Double Your Copywriting Response…By Not Using A Headline?
Double Your Copywriting Response…By Not Using A Headline?
What would you say if I suggested there are certain cases where you should not use a headline on your sales letter?
Most copywriters I know would say I’m nuts.
I mean, not using a headline is the greatest “sin” of copywriting, isn’t it?
And 99.9% of the time I would agree.
Except…
There are many examples of successful letters — including a couple of my own — that pulled better without a headline.
The most obvious and well-known example would be Gary Halbert’s Duos coat-of-arms letter — one of the most-mailed sales letters in history.
I’ve seen two different versions of that letter. One with typos and one without. And I didn’t see a headline on either of them.
Instead, it looks like a personal letter individually typed on a typewriter, written to one person — and not something mass mailed to everyone in the United States.
You can see it yourself here: Gary Halbert coat-of-arms letter
Do you think that letter, to that audience, selling that product, would have pulled better with a big, bold headline at the top of the page? If it didn’t have that “from the kitchen table of Aunt Martha” look?
Maybe, maybe not. But that letter mailed to hundreds of millions of people without a headline for years.
Another example of a no-headline control letter is this pitch I Panasonic get every few months from a company called “Biotech Research.”
And guess what?
No headline.
Here’s a scan of the first page so you can see Крепления к телевизорам Trone yourself: Biotech air purifier sales letter
And if that’s not “contrarian” enough…this letter also has no subheads, no p.s. and looks like your garden variety piece of corporate “junk” mail.
Interestingly enough, I actually have several dif
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