Gary Halbert the "Prince of Print"
In the early 80’s, a writer/entrepreneur who, for privacy reasons we’ll call Bob, was scheduled to speak at a seminar promoting his latest book on economics. In an effort to boost attendance, Bob took out an advertisement in a local newspaper, purchased a thousand or so copies and tore out his ad. Bob then purchased an mailing list of what he felt would be his target audience and enlisted the assistance of a friend who owned a small mailing business. Together, they affixed a sticky note personally encouraging the recipient to attend the seminar, impact addressed a #10 envelope and mailed it using a live 1st class stamp. The seminar was a huge success and Bob’s book wound up on the New York Times Best Sellers list for 9 weeks!
This is but one of the countless number of ways that newspaper tear sheets have been used to promote everything from diets, mortgage refinancing, speech writing and car sales, to name a few. The “Atkins Diet” was originally promoted using a newspaper tear sheet and we all know successful that book became.
…and then along came Gary…
Newspaper tear sheet mailings have come a long way since that first seminar. Gary Halbert, also known as the “Prince of Print” with his unique writing style and flair for thinking outside the box, took the newspaper tear sheet to a whole new level by developing it into an art form. Now newspaper tear sheets, along with the hand written sticky notes, hand addressing, smaller colored envelopes that require “special” folds and even multiple stamps to comprise the first class postage, are making their way into the recipients hand and promptly getting opened… no “circular files” here!
Specialized Mailing Services, Inc., was a featured guest speaker at many Gary Halbert seminars attracting the attention of super marketers Dan Kennedy, Jay Abraham, Ted Nicholas, Danny Levinas, Michael Kimball and Brad Antin. SMS was Gary’s private source for both his “unique” packages, cool mail ideas and newspaper tear sheet mailings.
Specialized Mailing has processed millions of newspaper tear sheets and magazine tear sheets over the past 25 years, in addition to newsletters, support letters and some of the craziest mail “grabbers” to ever enter an envelope.
“Gary somehow always managed to get me to do the seemingly impossible, if not craziest things,” Alice said. “Who mails dollar bills to people or wants 5,000 copies of a picture taken at the southern most point in the US?” “Gary, that’s who”, reports Alice Mishica, Owner and President of Specialized Mailing Services Inc.
Alice states that, “It becomes a personal challenge to make it happen for all of my clients who present me with unique mail ideas!” “It’s so great when we suddenly have that aha! moment and everything comes together. There are still an unlimited number of mailing tweaks and twists yet to be discovered – something new every day.” After 20 years of working with “The Prince”, I guess she’d know.
In an ongoing effort to further perfect the art of newspaper tear sheets, SMS, under Alice’s leadership, has formed partnerships with copywriters, graphic artists, creative producers, printers, list brokers and binderies making Specialized Mailing a true one stop shop for all of your direct mail solutions.
So, sorry, Consumer Reports. The “Post-it Bandit” is alive and doing quite well, thank you.
Alice may be contacted at 714-274-2284 or visit www.SpecializedMailing.com
