Tuesday, December 17, 2019

#78 Uline: A Family-owned Direct Marketing Business Doing Everything Right!

Issue #78 – Tuesday, December 17, 2019

http://dennyhatch.blogspot.com/2019/12/78-uline-family-owned-direct-marketing.html

Posted by Denny Hatch

A Family-owned Direct Marketing Business Doing Everything Right!

780-plus Pages. 36,000 Products. 
$3.6 Billion a Year Revenue. Wow!

Whenever I get into conversation with a stranger, the subject of what I do for a living frequently comes up.
     “I write a weekly blog on direct marketing,” I say. “For about 20 years I published a newsletter called WHO’S MAILING WHAT! and was the world’s foremost expert on junk mail.”
     Invariably the person’s nose wrinkles in disgust. “I hate junk mail,” is the typical response.
     “Do you hate catalogs?”
     “Oh, no! I love catalogs!”
     'nuff said.

Confessions of a Catalog Nut
I adore catalogs!
     These are the equivalent of wonderful retail stores coming directly to me—FREE—filled with fascinating merchandise from all over the world at great prices (and often FREE DELIVERY!).
     This is not the electronic trickery clogging my Yahoo in-box that (mercifully) is one-click away from oblivion.
     Catalogs are full-color tactile experiences filled with beautiful photographs and imaginative copy that caring marketers, writers and designers spent a lot of cash—possibly up to $5 a pop in the case of Uline and Restoration Hardware—in order to get my attention.
     In short, catalogs are a lot of fun. The bigger they are, the more fun they are!
     And one of the biggest—and best in its class—is Uline!
     In my opinion, every marketer of products and/or services—consumer and business—should study the Uline business model and strive to do likewise.

Below Is the Uline Manifesto.



Over 36,000 Products Always in Stock




• Huge selection. No need to look elsewhere.
• Fast delivery.
• No matter how crazy your hours, we’re here for you 24/7.
• “A knowledgeable customer service rep is always available to assist you.”
• Guarantee of excellence.
• Low delivery costs.
• 30-day no-hassle return guarantee for refund or credit.

A Typical Information-packed Catalog Spread­—
 Easy and Quick to Navigate and Order Any Time.
     
• Good illustrations.
• Complete descriptions, dimensions, prices.
• At the bottom of every spread:
  —Order by 6 p.m. for Same Day Shipping
  —PHONE 1-800-295-5510

Uline’s Fascinating Backstory
Dick and Liz Uihlein

In 1980, (à la the Donald Trump family business model) Dick Uihlein borrowed money from his father—the grandson of a Schlitz Brewing founder—and launched Uline from the basement of his home in Illinois.
     Today Uline has a headquarters campus in Pleasant Prairie, Wisconsin with 579,000 square feet of warehousing space plus 11 distribution centers scattered around the U.S., Canada and Mexico.
    What’s more, Uline’s 6,000 employees are well-paid:
“Average Uline hourly pay ranges from approximately $17.00 per hour for Data Coordinator to $30.00 per hour for Lead Mechanic. The average Uline salary ranges from approximately $45,260 per year for Warehouse Worker to $122,573 per year for Distribution Manager.” —indeed.com
     A low-key, hands-on manager, Dick Uihlein—now in his mid-70s—was described by long-time friend Chris McDaniel as “the kind of individual who will leave his office and walk down to meet somebody.”

Dick and Liz—An Extraordinary Partnership 
Liz is president of Uline; Dick is vice president.
     In the pantheon of Conservative politics, the Uihleins are at the top, up there with Sheldon Adelson, Robert Mercer and the Koch family.  
    Both The New York Times and Politico describe them as the Republican megadonors “you’ve never heard of.” They give tens of millions of dollars to dozens of candidates plus the Great American PAC and Donald Trump’s inauguration.

