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HARD SELL
brandN^ame
MAJOR CLAIM
U. S. RADIO • NOVEMBER 1957
agency men sound off:
Hard Sell and Soft Sell
Agency Executives Give Pros and Cons On These Commercial Approaches
"ED MAHONEY, vice chairman of the creative board and vice president in charge of radio-+v, Cunningham and Walsh, translates soft sell and hard sell radio commercials into the visual terms shown above. "Soft sell," said Mr. Mahoney, "usually expands one or more ingredients of the hard sell commercial (in this case the reason why). But since there are many possible variations you should not try to restrict yourself to any set formula."
A feud which in recent years years has stirred up much controversy among agency men seems to be burning itself out.
It is difficult today to find an agency spokesman -who is ^villing to stand up and be coiuited on either side of the familiar hard sell versus soft sell scrap.
Not only do agency men refuse to defend one sales approach against the other, but there is a surprising reluctance in some quarters to accept the two techniques as separate and distinct means to the same end . . . moving the client's goods.
AV'hen asked to define hard sell and soft sell, John Esau, radio-tv copy chief for N. W. Ayer &: Son, said, "I would like a definition, too. The labels hard and soft sell have been used and misused so much that they no longer have any specific meaning. They are an advertising cliche that gets in the ^\av of the
U.S. RADIO
November 1957
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