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I wrote and published my first novel, “Cedarhurst Alley,” in the late 1960s. My publisher was a taciturn Vermonter named Paul S. Eriksson, who ran a two-person shop on West 57th Street in Manhattan. Paul had the inside office; Peggy, his wife, sat outside and kept the business running.
My second boss in the publishing business was an outrageously funny guy named Franklin Watts, a hard-drinking, hard-living, ex-traveling book salesman who started his own company and then, in a disastrous move, sold out to the encyclopedia giant, Grolier. When Watts was drinking, he slurred his words, and everybody was sure his mind was gone. But it wasn’t. The next day, Watts would be at the office, razor sharp, dictating memos and letters that related to everything that went on the previous night, which he remembered in precise detail.
Etched in Eriksson’s mind was the first time he met Watts. They were at a crowded New York cocktail party, and Eriksson told Watts he was going to start a small publishing company. Watts, who towered over Eriksson, said four words to him. “Profits! Always remember profits!”
Throughout the evening, every time they passed one another, Watts would waggle his finger at Eriksson and say, “Profits!”
Super Bowl Idiocy
Unlike many Super Bowls, the 2008 game—with the Giants scoring a huge upset in the last two minutes—was a nail-biting stunner, while the ads, for the most part, were a bore. “The only purpose of advertising,” wrote the 1920s practitioner Claude Hopkins, “is to make sales.” According to BusinessWeek, the telecast brought in $225 million in revenue to the Fox Network. Add in production costs of an estimated $25 million, and you’re looking at a quarter of a billion dollars being spent by big agencies, not to make sales, but rather to show off to other big agencies how wonderfully creative they are. Think of it: $250 million spent on one-upmanship!
The Exception
Whatever you think of Vin Gupta, founder and CEO of infoUSA, you have to love him for the sheer delight he takes in sticking a spike in the eye of the mainstream advertising community. He spent in excess of $3 million for three 30-second ads during Super Bowl programming with but one objective in mind: to make sales.
As the gleeful headline of his Jan. 2 press release proclaimed:
“SALESGENIE.COM READY TO RECLAIM CROWN AS SUPER BOWL’S ‘WORST AD’ CHAMPION.”
His first sortie into advertising’s biggest league of all was in 2007, where he was castigated for the mediocrity of his ads. But his was the only campaign that made money, driving 25,000 registrants to his Web site to take advantage of his offer of 100 free leads. If conversion was 50 percent and lifetime value was $500, his ROI was $6.25 million on a cost of roughly $3 million.
His 2008 Super Bowl efforts—conceived and written by Gupta himself—were truly tacky animations, two of which featured a sad-sack Indian salesman with an accent from India (Gupta’s home country) and a panda family with Chinese accents.
A number of people were offended, calling the cartoons racist. Gupta apologized to all who might have objected, but added, “The pandas are Chinese. They don’t speak German.”
The commercials brought 30,000 prospects to infoUSA’s Web site, generated 2,100 phone calls and were responsible for another 25,000 views on YouTube.
Whatever you do in business, think of a happily fried Frank Watts amid the pullulating crowd at a noisy Manhattan cocktail party waggling his finger and saying, “Profits!”
You’ll never go wrong.
Denny Hatch is a freelance direct marketing consultant and copywriter. Visit him at www.dennyhatch.com, or contact him via e-mail at dennyhatch@yahoo.com.
My second boss in the publishing business was an outrageously funny guy named Franklin Watts, a hard-drinking, hard-living, ex-traveling book salesman who started his own company and then, in a disastrous move, sold out to the encyclopedia giant, Grolier. When Watts was drinking, he slurred his words, and everybody was sure his mind was gone. But it wasn’t. The next day, Watts would be at the office, razor sharp, dictating memos and letters that related to everything that went on the previous night, which he remembered in precise detail.
Etched in Eriksson’s mind was the first time he met Watts. They were at a crowded New York cocktail party, and Eriksson told Watts he was going to start a small publishing company. Watts, who towered over Eriksson, said four words to him. “Profits! Always remember profits!”
Throughout the evening, every time they passed one another, Watts would waggle his finger at Eriksson and say, “Profits!”
Super Bowl Idiocy
Unlike many Super Bowls, the 2008 game—with the Giants scoring a huge upset in the last two minutes—was a nail-biting stunner, while the ads, for the most part, were a bore. “The only purpose of advertising,” wrote the 1920s practitioner Claude Hopkins, “is to make sales.” According to BusinessWeek, the telecast brought in $225 million in revenue to the Fox Network. Add in production costs of an estimated $25 million, and you’re looking at a quarter of a billion dollars being spent by big agencies, not to make sales, but rather to show off to other big agencies how wonderfully creative they are. Think of it: $250 million spent on one-upmanship!
The Exception
Whatever you think of Vin Gupta, founder and CEO of infoUSA, you have to love him for the sheer delight he takes in sticking a spike in the eye of the mainstream advertising community. He spent in excess of $3 million for three 30-second ads during Super Bowl programming with but one objective in mind: to make sales.
As the gleeful headline of his Jan. 2 press release proclaimed:
“SALESGENIE.COM READY TO RECLAIM CROWN AS SUPER BOWL’S ‘WORST AD’ CHAMPION.”
His first sortie into advertising’s biggest league of all was in 2007, where he was castigated for the mediocrity of his ads. But his was the only campaign that made money, driving 25,000 registrants to his Web site to take advantage of his offer of 100 free leads. If conversion was 50 percent and lifetime value was $500, his ROI was $6.25 million on a cost of roughly $3 million.
His 2008 Super Bowl efforts—conceived and written by Gupta himself—were truly tacky animations, two of which featured a sad-sack Indian salesman with an accent from India (Gupta’s home country) and a panda family with Chinese accents.
A number of people were offended, calling the cartoons racist. Gupta apologized to all who might have objected, but added, “The pandas are Chinese. They don’t speak German.”
The commercials brought 30,000 prospects to infoUSA’s Web site, generated 2,100 phone calls and were responsible for another 25,000 views on YouTube.
Whatever you do in business, think of a happily fried Frank Watts amid the pullulating crowd at a noisy Manhattan cocktail party waggling his finger and saying, “Profits!”
You’ll never go wrong.
Denny Hatch is a freelance direct marketing consultant and copywriter. Visit him at www.dennyhatch.com, or contact him via e-mail at dennyhatch@yahoo.com.
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