The Side Businesses

The Uihleins bought a vacation home in Manitowish Waters, a rustic Wisconsin lakeside community. Over the years Liz bought up a number of down-at-the-heels business, renovated them and gentrified the town. The feathers of some old-time residents were ruffled. But as she once emailed to her critics:
“You all should be happy there are folks like my husband and myself who can afford to buy old, dilapidated buildings, rehab them and put businesses in them without worrying about a profit.”

A Personal Note
I flat-out disagree with the Uihleins’ politics.
     That said, I have great admiration for all people who spend their money and/or time on causes they deeply believe in—whether it be politics, religion, the environment and gun violence (à la Mike Bloomberg) or building affordable homes (à la Jimmy Carter working for Habitat for Humanity).
     The country and the world are better off with the likes of the Uihleins than with, say, Judge Judy and her fatuous existence.

Takeaways to Consider
• Have you created a Manifesto for your business—a complete description of the features, benefits, and personal philosophy that is front and center in your professional life and in the lives of every member of your staff? If not, why not?

• Have you condensed your Manifesto down to a Unique Selling Proposition (USP)?

• Over the past 45 years, I have studied and written about myriad catalogs—Lilian Vernon, J. Peterman and Sharper Image to name three. All started with a single item that was tested in small ads and grew turned them into multi-million dollar enterprises. They offered “items”—gifts, electronic goodies, outerwear, kitchen stuff. Every catalog was a new shopping experience. All three ran into trouble and wound up in the hands of venture capitalists and became shadows of their former selves.

• One reason for Uline’s great success: it is a catalog of consumables. These are the items continually reordered that enable companies to remain viable.

• By the turn of the 20th century, the Sears Roebuck catalog put a giant department store on the bookshelves of millions of hinterland homes.

• Fast forward to the 21st century and the mantra is, “Why print a catalog when everything is available online?”

The Wall Street Journal’s Elizabeth Holmes wrote in 2014 that catalog mailings were increasing. The reason: “Shoppers spend more online after browsing through lavish print spreads.”

• Do Dick and Liz Uihlein make mistakes? Astonishingly, I don’t remember having ordered from ULINE in the last 35 years—if ever. Yet I continue to receive this humongous catalog that must be folded in order to fit in our teeny post box in the mailroom of our Philly apartment building. My bet is each catalog costs $5 to print and mail. Two issues a year for 35 years is 70 catalogs or $350 wasted on me. Ouch!

###

Word count: 1016



At age 15, Denny Hatch—as a lowly apprentice—wrote his first news release for a Connecticut summer theater. To his astonishment it ran verbatim in The Middletown Press. He was instantly hooked on writing. After a two-year stint in the U.S. Army (1958-60), Denny had nine jobs in his first 12 years in business. He was fired from five of them and went on to save two businesses and start three others. One of his businesses—WHO’S MAILING WHAT! newsletter and archive service founded in 1984—revolutionized the science of how to measure the success of competitors’ direct mail. In the past 55 years he has been a book club director, magazine publisher, advertising copywriter/designer, editor, journalist and marketing consultant. He is the author of four published novels and seven books on business and marketing.

CONTACT

dennyhatch@yahoo.com

Note to Readers:  
May I send you an alert when each new blog is posted? If so, kindly give me the okay by sending your First Name, Last Name and e-mail to dennyhatch@yahoo.com. I guarantee your personal information will not be shared with anyone at any time for any reason. The blog is a free service. No cost. No risk. No obligation. Cancel any time. I look forward to being in touch!


IF YOU HAVE TROUBLE POSTING A COMMENT… Write Me!
Google owns Blogspot.com and this Comment Section. If you do not have a Google account, contact me directly and I will happily post your comment with a note that this is per your request. Thank you and do keep in touch.  dennyhatch@yahoo.com

Invitation to Marketers and Direct Marketers: 
Guest Blog Posts Are Welcome. 
If you have a marketing story to tell, case history, concept to propose or a memoir, give a shout. I’ll get right back to you. I am: dennyhatch@yahoo.com

You Are Invited to Join the Discussion!

