A Lawyer as Chief Marketing Officer?

Probably not a good idea ...

Vol. 6, Issue No. 3 | February 9, 2010 By Denny Hatch

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The New York Times account of 100 institutions of higher education sending high-tech direct mail to high school students in order to rope them in as applicants—with huge success—grabbed my attention. I devoured Jacques Steinberg’s story.

It quickly became clear that some old direct mail pro had landed in the honey pot—a fossilized industry desperate for business—and cashed in big time. Using tried-‘n’-true techniques developed over the past 800 years, these colleges learned they could eat their competitors’ lunch.

In the middle of Steinberg’s story, the name of an old pro jumped off the page and grabbed me by the collar—Bill Royall of Royall & Co. out of Richmond, Va., who shook up direct mail more than 20 years ago.

Plus ça change, plus c'ést la même chose.

A Personal Digression
In Target Marketing magazine, I run an ad offering a free critique of anybody’s direct marketing effort. Last year I received an inquiry from a defense contractor.

The piece in question was a letter to all the attendees of a giant weapons expo who'd stopped by this company’s booth. Hundreds of follow-up letters were sent out, and not one reply was received. Zip. Zero. Nada.

I pointed out that the letter—in terms of copy, design and lack of offer—broke a ton of rules. I woke up at 4 the next morning thinking about that sad-sack letter, hit the computer and made some suggestions on what to test following the next big show.

The marketing folks liked what I said, so I offered to fly out to its headquarters—for travel expenses only—for a free day of consulting to see if a permanent relationship made sense. The company agreed.

I didn't know squat about military or defense marketing, but I do know marketing after spending 50-plus years in the field. I showed up at the offices with my laptop and started asking questions and taking notes. It took me about 20 minutes to find out what was needed, the basics that were being ignored and what wasn't being done. We bonded, and the company kept me over for a second day.

The chief marketing officer was an attorney around age 50 whose entire career had been spent in defense industry contract law. The BDRs—"business development representatives"—were ex-military guys scattered around the country who looked on visits to customers and prospects as opportunities to swap war stories with other ex-military guys. They all did their own thing with no central guidance and no central repository of results. Nobody in the place knew how to ask for an order.

“We don’t sell,” was their mantra. Their idea of aggressive marketing was to sit around and wait for the phone to ring.

This defense contractor became a client, and I made a few inroads:

• I had the company assemble a collection of spectacular testimonials from deliriously happy customers and splashed these on its Web site, brochures and banners for the exhibit hall booth.
• I persuaded it to start a central customer and prospect database that included names and dates of who said what to whom in phone calls and meetings, as well as texts of e-mails, memos and letters, so whenever a contact was made, the person could look at prior history first.
• I tried to get its snoozer of a 70-minute PowerPoint presentation—that talked entirely about “we,” “us” and “our”—down to the 10-20-30 rule: No more than 10 slides. No longer than 20 minutes. No typeface smaller than 30 points.
• I wrote and designed letters, circulars and announcements.
• And unlike the effort I critiqued that got zero response, one letter I wrote generated 7 percent response.

None of this was rocket science. Just marketing 101. What was I up against? Here’s an actual set of exchanges plucked from dozens of e-mails:

DH to Marketing Manager (excerpted from a long memo)
... And again, I would urge you to suggest that [CEO Name] take some time away from his busy schedule to attend the show—even if for just one day—so as to get a feel for the mood and action of this industry, which is the heart and soul (and revenue) of your business.

Marketing Manager to DH
I was thinking that, if we get a million dollar "fish" on the line, [CEO Name] could certainly get on a plane for a in-person meeting (i.e., he wouldn't have to be "cooling his heels" in the booth all three days...)

DH to Marketing Manager
If I were in [CEO Name]’s shoes, I would not be "cooling my heels in the booth" all three days. I would be all over that exhibit hall like a cheap suit buttonholing everybody, trading info, collecting gossip, making furious notes and getting a feeling for what's going on and who the prospects are. How many times in the course of a year does a CEO get a chance like that?

Chief Marketing Officer (ex-contract lawyer) to DH and Marketing Manager
Gentlemen: you both realize that [CEO Name] has absolutely no subject matter knowledge of the business, knows no one in the business, and normally only meets the customer, if ever, after the deal is signed, right?

You can’t make this stuff up!

Amazingly, I lasted six months.

Is it smart to put a contract lawyer (or any nonmarketer) in charge of your marketing efforts? Probably not a good idea ... just as you might no want a local electrician to perform brain surgery on a member of your family.

Bill Royall: What Happens When a Savvy Marketer Takes Charge
In the March 1986 issue of WHO’S MAILING WHAT! I showed and described Bill Royall's faux Federal Express envelope that was being used by a slew of mailers. (Click on the illustration to see Royall’s “RACS Jet Express” envelope.) Here’s what I wrote at the time:

How do you guarantee a mailing will be opened? You can't absolutely guarantee anything. But if you make it look like a Federal Express or Purolator package, chances are it won't be ignored and tossed in the round file. And there are some very clever Federal-Express-y formats coming through the Archive these days, including this 6x9 red-and-blue RACS JET EXPRESS carrier of heavy coated stock and a poly window with an addressing form that really looks like a Federal Express waybill. It was created and developed by Bill Royall of Royall & Company, Richmond, VA and is being produced and sold by Innovative Professional Systems, Virginia Beach, VA, whose computers can actually make the label look as though it were hand-addressed. Although designed to go 3rd class mail, a number of Post Offices have been fooled into thinking it's a first class piece and have delivered it very fast.

