Dunn's Den of Knowledge.

In the first session of my advertising classes I ask the students if think they could be copy writers. They all say yes, with varying degrees of conviction.

 Then I ask them to prove it: “OK, I have reserved advertising space in tomorrow’s paper. I have a goat that I want to get rid of.  Write a headline for my ad.”

 They set to work, and after a few minutes they gleefully want to share their inspirations. Some of the memorable lines were, “Buy a cheap labor saving device,” or “Give this poor goat a loving home.”  In every class someone comes up with a version of, “Don’t let somebody else get your goat.”

 I stop the hilarity and say, “Is this a Billy or a Nanny Goat?”  Someone answers, “We don’t know, you didn’t tell us.” I reply, “You didn’t ask.”

 So it goes with other questions: How old is this goat? Is it healthy? Does it come from a line of good goats? Why is it for sale?  “You didn’t tell us!” Again, “You didn’t ask.”

 Then I get into the buyer.  Who buys goats, and why? What are some problems with goats? “How should we know?”

 The point of this story is you should never write an ad until you know what you’re talking about. So far I’ve only had one student who refused the assignment. She said, “I don’t know anything about this goat. I can’t do it.” (She was engineering major and knew nothing about marketing.)

If you want to sell a goat, get steeped in goat lore. Get to know goat owners and goat lovers.  Go so far as to get one yourself.

Then decide, what is the one most important thing you should claim about this goat?  That is its positioning. Now you are ready to write an ad. And your ad will have a good chance of actually selling that goat.  

George Lemmond