Tuesday, December 10, 2019

#77 Oppo Research (a.k.a. Stealing Smart)

Issue #77 - Tuesday, December 10, 2019
Posted by Denny Hatch

Oppo Research (a.k.a. Stealing Smart): You’re Nuts Not to Invest in It!

The 46 Words That Changed My Life
In 1980 I attended a Direct Mail Writer's Guild luncheon in New York where the featured speaker was Dorothy Kerr, Circulation Director of US NEWS & WORLD REPORT. Her words were instantly etched into my DNA:
 
“If you want to be successful in direct mail, you have to know who’s mailing what and track which mailings come in over and over again. These are the controls—the hugely profitable money-makers that are making marketers rich. Save them, study them and “STEAL SMART!”

That very day I started collecting junk mail—filing it by category, analyzing it, labeling it and—most important—tracking mailings that came in over and over again. By 1984 I had eight file cabinets full of junk mail in 123 categories.

     Word of my little archive got around the southern Connecticut creative community. A number of local writers and designers stopped by to look through my collection. I didn’t charge them. I loved exchanging gossip with visiting colleagues and was happy to help.

Harry
Harry Walsh was a lovely guy—big, gruff redhead who spent World War II teaching gunnery to fighter pilots. After the war he was an agency copywriter and Ogilvy & Mather’s direct mail copy chief until he went freelance. His schedule: work like hell from six a.m. to noon and then repair to Chez Pierre, an upstairs saloon in Westport, Connecticut for martinis and a long, leisurely lunch that lasted until mid-afternoon.
      I remember he called me to say he had an assignment to write a mail shot for the publisher of an upcoming series of World War II books. Did I have anything in my files that could be helpful? I did indeed—an 8-1/2” x 11” package for a pictorial encyclopedia from Columbia House as well as another set published (as I recall) by Stuttman.
     “Lemme come over and use your Xerox machine and I’ll buy you lunch. I’ve got an idea for you.”
     After copying the two mailings, he drove me to La Bretagne in Stamford and we settled into martinis. His idea:
     “I’d like to pay you for the privilege of using your archive.”
     “If you do that,” I said, “I’ll have to start a newsletter that tells you what mailings are coming in every month.”
     “I’ll be your first subscriber.”
     After that very wet lunch I lurched into the house and told Peggy I wanted to start a newsletter based on our junk mail archive.
     Her response: “Collecting money from newsletter subscribers must be easier than from a bunch of freelance clients. Let’s do it.”
     We took $10,000 out of savings and sent out a test mailing—5,000 to each of two lists, Adrian Courtenay’s DM News and Pete Hoke’s Direct Marketing magazine. The offer: Three Months Free, $99.00 per year. Cancel any time and receive a refund on all undelivered issues.
     The test brought in enough money to do a roll-out, which brought in enough money to launch the newsletter and junk mail archive service.

Issue #1 of WHO’S MAILING WHAT!

Trashed: A Once-in-a-lifetime Record of
Obscenely Profitable Communications
In 1992 we sold the business and moved to Philadelphia where we ran WHO’S MAILING WHAT! and saved Target Marketing magazine.
     After a 33-year run, in 2017 the new owners finally folded WHO’S MAILING WHAT! and trashed the archive of over 200,000 mailings in 223 major categories going back 35 years. (“We needed the storage space.”)
     Included in the detritus were 1,161 “Grand Controls”—mailings that had been received over three or more consecutive years—the products of tens of millions of dollars in testing.
     For example, in the trash was the most successful advertisement in the history of the world—The Wall Street Journal’s “Two Young Men letter” of 775 words that was mailed for 25 years and brought in $1 billion in circulation revenue
     The company's message to me and to the direct marketing industry:
     “Junk mail is dead—clunky, expensive, passé and a pain in the ass to keep track of and store. Hey, all you Luddites, digital marketing is the future! Get used to it!”
     Oh yeah? 

