The most valuable single sheet of paper in all of direct marketing is a letter.  When included in your direct mail package, a good letter can create 40% to 50% more response than sending just a brochure.  It can warm the coldest of customers, pave the way for an easy entrance to a tough-to-get-a-hold-of client, and soften the hardest entrance barriers to allow you the opportunity to make a sale.  Any arguments?

 More good news: although your letter is purely commercial - printed and mailed to the masses - somehow it's still read as a personal letter written specifically to your reader (even though somewhere in the back of the reader's mind he may know it's a direct mail letter).  I've written many personal letters to, oh, a few million of my closest friends.  That's the power of a letter - that personal one-to-one feel.

 Every sales letter, like every other piece of business writing, starts the same way: write your objective in the upper right-hand corner of a blank sheet of paper.  What specifically do you want the reader to do when he reads your letter?  Constantly refer to this to keep your writing focused.  First, we'll review a few objectives, then I'll go over an explicit and practical formula for creating powerful, successful sales letters, and show some examples.

 Sales letters usually have primary and secondary objectives. The objective - or goal - is exactly what you want the letter to accomplish.  If everything goes perfectly and precisely according to plan, you will have reached your objective.  Examples of some common letter objectives are "to generate a phone call," "to have the reader purchase a product," or "to create a warm atmosphere for your cold call."

 The primary objective of a letter is usually not to sell a product, but rather to generate a phone call.  Face it, the toughest objective for any piece of paper is to sell directly: to sell a product by soliciting an order without further contact or human intervention.  It would be great to close a sale by just sending a sheet of paper, but unless your sales piece is aimed 100% from the get-go at creating a direct sale, it's not likely to happen.  (How many times have I seen a company's general brochure - sent with a general "Enclosed is our company brochure..." cover letter offering their product for sale - almost as an afterthought?  Ugh.  Generating some interest - or a phone call - should be the priority for this type of direct mail package.)  Selling a product off a page - particularly difficult - is usually a secondary or tertiary objective.

GENERATING A CALL

 Getting the prospect to call you is the most frequent objective of a sales letter, and probably accounts for upwards of 90% of the letters I write for clients.  My letters always directly ask the reader to call, usually several times throughout the letter. I once wrote a letter asking the reader to call my client 16 times throughout one page.  It worked, readers called.  For the folks who would complain how hard it is to ask a reader to call just two or three times in a letter, call or drop a note to my office and request a sample of my letter.

 Another commonality in direct mail is a letter with a passive objective - such as an introductory letter creating a warm environment for you to call your victim, er, prospect.  The objective of this letter is to alert the reader of your presence and interest in doing business with him and that you will be calling. This is frequently used in a mailpiece you send to a warm market, such as a person who has inquired from your magazine ad. In these letters I always ask the reader to call with any immediate interest, and some do.  I also always state clearly "I will be calling you..." so that the reader knows in no uncertain terms I will.

Types of letters

 If structured correctly, letters can be one of the best selling tools in your arsenal of marketing and sales weapons.  Successful sales letter uses include:

 1. A broad-based direct mail solicitation letter sent to previously uncontacted prospects, such as mailing to a compiled or a response list of cold prospects. Objectives can be to generate a call of interest, or to complete a sale;
 2. To reply to an inquiry from either a direct mail solicitation or advertisement in a magazine;
 3. Sent to a known prospect you may or may not have spoken to on the phone - to increase brand awareness of your product or service or to set up for future contact;
 4. Follow up after a meeting or phone conversation to enhance the impression of your firm and your thoroughness, or with a query;
 5. As a "thank you" for good work, kindness, or referral;
 6. Confirmation of understanding of agreement.

Dashing off that direct-selling letter?

 Is that sales letter you're sending to 1,000 inquirers really a letter?  No, it isn't. A letter is a personal communication between two people.  If your sales letter goes to 10, 10,000, or 10 million people, it's really a highly stylized ad designed to look like a letter.  So, if you were thinking of dashing it off in a few moments, forget it.  As you would for any great ad copy, take your time and go through several drafts to make sure the final is perfect.  It takes me between five and ten hours to create a tight, one-page letter, and that's when I'm sober.  Nope, no TV on either - even if it is just  in the background.  If it takes you less time, maybe we should talk and you should give me some tips.