Primary users have been non-profit organizations — Christian Broadcasting Network, Rheumatoid Disease and Jerry Falwell. New York's Senator D'Amato was the first to use the form for his Senate race, dropping 100k on the East Coast on October 30-31, 1984 bulk rate. By November 1, he started getting responses and within 7 days had 1,100 returns — 60% more than usual with a $4-per-order higher contribution than prior efforts. The cost is high, natch: Outer envelope, personalized insert, brochure, BRE and personalized waybill addressing form run about $550/M in 100,000 quantities. To that you have to add postage and list rental.

I met Royall at some show or other back then—a low-key gentleman with an ever-so-slight Southern accent. He was appreciative of my write-up because it generated some business for him. But then we disappeared out of each other’s lives—until last week when Bill resurfaced in The New York Times.

Royall & Co. 2010, Revolutionizing College Admissions
I called Bill Royall and learned that his company is working exclusively in the field of higher education, and that he was frankly miffed that a New York Times reporter blew his cover. He preferred operating under everybody’s radar screen.

When I said I wanted to do a story on his marketing technique and asked if he would send me a sample of one of his mailings, he flatly refused. “Go find a high school junior or senior,” he told me. “They get a ton of my stuff.”

(I found a Dominican College mailing in the trusty WHO’S MAILING WHAT! archive, which you can see illustrated at right. Click on the images to enlarge.)

So how did Royall build a thriving business by using tested direct marketing techniques in a stodgy, alien industry that had never tried anything like this before?

The Market
High school juniors and seniors—young men and women that spend an average of 57 hours a week with high-tech audio, video, electronic gaming and social media gadgetry. Many of them are undisciplined, poor readers, often lazy, and have families scared of high tuition costs and resentful of ponying up $40 to $60 just for the privilege of submitting an application.

Bill Royall made the offer irresistible.

“The right offer should be so attractive,” said advertising legend Claude Hopkins, “that only a lunatic would say no.”

• First off, many of the pieces in the mailings have the kids' names plastered all over the place, making it seem like a very special and personal invitation.
• Royall makes it easy and pleasant to order.
• The kids' names and addresses are already filled in on the application form.
• A no-risk offer: The application fee is waived. The kids and parents have nothing to lose beyond a little time and a First Class stamp.
• A deadline adds urgency.
• Powerful copy is repeated on the outer envelope, brochure and letter so nobody can miss the point.
• The copy drips with three of the seven key copy drivers: exclusivity, salvation and flattery.

Here’s part of the letter:

Dear Samantha L.:

You have been selected to receive the Dominican University of California VIP (Very Important Penguin) Application. We think you have what it takes to be successful at Dominican and encourage you to complete this application and take the first step toward selecting a quality academic university for your future studies.

A Dominican education is a worthwhile, affordable investment. However, at Dominican, we understand that few families today can afford the full cost of private education. Dominican students receive significant financial support—over $10 million in institutional grants and scholarships from Dominican alone. In fact, more than 90% of entering freshmen receive scholarships or grant aid. Other options include federal and state grant assistance, loans, and payment plans.

Consider the following special benefits in using the VIP Application:

• $40 application fee is waived
• Send a previously written and graded paper as your essay
• Receive an admissions decision within two weeks—after we receive your official transcripts, test scores, and academic letter of recommendations
• Scholarships ranging from $24,000 to over $120,000 over four years—no separate scholarship application required.

How are these tested direct mail techniques working?

From Jacques Steinberg’s New York Times story:

More than 100 other colleges and universities paid the same marketing company [Royall & Co.] to send out variations of these fast-track applications last fall, more than a five-fold jump since 2006. Some have spent upward of $1 million on their application campaigns, and many have seen their applicant pools double or even triple in the last two years.

In this high-tech, connected world of the Internet and e-marketing, many colleges and universities save money by relying solely on e-mail efforts. I urge all marketers not to ignore old-fashioned direct mail. From Bill Royall’s Web site:

Many “e-recruiters” solicit college admission officers offering e-mail-only student inquiry generation programs. These electronic mail vendors cost less … but can “e-mail-only” get you the inquiries you need?

To find out, a large national university ran a split test between their longtime partners at Royall & Company and an e-mail-only recruiter. The result?

Both Royall & Company and Company X contacted 66,000 students.

Company X generated 2,700 total responses. But, by having a mail, login, and e-mail option for response, Royall generated 14,628 responders.

Royall & Company was also more successful in generating inquiries via e-mail-only recruitment. Royall’s e-mail campaign outperformed Company X’s by over 100%, generating 3,842 more inquiries through the use of strategic, creative, and enticing direct marketing tactics.

Deliverability was another key factor in the success of Royall’s e-mail campaign. Royall successfully delivered 12.8% (more than 6,000) more e-mails than Company X, thanks to proprietary systems that monitor e-mail filters for all ISPs and Web-mail services. Colleges simply can’t rely solely on e-mail recruitment. For this university, an e-mail-only inquiry generation campaign would have meant 7,501 fewer potential students.

While e-mail-only recruitment may seem attractive based on budget alone, this limited approach costs dearly in the long run. What school wants to miss out on 7,501 well-qualified potential students?

 

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55-Word Book Review

**** "In Fed We Trust: Ben Bernanke’s War on the Great Panic" by David Wessel. A superb primer on the Fed—lender of last resort—its inner workings and the machinations of the cast of characters that dealt with the current crisis, headed by Ben Bernanke, whose in-depth research of the Great Depression enabled mostly right decisions to be made. Must reading for history buffs, news junkies and, oh yes, economists. Crown Business, 336pp, ISBN-13: 978-0307459688, $26.99 hardcover. —DH 01-30-10

http://url2it.com/cblc

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