Direct Mail Is a $44-Billion Industry

“The Direct Marketing Association reports that the direct mail industry is valued at $44.2-billion. It’s the second largest channel for ad spend in the U.S. (teleservices is first at $45 billion) and it’s growing by billions of dollars each year.
     “For every $167 that was spent on direct mail in the U.S., products or services sold for an average of $2,095. That’s a 1,300% return on investment.” MSP, Pittsburgh, PA

 The Newsletter and Archive Were NOT About Direct Mail. 
This was about offers, pricing, Unique Selling Propositions (USPs), headlines, envelopes and teaser copy, personalization, premiums, freemiums, copy platforms, pricing, business philosophy and business models.
     In the 200,000 mailings over the past 35 years of old fashioned direct mail are the words, phrases and designs that motivate people to buy stuff. What’s more, all of these proven marketing techniques and knowledge are completely relevant in the techie world of digital marketing as well as TV, space advertising, telemarketing, Social Media, roadside billboards and skywriting.
     In addition, the only sure, safe way to test a new product or service is by direct mail. That’s because the Chinese “steal quick-‘n’-dirty” and will steal you blind!

WHO’S MAILING WHAT! Resurrected and Back in Business. Recently the Newsletter and Archive Service has resurfaced under new management. You are invited to give it a try! https://www.whosmailingwhat.com

Today Stealing Smart Has a New Name: Oppo Research
Stealing smart is about old-fashioned—totally legal and aboveboard—research. For example, along with my researching direct mail:

Politics: "When you go and talk, honestly, to congressman, they all do it, they always have, and that's the way it is. It's called oppo research."
  —Donald J. Trump to George Stephanopoulos, June 13, 2019

Automobiles: For over a century, on the very day one of Detroit’s “Big 3” (Ford, Chrysler, GM) introduces a new model into showrooms, research engineers from the other two secretly buy the competition’s spanking new car. They drive it off the lot and immediately tear it all the way down to every last nut and bolt. The object: learn everything possible about the newest developments and—yes—steal smart for next year.

Codes: The dogged U.S., Polish and British codebreakers of World War II in the Pacific and Bletchley Park outside London cracked the Nazi and Japanese secret codes and shortened the War by two years, thus saving millions of lives and trillions of dollars. 

Amazon: When the brand new replacement blades for my trusty Phillips-Norelco shaver started tearing up my face I did minimal oppo research on the source—Amazon—and discovered Jeff Bezos is in the counterfeit business big time and can no longer be trusted. With the exception of Kindle books, I am no longer an Amazon customer.

Oppo Research: The Incalculable Value of Secret Shoppers
Business is war. Your competitors are acquiring and serving customers who probably should be yours. You owe it to yourself—and your business—to do oppo research so you can know
precisely what your competitors are up to—what they are doing well and what they are doing badly—enabling you to steal their best ideas.
     When Peggy and I were running WHO’S MAILING WHAT! we had our own secret shopping network—roughly a dozen correspondents in homes and businesses all over the country. They sent us their junk mail. (We paid postage and gave them a free subscription to the newsletter.)
     Obviously we got only a fraction of what was in the mail. But we received the main stuff—an average of 1,800 unique mailings a month in 229 categories—business, consumer, non-profit and catalogs.