 The letter will have the highest readership of all the elements in your direct mail package.  Customers look at the brochure, but they read the letter.  Better make it a great one. Let's take a deeper look at the structure of these letters.

OBJECTIVE: SET UP FOR WARM CALL

 A common objective of a sales letter is to lay the groundwork to set up an appointment, where telephonic or face-to-face selling can be more personal and buying signals become clearer and more apparent.

 Here the primary objective is to set up a warm reception to a phone call from you.  The secondary objective may be to introduce you, your company, and your products, or to introduce a new product, pricing special, or other limited-time offer.  These reasons imply why it's so important for you to speak with the reader in a timely fashion.  With this objective, you need to explain in writing "I will be calling," and why it is in their best interest to receive your call.

 Stating "I will call you" in the letter is strategic and necessary for two reasons: 1. The customer now knows he must look over your material in greater depth as there might be a pop test and he may have to speak intelligently about it; 2. He must figure out if he wants to see you in person or whether to warn his secretary to fend off your call.  By the way, here's a good sales trick to avoid this screening: when the secretary asks what your call is in reference to, you can say it's "about the letter I wrote to Mr. Prospect."

SELLING FROM A SHEET OF PAPER

 Face it: the most difficult type of selling on the planet is trying to get a person to buy from a page in a magazine.  In a magazine there are other pages with ads competing for your customers' eyes and attention.  Heck, there are other ads on your own page competing for your customers' eyes and attention.  At a flick of a finger and the accompanying turn of a page, in just a second or two, your best ad is history... IF the customer has even opened the magazine at all that month.  The real advantage of placing ads in magazines is they have tremendous reach.  For every person who missed your ad, there may be 1,000 who saw it.  While it will probably cost you half a dollar to reach someone with a piece of direct mail, in a magazine you can reach thousands of prospects, usually at a rate of $15 to $40 per thousand.

 By the way, in Oxbridge Communications' Directory of Magazines, found in most libraries, you can find the cost of reaching readers stated in terms of cost per thousand (shown as CPM) for advertising in any magazine you select.  Finding this information for any particular magazine takes under five minutes.

 Although the CPM is much greater with targeted direct mail (including direct-selling letters), you can be much more precise and hand pick your targets - and thus limit your wasted advertising exposure and expense.  You also have the undivided attention of your reader for as long as you keep his interest - which may be several seconds, or 20 pages, depending on how interesting your direct mail package is.  There are no letters that are too long, only letters that are too boring.

 In addition, an effective letter will warm up a cool prospect for your phone call, while the best ad, even the best brochure, will probably leave cold prospects cold.

CALL GENERATION LETTERS

 Direct sales letters solicit orders or their mission fails, and so does your investment.  These letters are usually longer, harder selling, and more powerfully written - designed to make a person place some hard-earned dollars in an envelope and wave to it as he places it in a box.  Or to make a reluctant customer call with a credit card.  Not an easy task, and tough to do with a one-page letter, especially when the product or supplier is not a known entity.  A smooth, well-written sales letter must overcome the fears and the objections of buyers, and raise their confidence and level of trust enough to buy.  To succeed, this letter must cause the reader to defy the law of reader inertia (bodies at rest tend to stay at rest) and take a pro-active role, pick up the phone, and initiate the call.

 The same is true for call-generation letters that request the reader to call to set up an appointment.  These letters, while not as hard-selling as a product pitch, still need to sell the benefits of the product and tell the reader to pick up the phone and call, or the letter's goal is not met.  I usually offer a free brochure or free booklet to entice the reader to call.  I'll address this in a minute.

LETTER CREATION

 Here are the specifics of how to create call-generation, passive-appointment, and direct-selling types of sales letters.

 Your goals are accomplished by showing the reader the BENEFITS of the product or service you are selling.  Letters are appealing only if the reader sees what's in it for HIM, right from the start.  Copy is drafted from the perspective of the reader.  "I will send you" - which addresses matters in terms of what the sender will do - is not as appealing as "You will receive,"  where the reader's needs and wants are discussed.

