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Fundamental Principles
The Advantages Of Doing Business By Letter
Part I
Preparing To Write The Letter
Chapter 2
Letters have their limitations and their advantages. The correspondent who
is anxious to secure the best results should recognize the inherent weakness
of a letter due to its lack of personality in order to reinforce these
places. Equally essential is an understanding of the letter's great
NATURAL ADVANTAGES so that the writer can turn them to account--make the
most of them. It possesses qualities the personal representative lacks and
this chapter tells how to take advantage of them
* * * * *
While it is necessary to know how to write a strong letter, it is likewise
essential to understand both the limitations of letters and their
advantages. It is necessary, on the one hand, to take into account the
handicaps that a letter has in competition with a personal solicitor.
Offsetting this are many distinct advantages the letter has over the
salesman. To write a really effective letter, a correspondent must
thoroughly understand its carrying capacity.
A salesman often wins an audience and secures an order by the force of a
dominating personality. The letter can minimize this handicap by an
attractive dress and force attention through the impression of quality. The
letter lacks the animation of a person but there can be an individuality
about its appearance that will assure a respectful hearing for its message.
The personal representative can time his call, knowing that under certain
circumstances he may find his man in a favorable frame of mind, or even at
the door he may decide it is the part of diplomacy to withdraw and wait a
more propitious hour. The letter cannot back out of the prospect's office;
it cannot shape its canvass to meet the needs of the occasion or make
capital out of the mood or the comments of the prospect.
The correspondent cannot afford to ignore these handicaps under which his
letter enters the prospect's office. Rather, he should keep these things
constantly in mind in order to overcome the obstacles just as far as
possible, reinforcing the letter so it will be prepared for any situation it
may encounter at its destination. Explanations must be so clear that
questions are unnecessary; objections must be anticipated and answered in
advance; the fact that the recipient is busy must be taken into account and
the message made just as brief as possible; the reader must be treated with
respect and diplomatically brought around to see the relationship between
his needs and your product.
But while the letter has these disadvantages, it possesses qualities that
the salesman lacks. The letter, once it lies open before the man to whom you
wish to talk, is your counterpart, speaking in your words just as you would
talk to him if you were in his office or in his home. That is, the right
letter. It reflects your personality and not that of some third person who
may be working for a competitor next year.
The letter, if clearly written, will not misrepresent your proposition; its
desire for a commission or for increased sales will not lead it to make
exaggerated statements or unauthorized promises. The letter will reach the
prospect just as it left your desk, with the same amount of enthusiasm and
freshness. It will not be tired and sleepy because it had to catch a
midnight train; it will not be out of sorts because of the poor coffee and
the cold potatoes served at the Grand hotel for breakfast; it will not be
peeved because it lost a big sale across the street; it will not be in a
hurry to make the 11:30 local; it will not be discouraged because a
competitor is making inroads into the territory.
You have the satisfaction of knowing that the letter is immune from these
ills and weaknesses to which flesh is heir and will deliver your message
faithfully, promptly, loyally. It will not have to resort to clever devices
to get past the glass door, nor will it be told in frigid tones by the guard
on watch to call some other day. The courtesy of the mail will take your
letter to the proper authority. If it goes out in a dignified dress and
presents its proposition concisely it is assured of a considerate hearing.
It will deliver its message just as readily to some Garcia in the mountains
of Cuba as to the man in the next block. The salesman who makes a dozen
calls a day is doing good work; letters can present your proposition to a
hundred thousand prospects on the one forenoon. They can cover the same
territory a week later and call again and again just as often as you desire.
You cannot time the letter's call to the hour but you can make sure it
reaches the prospect on the day of the week and the time of the month when
he is most likely to give it consideration. You know exactly the kind of
canvass every letter is making; you know that every call on the list is
made.
The salesman must look well to his laurels if he hopes to compete
successfully with the letter as a selling medium. Put the points of
advantage in parallel columns and the letter has the best of it; consider,
in addition, the item of expense and it is no wonder letters are becoming a
greater factor in business.
The country over, there are comparatively few houses that appreciate the
full possibilities of doing business by mail. Not many appreciate that
certain basic principles underlie letter writing, applicable alike to the
beginner who is just struggling to get a foothold and to the great
mail-order house with its tons of mail daily. They are not mere theories;
they are fundamental principles that have been put to the test, proved out
in thousands of letters and on an infinite number of propositions.
The correspondent who is ambitious to do by mail what others do by person,
must understand these principles and how to apply them. He must know the
order and position of the essential elements; he must take account of the
letter's impersonal character and make the most of its natural advantages.
Writing letters that pull is not intuition; it is an art that anyone can
acquire. But this is the point: it must be acquired. It will not come
to one without effort on his part. Fundamental principles must be
understood; ways of presenting a proposition must be studied, various angles
must be tried out; the effectiveness of appeals must be tested; new schemes
for getting attention and arousing interest must be devised; clear, concise
description and explanation must come from continual practice; methods for
getting the prospect to order now must be developed. It is not a game of
chance; there is nothing mysterious about it--nothing impossible, it is
solely a matter of study, hard work and the intelligent application of
proved-up principles.
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