I've written something like 4,000 direct mail letters and direct response ads for golf products now. Okay, that's a bit of an exaggeration, but not much. Sometimes, the best ads come from sheer desperation. I was hitting the very bottom of my bag of tricks last year,...

There are two ads referenced in this commentary.  This is the second one (last couple of paragraphs). Another Rodale piece-- this time, they got impatient selling individual books about the various parts of men's lives... and decided to just lump everything together...

Gary Halbert gets credit for the headline and concept on this one. I was working with him at the time, in the last days of the Reagan presidency, when the financial markets -- and especially the precious metals markets -- were causing investors migraines. Banks were...

Here is an early self-defense letter, which struck a major nerve in the customer base for this market. It's run every year for the last decade in the major magazines and mailed even more often to hotlists. The appeal is simple and to the point: This is hard-core...