Advertiser

“ In the main, however, it is the advertiser who seeks the reader, not the reader who seeks the advertiser, and the care with which advertisements are prepared, and the certainty with which the success or failure of a trader may be traced to his skill or want of skill as an advertiser, show that the proper use of advertising is one of the most indispensable branches of commercial training. ”

“ What, then, can suffragists do for the advertising department? They can do three things.
(1) Increase the number of readers of the paper.
(2) Read the advertisements we print and patronize every advertiser possible, letting him know why they do so: and
(3) Unite to bring pressure to bear on advertisers so they will advertise with us.
Imagine what would happen if twenty suffragists in each city in the country were to call on the advertisers doing business there and urge them to advertise in the Journal! They would simply put the Journal on the advertiser's map! ”

“ The wise advertiser is the one who in preparing an elaborate and extensive newspaper campaign keys it in its printing qualities, not to the best papers on the list, but to the ones that are worst printed. ”

“ It is indeed to the interest of the advertiser, as well as to the interest of the reader, that this independence should be preserved, for the worth of any journal as an advertising medium depends upon its possessing a bona fide circulation among persons who believe it to be a serious and honestly conducted newspaper. All advertisers know that the minor weeklies, which contain nothing but trade puffs, and are scattered broadcast among people who pay nothing for their copies, are absolutely worthless from the advertiser’s point of view. ”

“ Always keep your paper before the live agent. Send sample copies to the advertiser direct, telling him what he is missing by not using your paper and asking him to call his advertising department ’s attention to the value of your publication. The Tidings has secured many valuable contracts through the insistance of the advertiser with the agent that this field be covered. ”

“ Don’t think that your obligation is fulfilled when the paper is placed. Try to work with the advertiser and encourage him to greater use of your medium by giving him information as to local conditions regarding the sale of his product, post the local dealers who would naturally be interested just when a certain product is being advertised, and endeavor to secure their co-operation in the way of window displays, etc., to connect the advertising with their stores. ”

“ Advertisements act and react. They attract readers, promote circulation, and circulation attracts advertisements. The Daily Advertiser, which sold to the public for twopence halfpenny, after paying a stamp-duty of three-halfpence, never had more than half a column of news; it never noticed Parliament, but it had the best foreign intelligence before the French Revolution. The Daily Advertiser lost by its publication, but it gained largely by its advertisements, with which it was crammed full. Shares in it sold by auction at twenty years’ purchase. ”

“ Generally an advertisement of this sort, or anything that can fairly be called an advertisement of goods for sale, is held to mean simply that the advertiser has these goods for sale and names a price he is putting upon them; he invites customers to come in and deal with him in regard to them. It is an invitation to come and make a trade rather than a direct offer of a trade. ”

“ So the modern manufacturing advertiser, instead of putting out a cheapened, unmarked and unidentified article to be sold to the dealer till some more profitable one comes along, marks, identifies and claims his article which he establishes directly in the favor of the people and which can not be supplanted at the dealers' wish, but only when a better one appeals to the people. ”

“ It may be so, but my informants have always been the owners or agents of advertising mediums. The traders who have been most fortunate as advertisers, cannot tell themselves to what their success is due. All they know is, that if they leave off thrusting their goods under the eyes, and up to the mouths, and into the pockets of the public, their sales fall off at once. But whether one form of advertisement attracts more than another, they cannot discover. ”

“ The latest tendency especially in the technical journals, where immense sums are spent in this business, is to become soberly educative. The customer is offered gratuitously the benefit of the immense experience acquired by the advertiser from an extended business in meeting the particular needs of the buyer. ”

“ It is when we come to the direct announcements to advertisers, however, that we get perhaps the queerest hints from our American cousins. ‘Advertising rates cheerfully furnished’ appears frequently; ‘Advertisers love it’ is a short and sweet statement regarding one paper; ‘Should be{716} patronised by every live advertiser;’ ‘Advertisers, do you want some return for your money? ”

“ In ordinary competitive business, as, e.g., merchandising, advertisement is a means of competitive selling, and is justified by the increased profits that come to the successful advertiser from the increased traffic; and on the like grounds a painstaking conformity to conventional usage, in appearances and expenditure, is there wisely cultivated with the same end in view. ”

“ Is that going to lose me an advertiser?' Be on the lookout to do your advertisers favors. They appreciate little things like special notices and seeing their names in print, in personals, and that kind of thing. And keep the paper optimistic. Don't knock. Boost. Business men warm up to that. Why, Boy-ee, if you'll just stick to the policy I've outlined, you'll not only make a big success, but you'll have a model paper that'll make a new era in local journalism; a paper that every business man in town will swear by and that'll be the pride of Worthington before you're through. ”

“ The advertisements in vernacular languages that one meets with, circulated and posted up in all sorts of places, tell the same tale convincingly; for the advertiser knows his business, and will not angle where no fish rise. ”

“ If you have supplied the best material for the newspapers to work with, the clean-cut reproduction of your advertisement is insured. If you have been penny-wise and pound-foolish in saving a few cents on your ad-plate, all the dollars you spent on art, typography and white space for your ad are on the knees of the gods and liable to be spilled off the said knees, and your ad is messy looking when it appears. The advertiser invariably blames the newspaper and the newspaper passes the buck on to the plate-maker. ”