 Armed with your written objectives, such as "generate call" or "sell product directly," pick up your pen and draw a line down the center of a clean sheet of paper.  On the left, write the features of your products; on the right, write the benefits these features bring to the customer. Features are what the product has, benefits are the good things that are derived from the features by the customer.  In the letter you sell benefits. (For example, people don't buy a fishing pole because it's made from fiberglass, they buy it because it catches more fish.)  Now with all your features and benefits written on the page before you, prioritize them.

Johnson Box

 To the right of your letterhead, place one or two short lines of copy that are designed to highlight the offer or immediately interest the reader.  These lines should be short and not extend too far into the center of the page.  This area is called the Johnson Box, after Bob Johnson who used this area in the mid sixties when the rest of us were still in retail.

Personalization

 Personalization of the salutation is expensive, but lends the opportunity to make the reader feel he or she is the only person in the world that is receiving this piece of correspondence.  It should be used on all sales letters where a follow-up will be made by phone and/or the goal is to close an appointment.

 Personalization in direct-selling letters usually pulls more orders than non-personalized mail, but is not always justified due to the expense.  I like personalization if the letter looks like it just came off a typewriter and sounds like it was just sent to one person.  If you can deliver this feeling and you have a very targeted list, or your product or selling price is high, it may be worth it.

Opening

 To start your letter, follow this simple rule (I call it the Jeff Dobkin 100 to 1 Rule) to create your absolute best opening line.  It's the rule all copywriters hate.  Write 100 lines, go back and pick out your best one.  Yep. That's how important the opening line is.  If this single line doesn't interest the reader and force him to continue... your response just went down the tubes with the rest of your mailing package - and your money.  Electrify your opening.  The only function of your opening sentence is to create interest and draw the reader in.

 The opening is the scariest part of the letter because the reader has no investment in your package yet.  He hasn't seen your offer, and he hasn't invested any time in reading the package, so it's a make or break instant in time.  Once you hook your reader and draw him into the package, he has an investment in terms of the time he has already spent reading, and he has probably committed to keep reading until you turn him off with a couple of bad paragraphs.

 (By the way, this same 100 to 1 rule is used for the teaser copy on the envelope. My favorite teaser copy is "Gift Certificate Enclosed!"  Reasons? 1) Inexpensive to print; 2) Cheap to redeem; 3) No cost if not redeemed; 4) Ships flat, lightweight; 5) High perceived value; 6) Target to merchandise you wish to dispose of; 7) Easy to track.)

 The second paragraph in your letter explodes with your biggest benefit.  Don't wait till you lose readers (don't worry, you'll lose readers soon enough).  Expand your biggest benefit in this and the following paragraph.  If you have secondary benefits, bring them in here too.
 
 If you have numerous benefits, create a bulleted list and insert it in the center of the page.  Bulleted lists have high readership value in a letter - everyone likes and reads a bulleted list.

 Now you've hooked them. They've invested time to read this far, so let's suppose they're interested; now start selling the objective of the letter.  Tell readers exactly what you want them to do.  If you're writing a sales letter to get an appointment, or selling something that is pretty expensive and will take several contacts, sell the phone call: "In a brief phone call to you, I'll show you exactly where you can save 40% and still increase..."

 When the objective is to have readers call, I also like to offer them a NON-THREATENING REASON TO CALL.  This can be an offer for a free brochure, free information, free informational booklet, free quote, free estimate, or whatever. "Call and get" is one of my favorite sayings in letters. Once they call, the goal of the mailpiece has been fulfilled.  It's now up to you to guide the conversation to its conclusion: the fulfillment of the objective of the phone call - whether it is to secure an appointment, close a sale, or leave the door open for further friendly contact.  As soon as the phone rings, the letter's job is finished.

 If the letter is to sell a product directly, I still draft the letter with the ardent intent of making the reader call as a means to make the purchase, but I usually spend an additional paragraph or two on the benefits of owning and using the product.  In the end, I still sell the phone call fairly hard:  "Just pick up the phone and call right now - get this..."  The secret of a successful direct mail letter is to soft sell the benefits of the product, and sell the call hard.

