"GETTING THE INQUIRY" COPY 1. Purpose and scope of inquiry copy.—An adver tisemen,t that seeks to attract attention, arouse inter est, establish conviction and persuade the prospect to buy all at once, has a big task to perform. For this reason many advertisers prefer to divide the burden between two or more 'processes. They put upon the advertisement the task of attracting attention and of interesting the public in their product, and depend upon either the follow-up letter or the salesman to close the sale. Copy, therefore, that seeks to arouse the interest of a reader in the product only to the ex ' tent of drawing an inquiry from him may be termed `finquiry copy." 2. Kinds of inquiries and copy.—The advertiser seeks to induce prospects to make inquiries about his product. Ultimately, of course, he expects to turn these inquiries into orders. In some cases it is de sirable to persuade the prospect to go in person to a dealer and ask for information, and in other cases to send a coupon or postal card direct to the adver tiser.
There are many and varied appeals used to get in quiries. In some cases a catalog or booklet is fea hired; in others samples of the product are offered, and in still others the product itself is offered on free trial. Experience has shown (1) that where the advertisement depends entirely upon its own power to persuade readers by purely educational copy, a minimum of inquiries may be expected; (2) that where free offers of booklets and the like are featured the inquiries increase materially; and (3) that where the free offer is featured in a way that arouses curi osity to a high pitch, the maximum inquiries result.
3. Why inquiries are solicited.—The purpose in seeking inquiries is to locate possible customers. Most people hesitate to part with their money on the first appeal. On the other hand, they are willing to investigate if the process is made easy and the risk reduced to the mere sending in of their names and addresses. Even very weak interest in a product may thus induce a reader to send in an inquiry. Cu riosity alone may be enough; but most advertise ments of this nature do not rely 'solely upon curiosity to supply the necessary motive for action; they in clude a "free offer" of some sort. Inquiry copy, therefore, is usually enhanced with a strong to those motives in human nature which make one dislike to lose a chance to get something for nothing, or to discard a coupon or other evidence of value.
Having located prospective customers, the com pany seeks to make them actual customers. The sim plest way of doing this is by the use of the direct order appeal. The advertiser asks a reader to send for in formation and with the prospect's name and address as a basis seeks to persuade him thru direct mail solicitation or by a visit from a salesman.
Another method is closely associated with the copy designed to direct the reader. A manufacturer may wish to show the dealers in a particular community that there is a demand for his product. The list of inquiries would be used as evidence of this demand and hence would influence the dealer to handle his goods. It is important to keep the motives distinct, for upon the motive depends the selection of the point of appeal and degree of emphasis to be put upon the selling qualities in the advertisement.
4. Inducement to gradual change in the point' of view in all parts of the adver tising field is 'reflected in the means of getting in quiries from prospective readers. At first the cata log was used almost exclusively, and in accordance with prevalent ideas, the product was made the sole basis of the appeal. Long technical descriptions pre dominated. Then came the coupon as an adjunct in obtaining inquiries for catalogs and as a basis for the more complete follow-up system which was added to the catalog and coupon methods. But finally there came a complete change in the conception of advertis ing appeal, the adoption of the "you attitude". Hence the catalog which had featured the product and which had been the mainstay in getting the in quiry, was superseded by a booklet which contained not merely a technical account of the product, but suggestions and infor mation of real value to the reader. Thus an of fice device was not ex plained as a piece of mechanism in the book let, but as a part of an office system. The ex cellence of its descrip tions raised the booklet from the rank of a cat alog to the rank of a ref erence or text-book up on the subject of office systems. The booklet of today makes, there fore, a double appeal since it offers informa tion about the product and is in itself a valuable acquisition to the read er's library.