding and following it:

 

Problems of Dollars and Cents saving easily solved. Retail Dealer’s plan of figuring selling price. Actual factory cost of buggy……………….. $46.25 Expense and salary, traveling salesman, about 10% 4.50 Jobber’s profit—at least 15% ……………… 7.00 Retail dealer’s profit (figured very low)……. 20.00 Losses from bad debts……………………… 2.50

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RETAIL DEALER’S SELLING PRICE………………. $80.25

My Plan of Figuring Selling Price. Actual factory cost of buggy……………….. $46.25 Expense and salary of traveling salesman…….. nothing Jobber’s profit…………………………… nothing Retail dealer’s profit…………………….. nothing Losses from bad debts……………………… nothing My one small gross profit……………. 8.50

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MY SELLING PRICE………………………….. $54.75

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This “saving sheet” can not fail to attract greater attention by means of its form and place of introduction than though it were typewritten and in regular order.

Right-out-from-the-shoulder arguments and facts may also be used to good advantage in handling competition. What the farmer wants is to know whether the other goods are as represented; whether the proposition has any holes in it. If the seller can give him facts that prove his product better than others, honestly and fairly, it does not boost the competitor but helps to sell his own goods.

A cream separator manufacturer claiming a simple machine now presents in his catalogue illustrations of the parts of other machines used in the actual separation of the cream from the milk. This comparison shows that his machine has fewer parts and consequently will stay in repair longer and clean easier—two important talking points.

Where a competing firm enters the field with a cheap quality of goods that would react against the trade, it is sometimes policy to put the facts before the prospective buyers.

This was done by a Winnipeg manufacturer of metal culverts after the following plan:

 

“Last May a firm manufacturing metal goods attempted to enter the culvert field in Western Canada. We sent out a letter to every Councilor in Manitoba and Saskatchewan showing the weakness of its culverts. It looks as though our letter settled all chance of selling the kind of culvert it was making, for it immediately quit the campaign for business. We do not think a single culvert was sold.

“The same company is again making an effort to enter the field, and we would be pleased to see it get a nice business If it sold a good culvert, but as long as it sells anything like the one now advertised we shall most vigorously oppose it beoause we are certain the culverts will not give satisfaction, and that will mean purchasers will be very much disappointed, and will have a tendency, as a result, to be opposed to all metal culverts; their disappointment will be so great that it will react against our company.

“Look at the illustration in the magazines of the nestable culvert—a man is pinching the metal on the lower section of the culvert back upon itself. There are very few machine shops in the country in which the heavy metal we use could be bent. At any rate, to bend back our metal, you would require a machine shop wherever you were doing your road work. Take a sledge hammer the next time you see one of our culverts and prove to yourself the task that would be before you to bend our culverts. You simply could not do it.”

 

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The farmer who receives such a letter, if not entirely convinced, is at least reasonably certain to make an investigation before placing an order with the firm selling culverts that can be bent by hand. And it is probably a good thing for the mailorder business that such efforts are being made to protect the public against inferior goods.

Experience has shown that while offers to the farmer must be clear cut, the chances of pulling an order are increased if he is given a number of options as to price, plan of payment and different kinds of items open to purchase. He does not like to be restricted to one particular item, or one arbitrary form of payment. This fact was long ago recognized by the large catalogue houses, for they aim to offer several kinds and sizes under every item listed. It has been found that where both the number of items and options in a line is doubled or otherwise substantially increased, that the percentage of sales immediately increases.

A company in Canton, Ohio, putting out a line of sprayers, offers on the back of its order sheet four sprayers of different prices and four forms of making payment for each sprayer. This gives the prospect sixteen options—one of which will look best to him, when he sends in his order.

This information is printed on the back of the order sheet, where it can not get separated from it and where it will have a “last appeal.”

The mailorder houses have been vieing with each other in trying to find unique appeals to the farmer. To this end profit-sharing plans and various premium schemes have been introduced, in some cases with phenomenal results.

