Motion Picture News (Jul-Aug 1916)

July 22, 1916 MOTION PICTURE NEWS 391 How to Advertise Your Theatre by Mail By Harold S. Hodes Manager Sales Promotion, Universal Film Manufacturing Company WHEN Bill Jones finally realized that all his efforts to make his theatre a paying proposition represented just so much wasted energy and cash, he sat down and took stock of the situation. " The town's a good town," he said to himself, " but competition is awful. Because I've had to do it or quit business, I've given away more groceries, drygoods and hardware than the average merchant sells. And, in my efforts to bust at least one of my competitors I've spent so much money on features, eleven or dozen-reel shows and novelty performances that my bankroll is about as fat as the flanks of a timber wolf after a long, hard winter ! " And so," concluded Bill, as he reached for the letters that the mail man had just shoved into the booth, " the question before the house is, shall I continue to die a lingering financial death or shall I shut up shop and hold on to the few pennies I've still got?" As Bill glanced through the contents of the first two letters his gloom increased visibly. They were bills. The third letter was from a local tailoring shop and even though Bill stood in no great need of a suit, so cleverly was the opening paragraph of the letter worded that he went on reading it. "If you want to know when your favorite stars appear at this theatre, leave your name and address at the box office." It wasn't long before Bill found himself in possession of a mailing list of respectable size. This list was swelled by the names called from the membership posters of the various organizations that were located near his theatre. Then, his mailing list compiled, Bill sat down and commenced working on the letter that was to be shot out to his prospective patrons. The one thing that had impressed Jones at the time he read the tailor's circular letter was its humaness—iht manner in which the writer had succeeded in making his letter read like a personal talk. " It's full of ' you-and-me ' stuff," was the way Bill put it, in analyzing the letter. " If I can put the same stuff into my letter, maybe the people who get it will overlook the fact that it is an advertisement." So Bill wrote his letter as though the persons it was to reach were right in front of him. He wasn't a " clever " writer by any means, but he did manage to imbue his message with sincerity. And, knowing how he himself classed the exaggerated statements in the advertisements he read, he did his best to keep adjectives down to the minimum. Circular Letter Gives Despairing Exhibitor Hope The writer of the circular letter would have been tickled clear through could he have seen the effect it had upon Jones. The exhibitor carefully laid the letter down after he had finished reading it, slowly leaned back in his chair and allowed his eyes to wander towards the ceiling of the booth. After about two minutes of deep thought, Bill picked the letter up and read it through once more. "Let's see," he murmured to himself. "If my friend Higgins finds it profitable to send out a thousand, or more, letters to prospective clothes buyers, why wouldn't it be profitable for me to send out as many letters to prospective picture fans? " Now, I've tried almost everything else that a real showman would think of. I've ballyhooed with the rest of my competitors. I've handed out enough circulars to reach from here to Chee Foo, China. While, as for my house organ, it carpets the floor of my theatre regularly. Darned if I don't give this idea a try-out." So Bill Jones discarded the tried, and frequently found wanting, methods of the " showman," and experimented with direct advertising. Did it bring him a hatful of money from the start? It did NOT. But what it did do was to bring enough results to justify another attempt. For one thing, Bill discovered that for the first time in his experience as an exhibitor, he was able to send his message right into the home of every one of his prospective patrons. He also found that the letter " got over " more effectively than his newspaper advertisements because, unlike the latter, it was not compelled to battle for attention in competition with other advertisements. Furthermore, the circumstances under which it was read made his mailed message more effective than any other form of advertising he had ever used. I Bill Jones " Mobilizes " a Mailing List 1 But, to go back a bit, the first thing Bill Jones did after arriving at his decision to try direct advertising was to compile a mailing list. This was easier than he thought it would be. Mobilizing his house staff, Bill instructed them to visit every house within a certain radius of his theatre and to copy the names contained in the letter boxes. In addition to this, Jones hit upon the idea of requesting his patrons, via the screen, to leave their names and addresses at the box office. The slide he used read something like this:" I Mr. Exhibitor Does a Little Figuring | His letter written, Bill's next step was to learn how much it would cost him to have a thousand copies multigraphed. This, was two dollars, and figuring the cost of the stationery and envelopes to be about six dollars, the letters in their completed state represented an outlay of eight dollars. Postage (it was his plan to send the letters through first class mail) amounted to twenty dollars. " Now," said Bill, in going over his campaign, " I wonder whether it would be possible for me to get a machine that would address my envelopes for me. If I have them done by hand, I'll have to fork up $2.50 every time I send a letter out. It would pay me, in the long run, to buy a machine if I can get one cheap." Anxious to get his campaign under way, however, Bill went right ahead and mailed his letter without waiting to purchase an addressing machine. Besides, he desired to make sure whether direct advertising would bring him an increase in business. A week later, Jones was prepared to go ahead. He found a small and compact machine that met his requirements to a tee. Its cost was in the neighborhood of fifty dollars. Figuring upon sending out one letter per week, Bill decided that the outlay was worth while since the apparatus would pay for itself in twenty weeks. The name plates were the next highest item of expense, the thousand names, stamped on metal, costing him about thirty-five dollars. They could be used almost indefinitely, however, and therefore would have paid for themselves many times over before ready for the scrap heap. But, to return to Jones' first letter, here is what happened when Mrs. Brown, whose name had found its way into the exhibitor's list, found it in her mail. Mrs. Brown couldn't remember ever having received a letter from a photoplay theatre. For this reason, Bill's first attempt at direct advertising immediately made an impression. Second, while she had frequently seen the various advertising efforts put forth by the photoplay houses in the community, these were addressed to the great body of fans and so generally failed to touch a responsive chord, so far as she was concerned. I His Letter Appealed to Her Personally I While crude, perhaps, Jones' letter, written in simple, forceful language, spoke to her personally. The result was that Mrs. Brown made up her mind to see the show that had aroused such