Takeaways to Consider
     • If you Google “Secret Shoppers” or “Mystery Shopping,” you discover a lot of companies and agencies offering to be your secret shopper.   
     • My advice: if you can find someone internally who knows your industry and your business, he or she needs minimal training and can start right away.
     • Set up the Secret Shopper (SS) office with a distant Zip code and different area code than yours.
     • Turn your SS into a customer who starts doing regular business with your competitors.
     • Have SS order their products and/or services.
     • Are the products delivered as promised—on time and well-packaged?
     • Scrutinize what you are sent—much like Ford, Chrysler and GM analyze each other's cars.
     • Pay special attention to the instructions that accompany the shipments. Are they clear, easy to follow? Or are they sloppy translations from the Chinese? How do yours compare?
     • Collect and analyze their fulfillment material—the stuff that accompanies their shipments, upsell efforts, newsletters and miscellaneous communications.
     • Collect the direct mail promotions, catalogs and email they send.
     • Is it easy to return a product or is it a hassle?
     • How are you treated by customer service reps on the phone.
     • How are new products or services introduced? Should you look into offering competitive products or services?
     • In short, what can you learn? What are they doing that you should be doing?
     • Create a dossier on each competitor that includes an ongoing, up-to-date information on their marketing, fulfillment and customer service.
     • While you're at it, secretly monitor your own organization's performance for comparison purposes.
     • What are they doing you and your people should do.
     • Are they offering products, services and line extensions that will further your reach and bring in additional revenue?
     • In short, what ideas can you Steal Smart?
     • Incidentally, every person in the workplace is thrilled and flattered to contacted by a headhunter.
     • If your SS comes away with a very positive impression of an employee in a competing company, alert your favorite headhunter to anonymously query the happiness and availability of that stellar person.

 ###

Word Count: 1609



At age 15, Denny Hatch—as a lowly apprentice—wrote his first news release for a Connecticut summer theater. To his astonishment it ran verbatim in The Middletown Press. He was instantly hooked on writing. After a two-year stint in the U.S. Army (1958-60), Denny had nine jobs in his first 12 years in business. He was fired from five of them and went on to save two businesses and start three others. One of his businesses—WHO’S MAILING WHAT! newsletter and archive service founded in 1984—revolutionized the science of how to measure the success of competitors’ direct mail. In the past 55 years he has been a book club director, magazine publisher, advertising copywriter/designer, editor, journalist and marketing consultant. He is the author of four published novels and seven books on business and marketing.

CONTACT

dennyhatch@yahoo.com

Note to Readers:  
May I send you an alert when each new blog is posted? If so, kindly give me the okay by sending your First Name, Last Name and e-mail to dennyhatch@yahoo.com. I guarantee your personal information will not be shared with anyone at any time for any reason. The blog is a free service. No cost. No risk. No obligation. Cancel any time. I look forward to being in touch!


IF YOU HAVE TROUBLE POSTING A COMMENT… Write Me!
Google owns Blogspot.com and this Comment Section. If you do not have a Google account, contact me directly and I will happily post your comment with a note that this is per your request. Thank you and do keep in touch.  dennyhatch@yahoo.com

Invitation to Marketers and Direct Marketers: 
Guest Blog Posts Are Welcome. 
If you have a marketing story to tell, case history, concept to propose or a memoir, give a shout. I’ll get right back to you. I am: dennyhatch@yahoo.com

You Are Invited to Join the Discussion!

Tuesday, December 3, 2019

#76 Road Scholar: Masters at Making Customers Happy

Issue #76 – Tuesday, December 3, 2019
Posted by Denny Hatch

Road Scholar: Masters at
Making Customers Happy!



Rudy
Our neighbor Rudy—a Renaissance scholar with a long career in computer technology—is brilliant, erudite and funny as hell. His family immigrated from Croatia a generation ago. Rudy speaks Croatian and early in their marriage Rudy and Marjory spent two years in Croatia.
     They wanted to see it again and asked if we were interested if he did the research and the price was right.
     We said sure.
     He did massive research and came up with an all-Croatia Adriatic cruise by private yacht.
     The company: Road Scholar.
     Road Scholar? I had never heard of it!

Our First Experience with Road Scholar Was Magical!
We spent a week aboard M.V. Futura—an intimate 150’ yacht with 16 very spacious cabins—cruising the sunny coast of Croatia on the exquisite (and calm) Adriatic Sea.
     The ship is gorgeous—with Cordon Bleu cuisine prepared by an amazing husband and wife (with wine and beer included). The top deck spacious and comfortable for reading by yourself or simply contemplating magnificent scenery.
     The tour guides, lecturers, sites and sights were riveting. Hotels and all Road Scholar personnel were world class.

