I’ve been back from my Christmas trip to the UK for almost a week now and I’ve just about caught up with all the “stuff” that inevitably piles up!
Going through my mail, came across the January issue of Reader’s Digest. Now, I have a subscription because of a tip from legendary copywriter John Caples.
In his classic book “Tested Advertising Methods”, Caples provides a number of ideas on how to write the opening of a sales letter…
Many of these ideas came from a study of Reader’s Digest.
Why? Well, in his own words…
“Some years ago I picked up an issue of Reader’s Digest and copied down the first sentence of every article in the magazine – 35 articles in all. I wanted to find out how the editors of the world’s largest circulating publication handle the problem of holding the reader’s interest after that interest has been sparked by the title of an article.”
Caples identified 6 types of openings…
1. Interrupting Ideas.
2. The Shocker.
3. News.
4. Preview.
5. Quotation.
6. Story.
(Note, in passing, the attention to detail displayed by Caples in conducting this study. One reason why he was such a great copywriter, I suggest).
Interestingly, in this study Caples found over half the articles began with a story.
Ever since I read that, I’ve had a subscription for the purpose of gathering ideas for openings.
But there are other benefits as well.
In common with most magazines, the front page is a great source of headlines or subhead ideas. For example…
“13 New Facts About Your Weight”
“So You Want A Divorce?”
“Steve Fossett’s Final Flight”
Look, none of these are terribly original. But they serve as a reminder and a potential source of ideas. One of the biggest problems I find as a freelance writer is not having someone around to bounce ideas off. It’s all too easy to get a little stale working on your own. So any source of outside ideas is very useful.
One other benefit lies in the articles themselves. You’ll often find fascinating facts and information that might be useful in a sales letter. The great Gary Halbert was a walking encyclopeadia of facts that related to consumers and marketing so you never know when something might come in useful.
Of course, Reader’s Digest isn’t the only magazine that’s useful in this regard. Pretty much any mainstream magazine can be useful to a copywriter. For headline ideas, of course, the “National Enquirer” has long been recommended by top copywriters such as David Garfinkel.
So, take another look at any magazines you might have around. You could well find there are more than a few things that can help your copywriting.