Advertising Is Good For You

'Hey, mortgage company, thanks for scaring the crap out of me' said no one ever

A very official-looking envelope arrived in the mail yesterday. I knew it was probably junk mail but I opened it anyway. Just in case.

This is what was inside:

For a split second I thought the IRS was was after me.

But, no, this was an offer to refinance my mortgage. To an adjustable rate mortgage, no less.

The folks at Residential Finance designed their direct mail solicitation to look like something from the IRS.

Look at the box in the top right-hand corner of the blue letter, then look at this sample 1099 from the IRS:

The similarity was just close enough to fool me into a momentary panic. 

Once I realized what it really was, I scanned the solicitation to use in this post. And then I put it through the shredder.

Scaring people is not a good advertising strategy.

Advertising Arts & Crafts: Junk Mail Houses

Artist Jeremiah Johnson creates "Dream Homes" from direct mail credit card solicitations.

Click here to see more work by Jeremiah Johnson.

Amir Zainorin creates portraits from junk mail postcards

Click here to see more of Amir Zainorin's work.

                                                                                        Via Collabcubed

Ruinart Champagne postcards

These great postcard illustrations are from Eight Hour Day.

Click here to see a campaign for Dom Perignon featuring Eva Herzigova.

Sandhi Schimmel Gold creates portraits from junk mail

Click here to see more of Sandhi Schimmel Gold's work.

Junk Mail Queens

Artist Sandhi Schimmel Gold creates portraits from direct mail solicitations.

To see more of her works, visit Sandhi Schimmel Gold's website.

 

Art that Rocks! from Joe Petruccio

One man's trash is Joe Petruccio's canvas. The artist has recycled business reply cards from Rolling Stone magazine subscription solicitations and turned them into a collection of watercolor portraits he calls Art that Rocks! 

Click here to see more of Joe Petruccio's work.

Kurt Cobain:

Bruce Springsteen:

Also Bruce Springsteen:

Jimi Hendrix:

The Beatles:

I love a rhyming tag line

Click to enlarge. So you can read the tag line. What did you think I meant?

Found at Copyranter.

This is curious

Somehow my name got on a mailing list of morbidly obese people.

Advertising Arts & Crafts: junk mail lei

Instructions for making a junk mail lei are at Instructables.

What "LAST & FINAL CHANCE" really means

One of my favorite magazines wants me to renew my subscription.

Actually, the magazine started bugging me to renew almost as soon as my last subscription began.

Naturally, I've been ignoring the mail solicitations.

It's part stubbornness on my part. I simply refuse to renew a subscription when I still have practically a year's worth of magazines coming to me.

It's also about money. Direct marketers typically offer the best deals in their LAST effort to a subscriber before purging the person from their mailing list.

This is the junk mail I wait for:

"LAST & FINAL CHANCE" typically means "this is the best offer we're going to make you." 

In effect, the loyal readers who resubscribe early oftentimes pay more for the same subscription than those who wait until the last minute.

It may not seem fair but it makes sense. Look at it this way: every time you ignore a renewal request, many publishers will sweeten the pot to get you to reconsider.

Junk mail fail

Going through the mail the other day, I came across a simple white envelope from one of my utility companies.

On the outside of the envelope was printed this headline:

IMPORTANT SERVICE NOTICE ENCLOSED.
PLEASE RESPOND IMMEDIATELY.

My blood pressure spiked as I read it.

I was convinced this was a statement from the utility telling me it about to turn off my service. I tore into that envelope convinced I was in for a months-long battle trying to proof that I was up to date on my payments.

My blood pressure spiked again when I saw what was inside: a letter trying to sell me an upgrade.

Direct response advertising is my specialty. No one knows better than I the importance of getting a prospect to open the envelope. BUT YOU'RE NOT SUPPOSED TO PISS PEOPLE OFF IN THE PROCESS.

Disgusted, I threw the letter away. Then went back to fish it out so I could write this post.

Now I get the satisfaction of throwing it away a second time.

Junk mail couture

According to Craftzine:

Colorful junk mail (catalogues, solicitations, newspaper ads) were folded into fans and sewn onto a skirt and dress made of scrap canvas and a mantilla for the hair. The vintage shoes are covered with old postage stamps. The inspiration for this outfit came from the origami peacock earrings- Nancy Judd made them in 1988 when she designed and sold origami jewelry for a summer job."