Traveling Like Millionaires!
What we saw, how we saw it, where we landed and where we ate ashore were the same as what is experienced by a corporate titan who paid $400 million for the mega-yacht tied up next to us in Dubrovnik.

Road Scholar History in 83 Words
Elderhostel was founded in the summer of 1975, as a learning program “conceived to combine not-for-credit classes with inexpensive lodging for older adults.” Elderhostel was rebranded Road Scholar in 2010. Today, Road Scholar offers 5,500 learning adventures, serving more than 100,000 participants annually. Our programs combine travel and education to provide experiential learning opportunities featuring an extraordinary range of topics, formats and locations, in every state in the U.S., 150 countries and aboard ships on rivers and oceans worldwide.” HQ Boston; 270 employees.
 
What Makes Road Scholar Special—
Everything is Thought Through!
Below is page 4 of a Road Scholar catalog. Every catalog has this Activity Level chart and every travel adventure description ledes off with a red bar or partial-red-bar that immediately depicts the physical difficulty.

The page describing Our Croatia yachting adventure was headed with the all-red “Let’s Go!” bar (fourth on the left above)—meaning the participants damn well must be in good shape.
     Unlike bus tours, this was a ship trip; as veterans of myriad Viking river and ocean cruises we know if we don’t want to go on a shore excursion—for whatever reason—we can simply stay on board and read or find a museum or coffee shop at dockside while fellow travelers trudge through rugged countryside.
     What’s more, Road Scholar alerted us in advance and in writing of any physical difficulties on a day-to-day basis. Examples:
Split. Note: walking approximately 2 miles roundtrip to/from Split Ethnographic Museum; about 1.5 hours on feet; mostly flat terrain. Periods of stand in museum; climbing several flight of stairs to top floor of museum; no elevator is available.
Mljet National Park, Korcula Island & Town. 
Note: Walking approximately 4 miles throughout the day. About 2.5  miles, approximate 2 hours at Mljet National Park around lakes, including small incline. About 1.5 miles roundtrip, approximately 1.5 hours at Korcula. Climbing some steps; uneven terrain of gravel and rock, stairs with no railings. Getting in/out of small boat, short  ride to St. Mary Islet.

Fourteen Features and Benefits That Make
Travelers WANT to Go with Road Scholar
If You Have Special Needs 
Road Scholar is committed to providing reasonable accommodations to participants with special needs and disabilities. If you have special needs requiring accommodation, please communicate them to Road Scholar at the time of enrollment. We will discuss your request with you and make every effort to accommodate your needs.
  
Passengers’ Health Is Paramount 
Okay, we’re geezers. I'm 84; Peggy is considerably younger. On signing up for Road Scholar yacht tour, we were sent a detailed questionnaire about our health—physical mobility, what medicines we take, dosages, etc.  Why?
     On a cruise to Alaska, 70-year-old Richard Puchalski died of heart failure. His family was awarded medical expenses and loss of companionship because Royal Caribbean did not employ a  world-class cardiologist.
     The company was judged to be 70 percent at fault. Royal Caribbean must pay Puchalski’s estate $3,384,073.22.

Two Quick Personal Asides on Tour Wreckers
1. On a Danube River Cruise in Bulgaria we were bused to a town requiring a long walk—two miles each way—over uneven terrain. One very elderly passenger was clearly in perpetual pain, painfully slow and required help from her daughter. They caused a late departure. Every one of us was concerned about this enfeebled passenger. It was a memorable afternoon—for the wrong reasons. If this were not a riverboat tour—but rather a bus tour—a passenger unable to keep up can ruin it continuously.

2. On one of the last Renaissance cruises before the line went out of business, we signed up for a terrific Aegean itinerary from Athens with stops in Crete, Cyprus and Israel. She was an older ship, a tad down at the heels but perfectly comfortable, okay food and normal amenities. A small cabal of complainers managed to turn the entire trip into a perpetual bitch session. One complaint etched in my memory: "No ice sculpture on the midnight buffet."


