What Is Advertising According to Claude Hopkins?

David Senra, reading the salesmanship chapter of Scientific Advertising, says advertising is salesmanship. Its principles are the principles of salesmanship, so every advertising question should be answered by the salesman's standards. Advertising is multiplied salesmanship. It may appeal to thousands while the salesman talks to one. A mediocre salesman may affect a small part of the business. Mediocre advertising affects all of it.

Hopkins's test for an ad is the test for a sales call. Would this help a salesman sell the goods? Would it help if you met the buyer in person? Some people say be very brief, because people will read very little. He asks whether you would tell a salesman that, with a prospect standing there, and whether you would confine him to a fixed number of words. He calls that an unthinkable handicap. Treat the reader as one prospect seeking information, and give enough to get action.

The line Senra says David Ogilvy repeated is that the more you tell, the more you sell. Senra says some of the most successful ads run about 15,000 words, an interesting story for someone who already chose to read past the headline. Do not think of people as a mass.