Gary Halbert is remembered for a lot of things.
* The writer of the most mailed sales letter in history: “The Coat of Arms Letter.”
* A gifted and profound teacher who’s probably influenced more direct response practitioners today than any other.
* An oddball uncle whose direct marketing and real world wisdom could be counted on.
One of the things he’s not as well known for, yet was a world class master of, is the space ad.
Gary took a perverse pleasure in coming up with some of the weirdest pseudonyms in his early display ads.
When I saw him at Gary Bencivenga’s seminar in 2005, I complimented him on them and we talked about these early ads.
This one was written 21 years ago for Tova Borgnine and is a textbook example of a direct response ad for a beauty product.
Though the “reason why” and U.S.P are compellingly stated in this concise ad, the biggest take away however, is the response boosting nuance in the last paragraph.
If you are in the Southern California Area, you may pick up the product at 8920 Wilshire Boulevard, Beverly Hills, California, between the hours of 8:30 to 5:30 Monday to Friday.
In Gary’s opinion, this one little closing paragraph boosted response to this ad by at least 15%.
Why?
There were no customer lines on Wilshire Boulevard. Almost no one showed up to pick up the product in person.
What this paragraph did was strengthen the association between the product and it’s place of origin — Beverly Hills — a place that’s loaded with connotations of wealth, beauty and luxury.
More importantly, it persuaded even the most skittish prospect that, yes, this is a bona fide product from a legitimate company…so much so that they invite you to their Beverly Hills location to pick it up.
Devilishly reassuring.
Here is a full page PDF of: “Amazing New Formula from Beverly Hills Lets You Look Years Younger.”
“TheGaryHalbertLetter.com” The greatest copywriting newsletter archive on the planet!
I’m interested in more Gary Halbert space ads.
Yes, I’m interested in more Gary Halbert ads.
Gary Halbert was many things – love him or hate him… but for me he was a life line… he helped me in many ways… he was the inspiration for me into the funnel-vortex of copywritting and direct response advertising… his web site was/is one of the greatest places on the planet…(i must have read over 750 pages of priceless material) he gave a lot… just so others might be inspired… god rest his soul.He will be missed by many.
Gary was a master of his art and his Website and the newsletters were a real treasure trove. Amazing that he gave away so much compared with stuff that others, lessers, charge for. I’d love to see more of his ads. There’ll be much to learn from them, I’m sure.
You know Mike Senoff of “Hard to Find Seminars” is
an excellent FREE resource for a lot of this material.
He even has free audio interviews with many of these
people.
Worth checking out!
Mike Smith
FingerBiz.Com
Awesome post Lawrence, funny thing, I’ve been going over Gary’s “root canal” seminar and his “fusion seminar” dvds and he talked about this very thing alot.
He spoke about just renting a small office, a physical place, so that you can put that address in your ads. Telling people to come visit, and giving relative location as to where you are “across from the library on 2nd” or whatever.
It’s amazing how much this can boost response, but actually, it makes sense. Gives the sense of a real person, company, a real business…and not just some fly by night operation.
I’m definitely interested in more Halbert space ads, I have his motherload collection as well as the 57 master sales letters from one of his copywriting boot camps, not sure if all the space ads are in there…but I’m always open to more.
keep em coming.
What did you mean by “A pirate in business”?
Gary was a great inspiration and continues to offer inspiration and guidance every day. I have some of his stuff but am always interested in more. His instruction on how to learn to write copy is without a doubt the best piece of advice anyone in this business can get. I still write at least one classic ad a week by hand. Sometimes more. This simple exercise of using your hand and pen and paper stimulates more creativity than almost anything I know of. Thanks Gary and Thanks Lawrence for this posting.
David
Thanks Lawrence for this posting.Gary Halbert was a direct response master.I’m definitely interested in more of his space ads.
The more Halbert, the better!
Rod
Awesome post Lawrence!
Also useful how the picture in the ad works. (The eyes of the woman in the picture looking towards the first paragraph of the ad.)
Great… great… great!
Gary’s ads POP more than balloons
at a 5 year old’s birthday.
Interesting thing is…
Gary’s stuff is FUN to read.
Yet he’s still effective!
I’d love more Gary… with a little Carlton
thrown in too!
Thanks Lawrence.
Lawrence,
Could you explain what you meant by “pirate in business”? I’m quite curious. Thanks! 🙂
And as always, thank you for this site.
I’m interested in more Gary Halbert space ads.
I’m just getting introduced to his magic.
I’m really bummed he passed away: I would of love to have met him.
Adam
I’m interested in the letters if it’s still available. Unfortunatly, I wasn’t introduced to these ideas earlier.
Lawerence,
If you have more, I’m interested in anything Gary has written. And to be quite frank, I don’t care if it happens to be something I already possess in my swipe file. The way I see it, when it comes to “the likes” of Gary (or any of the other legendary writers), to revisit something I make already have will only sharpen the blade.
Thanks.
jerry
Hey Joe,
How do you get the Halbert seminars?
Regards,
Nick
I met gary in key west fl in around 2000 and what an inspiration he was to me.so sorry to hear about his passing