If You Don't Fit, You Can Be Forced to Quit.
Admission & Participation Policy: The granting or denial of admission to a program is within the sole discretion of Road Scholar. Road Scholar reserves the right to revoke admission or terminate or limit participation at any time if Road Scholar reasonable determines a participant's condition, behavior or actions are inappropriate or disruptive or adversely affect the participant's health or safety, or the health, safety or enjoyment of other participants.

   In words of one syllable: If you are in poor health and can’t keep up—or if you are “disruptive”—Road Scholar can send you packing in mid-tour. 

• Free Insurance for Emergency
Road Scholar’s Assurance Plan. The Road Scholar Assurance Plan is purchased on behalf of every participant and paid for by Road Scholar. The plan provides 24-hour assistance in the event of an emergency during your program and insurance for emergency medical evacuation. The plan includes insurance benefits underwritten by Arch Insurance Company and emergency assistance services provided by On Call International. To learn more about this plan please visit:www.roadscholar.org/about/assurance-plan.

Low-cost Trip Cancellation Insurance. Our friends Rudy and Marjory took out Road Scholar insurance for a few hundred bucks and, alas, had to cancel. They received a full refund immediately—including airfare that was booked independently.

No Tipping. Hello, yes all tips, taxes, and gratuities are covered by Road Scholar on all adventures including cruises. We are available if you have any further questions or concerns. ~ Your Friends at Road Scholar”

Wine and Beer Included with Lunch and Dinner. Road Scholar is not in the business of unpleasant financial surprises at the end of your trip.

Tour Guide Voice Boxes. On every trip Peggy and I have taken we have been jostled and elbowed aside by a gaggle of gapers desperate to stay close to their guide shouting information—usually in a shrill foreign language. (Our worst experience: the crazed mob scene at the Church of the Nativity in Bethlehem on Christmas Day with guides yelling information while priests and monks from various Christian sects hawked crucifixes, rosary beads, tree ornaments, baby Jesuses and religious tchotchkes at the top of their lungs. 
Road Scholar, Viking and most other caring travel companies supply small wireless receivers and ear buds that connect you directly your tour guide. This means you can be anywhere in the vastness of a crowded cathedral, crowded street or in the Mona Lisa mayhem of the Louvre and  this once-in-a-lifetime experience is enhanced by a civilized, knowledgeable expert murmuring fascinating information in your ear. And no one around you notices.
     In short, I suggest if your tour company does not have these gadgets, look elsewhere.

• Amazing Photo Option. Timing dictated that we take this end-of-season Road Scholar tour that included a small premium for a professional photographer to accompany the group.
     Our guy was Panamanian photo-journalist Esdrass Saurez, a splendid Indiana Jones-like character, winner of two Pulitzers (Columbine and the Boston Marathon).

We were never bothered by camera hounds getting in our way in a scramble for photos.
     Instead, at each outing serious photographers were invited to meet Esdrass at a designated spot nearby, and they would go off and “do their thing.”
     Esdrass coached them in every aspect of photography—seeing the world as a photographer, adjusting for light, how to interact with subjects you want to photograph, editing, saving, labeling and cataloging your work.
     At a showing on the last day, many of the photographs—those of Esdrass and his pupils—were dazzling. Here was yet another dimension of the Road Scholar experience. Camera aficionados can become more expert in the craft of photography while traveling companions are enriched by the sights, sounds and history.
    
• An additional benefit of having Esdrass along. He led beginner yoga classes for seniors on the top deck. (To show off his bona fides, he did a couple contortionist’s handstands that I have seen only once before: at a Cirque de Soleil performance in Las Vegas!)
     In short, for camera buffs and us hangers-on, Esdrass—a master story-teller and teacher—was a delightful addition to the group.
    
• Want a swim?
                    
