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SECTION VI
BUSINESS-TO-BUSINESS DIRECT MAIL
One of the most difficult letter writing jobs is creating messages for business executives. These
messages not only have to appeal to the intended recipient, they have to get through the so-called
"secretarial hurdle" as well.
In business offices, advertising mail is often screened by a personal secretary, an office manager,
or in some cases, the mail room. Therefore, a good business-to-business direct mail letter has to
seem important. More business-to-business letters are written than consumer mail order letters.
But since they go to very select audiences, most are never seen by the majority of people in the
direct mail field.
In this section, representative examples of outstanding business-to-business direct mail letters
came from my own files and several response agencies who have business clients. The best of
these letters follow.
IBM DIRECT RESPONSE LETTERS
IBM, like thousands of other business-to-business marketers, was troubled. It watched as the cost
of a traditional personal sales call doubled, tripled, and quadrupled. Something had to be done
or the cost of selling would wipe profit potential.
So IBM set up a task force in its Office Products Division, and studied methods of selling many
products and supplies by various alternate methods. The answer was "IBM Direct" — a combination
of direct mail and telephone marketing to sell many items that had become uneconomical
to sell by direct customer contact. When it became obvious that IBM was out of the testing stage,
many other companies — who had been watching IBM with an eagle eye — ventured into direct
marketing. But IBM gets much of the credit for leading the way.
The letter shown here is typical of many used by IBM's Office Products Division. While it, and
many similar letters used by IBM, might not be considered a "classic" strictly from a copywriting
standpoint, these letters deserve special recognition for their role in leading other business-tobusiness
marketers into direct marketing.
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