The billboard (Dec 1896)

BILLBOARD ADVERTISING. f elling ftopU About Things. Advertising is telling people about things. Telling them what things look like, what lliey are good for, who sells body, so 111 permit it to stand, if the editor is willing. Suppose we consider a proper plan for advertising a new remedy for curing coughs, colds and the other things of a -like nature. The first thing I would do would be to mt my money. Then I would figure : how big a territory I could thorougbly I would booklet In) town with pasters, a well-written and well-printed into every house, I would make the bill posters happy, and the distribu- tors happy, and the publishers happy. I would start my campaign along in the fall when people begin to sneeze and snuffle and make brisk business for the followed^the wrong plan, or used the wrong kind of matter, or spread his ad- vertising out too thinly. Once in a while a man spends too much, but such men wouldn't make a very big army. often enough and in the right way. Some- times it takes a good while to find out the right way, but there is a right way for everything. I would get lown tne newspaper directories and pick Jul the right papers to use. A shrewd tdvertiser can nearly always read between asy. The n o adve ■ the freer than air. There is more of it than Trouble with most advertising is that it doesn't fit. It isn't made to order. It is either patterned after somebody else's advertising, or it is prepared by somebody who doesn't know anything about adver- tisinp. The most important part of advertising is the plan. It is like the prescription of the physician. Any druggist can fill a responsibility rests on the writer. Once more the plan is what counts. Get on the right track, and the rest is easy. Map out a plan of campaign on tbe right lines, and it will take an un- comniun amount of blundering to make a failure. I would rather start on the right plan with poorly-prepared advertising I think about five inches, siiigk* col umn, would be enough space td"iflSe in the papers. In that space I would tell the people that my remedy cured colds. I would tell them that every case of con- sumption sprang from a tilth- cough. I would say that a cough was the signal that consumption always gave. That it was a warning to get ifl the road to the graveyard. Stop the cough when it starts and you stop consumption. Of course I would want lots of pictures. These I would use in the papers, on posters and in booklets. My whole en- deavor would be in the direction of pounding in the fact that half the tomb- stones in the graveyard rat erected over the dead bodies of people whose untimely ends came because they failed to slop a little t thinking of my remedy. That is the way I would do. I would stick to that territory until it was thor- oughly worked. If I bad any money left it would go into pastures new. I would there go through the same performance. I would not figure on getting my money back next day. If it came back in a year or two, I would be satisfied. I believe there are preparations that really cure most all roughs. A Disinterested (?) A We clip tbe following naive and ingen- ious paragraph from JVeicspapertfom ; The Mmrimjporl(Mass.) jVra'i objects to the disfigurement of the country along tile railroads, with unsightly advertising boards. It says : We believe there is a state law against defacing natural scenery iu the shape of rocks and trees: it ought to be so extensive in its scope as to make the present defilement of the marshes with advertising hoards an impossibility. Tbe state has something to learn from other commonwealths in this respect." The money spent iD putting up and main- think I would put the price a little han the prices of simitar prepar- Thenl could say: "This remedy costs most, but it is worth most. The man or woman who buys medicine be- cause it is cheap is getting ready to give the undertaker a job." The man who says in a general way that newspaper advertising is the only kind that pays who pins bis faith SOMETHING NEW. The Orrting Sign Co., corner of Second and Ludlow streets. Cincinnati, O., are in the field with a new and original adver- tising service which possesses peculiar interest to bill posters. The plan pursued enables them to work band and glove with the bill posters of the country, and both are mutually benefitted. Those mem- bers of the craft who have already had right. I make understanding that the The one great thing much advertising fall ft; in the advertisers them: ight and written advertised about their goods. They tell what isn' so. For instance, one man says he sells soap that is a wonderful article. He tell the good housewife that all she has to do i to buy the soap and sit down. The soa •9 do the rest. It will finish the According to his ads. the soap is a living, breathing thing. It can do tvervthing but Ulk. It rolls up its sleeves, spits on its hands, and proceeds to drive out all the dirt within a radius of ten miles. very much. When the i map. she finds it just likf It makes things clean, but it does not work automatically. Shehi and apply it liard. By the sweat of he bmw and by the power of her elbow, shi makes the soap do its duly, time she sees a soap ad or any other kind of a,i. she smiles, and says: "Thank 1 have had a Utile experience of Ix-gin to lose their pulling power, uch papei goal-they don't pull. I "United out in this article to talk about thv importance of the planning, but