Letter Design

 To make people feel it's really a letter, the closer you can design your letter to actually look like a letter, the more credibility you'll build into your presentation.  But don't you forget, it's an ad. Never forget this important point. Start with a traditional letterhead, then use a friendly, warm, letter-like salutation.  I like "Dear Colleague," and usually place "and Friend" after it: "Dear Neighbor and Friend,"  "Dear Pharmacist and Friend."

 To get your letter read by the widest audience, it should look easy to read even if it isn't.  Start with a one- or two-line opening paragraph (hopefully this copy will tie-in to the teaser copy on your envelope).  Indent all paragraphs four spaces.  No paragraph should be over seven lines in length.  Vary paragraph length.  Use short sentences with five-cent words instead of 50-cent words (even though you have them in your vocabulary).  Set copy flush left, rag right - never justify.  Always write to the level of your audience (though, still, I use some of my shortest words when writing copy for letters going to doctors).

 It's OK to use bold sparingly - like once in a paragraph, italics can be used with slightly greater frequency since it blends-in better. Underline sparingly.  All caps can be used once on each page, twice at most.

 Although I have 300 fonts in my computer, 99% of my letters are in courier to make them look like and have them perceived as personal letters. To break up the letter visually so it doesn't appear boring or monotonous, use a foreshortened paragraph in the middle of the letter: move both the margins in about an inch to create a paragraph just about four inches wide.  This paragraph can be set in a smaller font size and italic (my personal favorite) or a different typeface all together.  If your letter is running long, this is the place to use a compact face like times roman, garamond, or bookman italic.  Come to think about it, just about anything is smaller than courier.  Times roman has a character density of about three times that of courier.

 Speaking of long, if your letter is designed to be one page and the copy runs over, you can reduce that 12-point courier to 10 or 11 points.  I wouldn't go much lower in point size, because the credibility of "this is a letter" falls off pretty fast after that.  If still too long, expand your margins and let the copy run to the edges of the sides and to the the very bottom of the paper.  Then, when you have it printed, ask the printer to reduce it 10%.  This will give you an additional 1/2" margin at both the top and the bottom, and almost half an inch on each side.

 Sign with a LEGIBLE signature.  Don't forget an electric P.S.  Since the P.S. is a well-read letter part, I always save it for my hottest copy points: a guarantee, a recap of my offer in its best terms, and why they should pick up the phone and call right away.  I usually give the phone number again and finish with the word "Thanks."

 Your letter may be of any length as long as it's short.  Seriously, it may be of any length as long as it's interesting. There's no such thing as a letter that is too long, only too dull. Biggest danger: reader fall off.  Suggestion?  Keep it crisp by editing severely.  I have a rule I call the two-paragraph rule of readership survival:  your readership will fall off dramatically when there are two paragraphs back to back that are not interesting.  While a three-page letter may be toooo long, and get tossed out, three one-page letters will get read.  Consider sending more than one letter for any big dollar amount sale, or to build loyalty or credibility into a campaign.  I have a campaign in my book, Uncommon Marketing Techniques, that shows the 14 letters I sent for one campaign, one letter every three weeks.  Feel free to use this as long as you send me a copy.  Check it out.  Remember: a single letter is not a campaign.

Recap:  Start with a written objective.
   Make it look like a letter.
   Write a one- or two-line synopsis of your offer or best pitch in a        Johnson box.
   Always use a salutation.
   Compelling, electric one- or two-line opening paragraph.
   State biggest benefits first.  Then expound.
   Give additional benefits.
     Bulleted lists of benefits have high readership.
   Sell the call or the objective.
   Sell harder in direct mail order-generation letters.
   Design your letter to make it look easy to read.
     Indent paragraphs.
     Flush left, rag right.
     No paragraph over seven lines.
     Use bold, italics, underline, and capitals sparingly.
     Short words and sentences.
     Foreshorten a paragraph in the center.
     Sign legibly.
     Have a strong P.S. as a recap.
     Use white space as a design element - make it look easy to read,          even if it isn't.

 If your letter is personalized and the envelope is imaged directly with the recipient's name and address (not a label), no teaser copy may be necessary.
 
 Best trick of all in writing:  having a hard time?  Start writing anything, go back and cross out your first sentence.