While the farmer is no different from the ordinary public in wanting to get his money’s worth he is open to conviction through smaller devices than is his city brother. And the “novelty device” appeals to him strongly.

An Ohio company putting out buggies as a main product, adds an insurance policy as a clincher. The purchaser is himself insured for one hundred dollars payable to his heirs in case of his death; the buggy carries an indemnity—not to exceed fifty dollars—covering accidents along the line of breakage or damage in accidents or smash-ups. This insurance, under the policy given, is kept in force a year.

This extra not only acts as a sales argument but a basis for a talk like this:

 

“The S. & W. pleasure vehicles have been tested by insurance company officials. They have been proved practically unbreakable, the material and durability surprising the insurance officials. Insurance is not issued on sickly persons, weak buildings nor on inferior vehicles. It is because our vehicles are so well made that insurance is permitted.”

 

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This makes a convincing talking point, particularly to the man who is not familiar with accident indemnity, and to the young man who is about to buy a “rig” in which he may attempt to demonstrate that no other man can pass him on the road.

When it comes to framing up a campaign there are many points, minor in themselves, but each having its significance, that it is well to consider. It frequently happens that not enough attention is paid to the stationery that is used for farmers, but all these things have their influence in prejudicing the recipient for or against a new house.

“It is a good rule in writing the farmer to diversify your stationery,” says a mailorder man who has sold a wide range of specialties. “The reason for this lies in the fact that when a farmer has been drummed about so much he may grow resentful at the persistence. We aim, not only to present the proposition very differently each time, but we use different size envelopes, different letterheads and markedly different enclosures in each follow-up.

“Particularly along rural routes, where the men folks are in the field when the carrier comes, I aim to change envelopes and letterheads. I never want the housewife to be able to say to the man of the house when he asks what mail came, that ‘There’s another letter from the firm that’s trying to sell you a cream separator’.”

To make ordering easier and to get the farmer to “act now” a coupon or an enclosed postal card, good for a limited number of days is widely used. This makes it easier to send for catalogue or a free trial or whatever is advertised. It is a spur to action and results in adding to the mailing list, names of many persons who might never respond if they had to wait until they found pen or pencil and paper—and a convenient opportunity.

A rebate check is another popular scheme for inducing the customer to order. An old mailorder house calls attention in the first form letter sent out with a catalogue to the fact that accompanying it is a check for one dollar to apply on the first order.

This order is made out in the form of a personal check, filled in with the prospect’s name. It is, to all intents and purposes, a personal check, only payable in goods instead of cash.

Similar use of the check method of exciting interest is also used by a Detroit incubator manufacturer, who finds that many who have resisted other appeals answer to the chance to convert a check into a saving.

This same firm also adds as a clincher an offer to pay the freight on certain lines of goods, so that the catalogue price becomes actual cost instead of cost plus freight charges. Such inducements come home to the farmer; anything on the “something-for-nothing” order appeals to him.

Aside from the nature of the proposition and the way it is presented, there is the all-important element of seasonableness. The man who has always lived in the city might understand the general principles of mailorder selling and have a good proposition, but his success would be indifferent unless he understood the meaning of timeliness in reaching the farmer. If your letter or advertisement catches the eye of the farmer he will in all probability put it away in the shoe box back of the chimney until ready to buy; it would be almost impossible to train enough guns on him during the rush season to force his interest. It is a common experience with mailorder houses to receive replies to letters or advertisements six months or a year after they are sent out—sometimes years afterwards. The message was timely; it wormed its way into the farmer’s “mental want list” and blossomed forth when he felt that he could afford the article.

Only a carefully kept record-of-returns sheet or book will show when sales can best be made on a particular item, and the shrewd manager will test out different items at different seasons before launching a big campaign which may be ill-timed.

“The winter months are the best time for comprehensive information to soak in—but the letter generally is not the place for this. Put personality in the letter—specifications in the circular.” This is the advice of an experienced correspondent whose length of service enables him to speak authoritatively.

“A winter