           
The captain (and owner) of yacht Futura is delighted to drop anchor in a secluded cove and let you frolic in the gloriously clear Adriatic waters.

• As a Marketer, I Loved How Road Scholar Makes It Easy to Decide.
We are Viking cruise regulars and occasional Cunard London-New York transatlantic passengers. We get blitzed with cruise offers from myriad organizations.
     Below a typical offering from Oceania for “Scenic Americas” 
                                                  
This is ordinary nuts-'n'-bolts copy and wishy-washy design—schedule of stops, bridge games, free airfare, cabin sizes and three sets of costs: full price (rack rate) and two kinds of discounts amounting to roughly 2/3rds off.
    Nowhere am I told the experiencing the glories of Ketchikan, Sitka or Skagway are worth spending thousands of dollars and traveling thousands of miles.

Road Scholar Creates WANTS 
For This Croatian Adventure!


• Every Road Scholar Mailing Heightens the Excitement
The follow-up materials are compelling, information-packed personalized bound booklets about the exciting travel adventures that await us. 
     Each evening we received details of the following day’s adventures—what to look for, what to expect. Nothing was left to chance.

• Creating More Wants!
On our arrival home, Peggy received this email during the week of her birthday:
                 
                                                        
Road Scholar offers a dazzling array of special travel opportunities for small groups—by ship, bus, hiking, biking, climbing, house tours, garden tours, archaeology, fine arts—whatever floats your group’s boat. Tell ‘em what you WANT; Road Scholar will suggest where, when and how; what’s more and they’ll make all the arrangements! Easy peasy.

The Ultimate Road Scholar Testimonial
     On our Croatian jaunt was a couple who told us this was their 29th Road Scholar expedition. “We wouldn’t travel with anybody else.”

Takeaways to Consider
• The more ways you can make customers happy, the more customers you'll acquire.


• On our return, we were immediately contacted by Road Scholar and asked for a detailed review of our experience—what we liked and what they could do better.


• With the Internet and social media (e.g., Yelp, Reddit), grievances by pissed-off customers—whether valid or imagined—can go viral around the world in twenty minutes.

• “A lie can travel half-way around the world while the truth is putting on its shoes.” —Attributed to Mark Twain


• Unlike retailers, as direct marketers we can be in constant touch with our customers.

• How does your organization handle incoming mail?

Turn Complimentary Mail into Marketing Tools. Testimonials from happy customers should go straight to your marketing people. Great testimonials should be cleared and permission given for use in marketing. Here’s the drill:

—Send an enthusiastic thank you letter for the kind words.

—Include the precise words of the customer’s praise you are asking to use,  saying you would be honored to share this enthusiasm with existing customers and prospects.

—Ask for an OK and a signature.

—Ask how the customer would like the attribution: (1) John Smith or (2) J.S., Merrick New York.

—Include a “Kindly do not use” box to check.

—Do not date your testimonials. You want them to be evergreen for years.

Unflattering or complaint mail is invaluable market research. It should be immediately directed to senior management for action.

—If the report of a screw-up ends up in the maw of your bureaucracy, the person(s) who caused the problem could cover their butts by quietly "losing" it.

Two quick ideas:

 —Successful direct marketers spend time and money on creating wants—finding new customers and making irresistible offers to their most profitable customers.


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At age 15, Denny Hatch—as a lowly apprentice—wrote his first news release for a Connecticut summer theater. To his astonishment it ran verbatim in The Middletown Press. He was instantly hooked on writing. After a two-year stint in the U.S. Army (1958-60), Denny had nine jobs in his first 12 years in business. He was fired from five of them and went on to save two businesses and start three others. One of his businesses—WHO’S MAILING WHAT! newsletter and archive service founded in 1984—revolutionized the science of how to measure the success of competitors’ direct mail. In the past 55 years he has been a book club director, magazine publisher, advertising copywriter/designer, editor, journalist and marketing consultant. He is the author of four published novels and seven books on business and marketing.

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