“ Use boosting articles and home in stories for front page, get the
people interested—then get the advertis ing by presenting the facts, by giving the advertiser his money’s worth. Quality circulation is as important as quantity. I write not less than a hundred letters to advertisers and prospective advertisers every month and some months several times this number. Point out my good points, my new list of subscribers and remind them of seasonable goods to offer at the right times,
W. H. Wanen,
otherwise
or
alias
“Bill,” has finished his term in the gal leys. ”

“ We have long heard that "A pleased customer is the best advertiser." The Forerunner offers to its advertisers and readers the benefit of this authority. In its advertising department, under the above heading, will be described articles personally known and used. So far as individual experience and approval carry weight, and clear truthful description command attention, the advertising pages of The Forerunner will be useful to both dealer and buyer. If advertisers prefer to use their own statements The Forerunner will publish them if it believes them to be true. ”

“ The beauty of posting for the local advertiser is that he knows his advertising cannot be scattered. It will go right in his own territory, and he will not be paying for any waste circulation outside. Then, too, he can select his locations, supplement his special poster with hand-bills to the farmer, newspaper announcements and special window displays to connect his store with just what he is advertising at the time he is advertising it.
The fact that everybody knows the local merchant is no argument against advertising. ”

“ Suppose an advertisement of an inch is placed in a list of publications by a watch dealer, a picture dealer, a medical advertiser, a novelty man and an agents’ supply house. There will be quite a striking difference in the ratio of results in each instance. A paper that pays one may not pay the other. We have seen this demonstrated so many times that we know whereof we speak.
Advertising Axioms.
“Virtue increases under a weight or burden” and results increase with a comprehensive expenditure of money in good advertising mediums. ”

“ Not in any incautious way do those who are most qualified to judge of value for money act. Turn to any paper of repute, and it will be seen that the professional advertiser, the theatrical manager, the publisher, the auctioneer, and [8] the others whom constant practice has made wary, lay out their money on quite a different principle from that of the casual advertiser. ”

“ Another observation I have made is, that extensive advertising is likely to result in a desire for the exaggeration of facts—at all events, so far as the individual advertisers themselves are concerned. That any firm, tradesmen, manufacturers, agents, quacks, perfumers, patentees, or whatever they may be, pay a settled annual sum, no more and no less, for advertising, I do not believe now, whatever I may have done before commencing my inquiries.
I have endeavoured as much as possible, and wherever practicable, to make the advertisements tell their own story. ”

“ This paper will have, of course, many pages of business advertisements, and these will usually be well worth looking through, for the more intelligent editors of the days to come will edit this department just like any other, and classify their advertisements in a descending scale of freshness and interest that will also be an ascending scale of price. The advertiser who wants to be an indecent bore, and vociferate for the ten millionth time some flatulent falsehood about a pill, for instance, will pay at nuisance rates. ”

“ There are many well established firms who will not advertise in the newspapers at all. They believe that the same amount of money spent in circulars, catalogues, etc., sent direct to the persons whom they desire to reach, pays better than newspaper advertising. This is more direct, and affords the advertiser the opportunity of setting forth his claims more fully. ”

“ The advertiser, conceiving that many gentlemen either in London or at the Universities, or in other parts of the kingdom, may think such a situation desirable, takes this public method of enabling them to obtain it. ”

“ There are various ways of exhibiting one’s wares and attractions, and chief among them comes the object of our attention—advertising. Of late years there seems, in addition to the ordinary courses open to advertisers, to have been special arrangements made on behalf of the unmatched, who are allowed to express their desires and recommendations free, gratis, for nothing, in the columns of certain cheap periodicals—the described being all beauty or virtue, or both, when not possessed of capital. ”

“ But we still think that to conjoin the character of a Magazine and Newspaper, and at the cost of one to give the advantages of both, will be to study the true economy of our cause.
The readers, therefore, have much of the settlement of the question in their own hands—even to the influencing of the advertisers. All advertisers look for papers of large circulation, and as advertisements are a great means of support to a newspaper, it is evident that the more “The Builder” is supported by the mere reader, by so much the more does it stand a chance of support from advertisers. ”

“ At least it must in no way hamper the purposes of the advertisers. Nothing should go in a popular magazine which would cast a sinister shadow over any form of business venture that advertises or might be induced to advertise. ”

“ The advertising manager's duties are as manifold as those of his associate. He directs the advertising solicitors and advises prospective advertisers about the place, prices, space, and character of their advertisements. A chewing tobacco ad is worth little in the column bordering the society section; the back page is far more valuable for advertising than the inside; and the columns next to reading matter are worth more than those on a page filled only with advertisements. The advertising manager, too, has the power of accepting or rejecting advertisements. ”

“ The first duty of an editor is to gauge the sentiments of his readers, and then tell them what they like to believe. By this means he maintains or increases the circulation. His second duty is to see that nothing is said in the news items or editorials which may discountenance any claims or announcements made by his advertisers, discredit their standing or good faith, or expose any weakness or deception in any business venture that is or may become a valuable advertiser. By this means he increases the advertising value of his circulation. ”

“ There is a general impression that advertising indirectly subsidizes and supports most of our magazines and newspapers; and with that goes a hazy idea that advertising is also profitable to most of the advertisers ”

“ The handsomely illustrated advertising pages supplement the text, and make it at once the freshest, fullest, and most attractive periodical of the sort in the world. An examination of the index of advertisers will show how widely its advantages for reaching foreign buyers have been appreciated by leading American houses. ”