Open Me Now: Direct Mail Envelopes That Work...and Those That Don't

by Herschell Gordon Lewis

If you’re a student of selling by mail, you may have wondered why “experts” write book after book and magazine article after magazine article about letters ... and almost nothing about the envelopes housing those letters. The reason I do is one that becomes obvious the first time you create a brilliant, award-winning, irresistible direct mail campaign ... and it bombs. “What’s wrong with these people?” we cry. “This was aimed right at them. They need it. The price is right. The letter is loaded with dynamite, and we spent a ton of money taking pictures for the brochure. What happened?” The question should be: “What didn’t happen?” If the message is aimed right at them and they need it and the price is right and the letter is loaded with dynamite and the pictures in the brochure are worthy of hanging in The Louvre, what’s missing? Where did we goof? The envelope. If they didn’t open the envelope, all that brilliance was reduced to a zero-watt intensity. The envelope is the greeter, separating us from everyone else…from all the other business mail driven by self-intensifying databases (the best prospect are the best targets and thus get the most mail and thus are harder to reach and even harder to convince). The envelope is the bellwether, molding the recipient’s attitude. It whispers, says, commands, or shouts to the person holding it, “Open me now!” What happens next can determine the fate not just of a mailing but of the organization behind it. And that’s why this book exists. Thanks for agreeing with my premise: If they don’t open the envelope, all the brilliance in every other component is reduced to a zero-watt intensity. Now, let’s get some megawatt envelopes into the mail!

144 pages, Paperback

First published June 30, 1991