He showed me the ad he had prepared. It was well written, of display size-large enough to be noticed. He told me it would cost him over $100. I explained to him that these men were at a convention, had meetings during the day and at night would probably be going to shows and night clubs. In all probability, during their spare time, they would be drinking, eating, and dancing-certainly would not be sitting alone in a hotel room reading Women’s Wear clipping his ad, and then rushing to the phone to ask him for an interview. This had never entered his head.
I added that I thought he would be wasting his money, for when people attended conventions they were too busy. Even if people saw his ad it was not likely that they would act upon it at that time; and if they did nothing about it at that time, they probably never would.
The following morning Lewis L. called me to say he had decided to place the ad anyway. I answered that I hoped it would bring results; in any case, it was a noble experiment. I asked him to tabulate the results for the benefit of others. A day went by, a second, a third, then a whole week. Each day he called at the newspaper office for his expected answers. No answers ever came in-not a single one. Lewis L. was a very disappointed man.
It was then that I finally persuaded him to use his broadcast letter. He had continually argued against the idea, saying that hiring wasn't done that way in the department-store field. In spite of this, he mailed several hundred letters the following week to department-store presidents over the entire country. This letter literally exploded into interviews, and he was invited to places as far away as Texas, Oklahoma, and Canada.
The interview he had in Ottawa, Canada, proved to be the gold mine. A family-owned department store was in trouble. It had been run by a father and his son. The father was ill and in the hospital, and the son needed help. Lewis L. was interviewed by the son in the morning and by the father (in the hospital) in the afternoon. Before five o'clock the same day, he was offered the job. He was at work a week later.
I have in front of me copies of the New York Women's Wear Daily and the News Record. Each carried Lewis L.'s picture and announcement that he now was general merchandise manager of this Canadian store. Just another "miracle."
The advertisement mentioned in the beginning of this chapter cost more money than did the letter campaign. The ad pulled nothing, but the letters did the trick. If he had mailed out letters immediately, he would have saved himself a lot of grief. Lewis was like many others for he was a skeptic in the broadcast-letter method, and he had to be converted. Many more people have since placed ads in the ''Job Wanted" columns of the daily papers. Of all the people I have worked with, I do not know of a single one who was satisfied with the results.
One man wrote me a very detailed report on his job-getting experience. He is the only one who had a goodly number of replies from ads. The following ad appeared in the financial section of the Sunday New York Times. It cost $23 for one insertion. The result was eighteen answers but no job.
COST ACCOUNTANT PRODUCTION PLANNER
Business School graduate, former Navy Lt. Commander commanding own ship, age 30, previous experience in production, planning, desires factory accounting position with future. Would consider assistant controller, small company. Y 2205 Times
That year there was a labor shortage in certain industries. Business was looking for men to hire. Personnel people searched through newspapers. Employment agencies were active in this hunt. Many of them wrote to the "Job Wanted" advertisers.
When you are in a seller's market as far as jobs are concerned, you may do much better with the number of replies you get to your ad, but you will also do much better at such times in the number of replies you will get to your letter campaigns.
The following letter is from another man relating his experience with advertising:
Dear Carl:
Here is further proof about the uselessness of advertisements. I placed this ad in the Sunday edition of a New York paper seven weeks ago. Up to now I have received not one single reply. Sincerely,
INTL MANAGEMENT EXEC
Plan organizes and directs your operations. Diversified background in finance marketing manufacturing concentration in Europe common market and Latin America. Market development licensing acquisitions diversification negotiations worldwide background with education and career specialization in international commercial operations Harvard MBA reply.
F576 Times.
If you feel you must advertise, be dignified and conservative. Give the future employer one or two good concrete examples of accomplishments, with measurable results.
