Advertising, as well as prospecting new clients, is not a one-and-done kind of thing. You have to break through the daily clutter to get noticed and then you have to reinforce it again and again. If you don’t, you are just wasting your time.

As a business advisor I recommend that when you decide on a campaign, be a prospecting campaign or a marketing campaign, make sure you understand that it is for the “long haul”.

I have had this list for many years (I think it is from the 1930’s, but it holds true today) and I recently saw it on the internet somewhere so I dug it out of my archives and wanted to share it with you.

ADVERTISING
1. The first time a man looks at an ad, he doesn’t see it.

2. The second time, he doesn’t notice it.

3. The third time, he is conscious of its existence.

4. The fourth time, he faintly remembers having seen it.

5. The fifth time, he reads the ad.

6. The sixth time, he turns up his nose at it.

7. The seventh time, he reads it through and says, "Oh brother!"

8. The eighth time, he says, "Here’s that confounded thing again!"

9. The ninth time, he wonders if it amounts to anything.

10. The tenth time, he will ask his neighbor if he has tried it.

11. The eleventh time, he wonders how the advertiser makes it.

12. The twelfth time, he thinks it must be a good thing.

13. The thirteenth time, he thinks it might be worth something.

14. The fourteenth time, he remembers that he wanted such a thing for a long time.

15. The fifteenth time, he is tantalized because he cannot afford to buy it.

16. The sixteenth time, he thinks he will buy it someday.

17. The seventeenth time, he makes a memorandum of it.

18. The eighteenth time, he swears at his poverty.

19. The nineteenth time, he counts his money carefully.

20. The twentieth time he sees the ad, he buys the article or instructs his wife to do so.