The Brinkley argus., 1914-02-13
Advertising. Talks
 Q
SELLING GOODS
 WITHOUT "TALk''
Printed Advertisement Is Silent Salesman That Works TWen-
 ty-Four Hours a Day.
By TRUMAN A. DE WEEsE.

. | printed word over the old style of
 "salesmanship by conversation. It | is true that you can reach thousands through the printed word while you are talking to one customer but that isn't the only advantage of the print ed page in the newspaper over the talk of the old-time drummer.
 The man who tries to sell goods through talk wastes thousands of words and every thousand words means quarter of an hour. How often have you seen lOQuacious salesman laboring for an hour to sell 8 two-dollar article the profit on which might be as much as 40 cents? If the salesman received four dollars
 . day. how much profit did the owner
 of the store make on that sale? You not only reach larger audi ence through the printed advertising; but you catch the prospective custom ar in 2 rseeptiye mood. If he is read ing his newspaper he is in 2 mental attitude that makes him responsive to argument. He is far away from the distractions of his own business. He is ready to be convinced of some thing. Moreover, he cant talk back to an advertisement. He cannot
 heckle it with frivolous questions. He cannot engage it in controversy. But am not in the mail-order business" says the merchant. My goods have to be sold by salesmen. It Is matter of talk, even though l
 do advertise. Besides, there is the personal touch--the influence of per
 soDality, which you cannot exert
 through printed advertising"
 In this the merchant is laboring under two delusions In the first place, advertising that is properly done sells the goods before the GUS toner comes in.
 Now, all this applies to retail ad- vertising in a newspaper as well as
 to national advertising. If merchant
 makes his advertising educationally
 descriptive from day to day the things
 that are leaders in his advertising
 should be sold to the customar be-
 fore he enters the store. In ds own
 mind the customer has already bought
 the article. He is merely coming to
 the store to supply the want already
 created through advertising. It is
 plainly obvious that the clerk who at
 tempts to sell him after he has been
 ~sold" is wasting the time of his em- ployer It Is conceivable that the GUS
 toner might want to supplement or confirm what he has already learned
 through the advertising. and 1t may
 be advisable and 1t may be wise to answer few questions, but the val. uable clerk will not encourage his conversational powers beyond reason able limits. The printed advertising should be newsy, informative. terse and to the point. It should waste no words.
 Now. about the personality" in salesmanship. It is possible to put personality into printed advertising. Type is the silent salesman that works after the store is elosed-on holidays. Sundays, when the merchant Is sick or well-and ye' 1t Is possible to invest this silent salesman with . distinct personality
 Some men who never talk have more personality than the most gar. rulous salesman-in fact 1t is the ad- vertising into which the merchant has put his personality that leaves and finally makes definite impression. Through the printed type the mer- chant can project his own personality. It soon becomes vibrant with his we'll known reculiarities. You can see and hear Jchn Wanamaker when you read his s.ivertising. It is distinctly diff ferent. You quickly differentiate 1t from all other advertising. and you soon find yourself looking for the Wanamaker message every morning or evening in your newspaper. It has the Wanamaker atmosphere and the advertising stands for everything of honesty, peculiarity or sincerity that may be associated with that name.
 The purpose of advertising Is to multiply sales. The great merchants who have used newspaper space in- telligently and efficiently are the ones who have built up the volume of sales until it requires all the time and energies of large bodies of sales men to supply the demand created | each day by advertising. Are you one | of them?