Recently I asked one of my men whether he had done any advertising in getting his job. He had just gotten a position as overseas sales manager for a drug manufacturer. This is what he told me: "In scanning advertisements in the papers for jobs that fitted me, I also used to look over the ads of men advertising for jobs. In this way, I ran across the ads of three men who had experience similar to my own, I wrote to each one of them. I offered to share the job leads which did not interest me any longer in return for similar leads from them. I also asked them to let me know what their experience had been in getting interviews through the ads." He stated further, "I heard from two of them. Each one was thoroughly disgusted with the results obtained. They stated that they had heard from people offering to sell them name lists; others offered resume construction for a fee; others had letter printing and addressing to sell. The majority offered a job in return for a financial investment in their business."
Here is another letter in answer to my request for information on the value of advertising for a job;
Dear Carl:
I am writing to you with reference to the information that you wanted about my experience with "position wanted" ads. In accordance with your advice on the conducting of a campaign, I proceeded to do in a routine fashion everything you advised.
First, prepare a resume, then a solicitation letter, obtain a mailing list and send out letters. At that time, instead of waiting for re plies announcing fabulous new offers or for my fairy godmother to intervene with a perfect proposition, I proceeded to take any other action that would have a contributory effect on my objective-namely, call on all executive recruiters, register at all interesting employment agencies and, thirdly, if financially able, insert a Position Wanted advertisement.
At the same time, I sent a Form Letter that appeared as a personal letter to other Position Wanted advertisers and stated that as my background and interests were somewhat similar, I was also advertising and at the same time conducting a mailing campaign using the enclosed Form Letter; and that I would be very interested in exchanging experiences or possible leads if they would care to get in touch with me.
As a result of sending out about seventy-five of these letters, I was contacted by long-distance phone and received letters from all over the United States. The men who wrote said that they would contact me when they came to New York and would then exchange ideas about job hunting. The consensus was that the advertisements were a complete waste of money. Almost every one experienced the same result in getting replies. Most of them were from people who wanted to run our campaigns for us or to write our resumes, usually at exorbitant prices; or from life insurance salesmen asking for an appointment to discuss life insurance. In addition, many of the men received junk mail, advertising many different items for purchase. Occasionally fly-by-night promoters would have a hot scheme to discuss, usually involving an investment of money, or working time.
Sincerely,
In the final analysis this man secured his job through a mail campaign.
Recently someone brought me the following advertisement:
BOSS WANTED BY YOUNG MAN ON WAY DOWN WHO WANTS TO GO BACK UP.
9 Years Top Publication Experience-Space Sales, Sales Prom., Merchandising. College Degree, plus 2 Yrs. of Graduate Work. 32, Mar. & Family. Finest Ref.
I don't know how this advertiser made out-whether or not he was given a chance for a comeback. My immediate reaction was, "What is wrong with this man? Did he fall into the cellar and needs someone to pull him out? What was it that pulled him down? Why does he have to go to this length?" There are too many negative reactions created in the reader's mind for such an ad to be useful.
"Situation Wanted" ads are usually used by people who are in a job and for some reason or other want to move. Getting possible interview exposure this way eliminates the risk of having their present employer discover that they are looking for a job. From the replies, they are able to sort out and eliminate the names of those companies with whom they dare not pursue an interview.
Advertising under these circumstances is a time-consuming affair. It is like fishing in the middle of the lake and hoping some fish will see your bait. I suppose that is why so many frustrated people are locked in their jobs. They want to get out but can't find the courage and lack the know-how to take the first positive step.
Over the years my experience, in looking on as people tried using "Help Wanted" ads, or classified and display advertising, has been that the results have been too poor to warrant their use. Who do you suppose is most likely to spot your ad in the paper in case you did advertise? My guess is that it would be the personnel director or one of his assistants. If you did get called in, who do you think would be the person most likely to interview you? My guess again is the personnel director or his assistant. You can be absolutely positive that it will not be the president or any other officer. If you want your interview to be with an officer of a company-and you do, don't expect to get it through inserting a situation-wanted ad.
