…and marketers at Lawrence Bernstein’s “Info Marketing Blog”.

I’ve sung the praises of Lawrence’s blog before.

What he’s been doing lately is link in some classic direct response ads to the dramatic events unfolding in the financial and political arenas.

For example, his latest post is “Why You Will Probably Lose Everything In The Coming Depression” and it covers an ad for a book “Crisis Investing” that was originally published in the late 1970s.

Now, the fact that the author was completely wrong in his original forecast, in no way detracts from the value of the ad as an example.

As an aside here, let me say that recent events in financial markets are extraordinary.  Even if you have been expecting something like this for a while (as I have), it’s still astonishing to see the speed at which major financial institutions have collapsed. In years to come, I expect we’ll look back on September 2008 in much the same way as October 1929.

Anyway, back to the ad.  The point for copywriters and marketers is that these classic ads can be used as templates to tap into the current concerns of your audience.

Lawrence has been blogging up a storm in recent weeks (er, in contrast to yours truly…) so well worth having a browse of recent entries.

Let me direct you to this little gem in the post “The Way of The Hunter Warrior” …

“One of the little known advantages of proven book advertising is self-publishers and info-marketers can model timeless templates like these for creating advertising for high margin home-study-courses.”

Well worth keeping this in mind in the current circumstances.