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Secrets of Direct Mail: The

Dialogue Method by Siegfried
Vögele

Chris Keating

Feb 2 · 8 min read

Error! Filename not specified.

The late Prof. Siegfried Vögele, a founder of modern direct marketing

If you’ve ever read a direct mail letter, you have probably encountered the
work of Siegfried Vögele. Through countless experiments and observations in
the 1970s and 1980s, he was the first person to exhaustively analyse how
people read and interact with letters they receive.

Much of what we today call good practice in direct marketing stems from his
book “Handbook of Direct Marketing — The Dialogue Approach.” Things like
always including a PS or underlining the most relevant parts of the letter,
which lots of people will say the ‘know are important’, were either first
implemented or first proved by his work.
Very sadly, Siegfried Vögele died in 2014. His book is long out of print and sells
for an exorbitant sum. Many of the same things have said since by other
people, but rarely with the same clarity and precision.

If you want to learn this fundamental approach to direct mail, then

read on!

This post covers Vögele’s approach and the principles behind it. I’m in the
process of writing a series of posts with the details of how to apply the Dialogue
Method to different aspects of a mailing.Post 2 is about envelopes!

The Dialogue Method

There’s one key insight that lies behind Siegfried Vögele’s approach. Let’s do a
thought experiment to illustrate it.

Imagine: You’re at home drinking a cup of tea quietly, and

someone knocks on your door unexpectedly.

What thoughts go through your head?

Who is it? What do they want? Am I expecting a delivery today? Is

it really worth my effort engaging with them?Maybe they’re selling
something. Or maybe the Police are finally catching up with me!

You look through the keyhole. There’s a young person there, smartly dressed,
some kind of ID badge visible. Probably selling something. What are they
selling? Do I really care? Should I open the door, or pretend to be asleep?

You open the door. “Hi, I’m Becky and I’m from…. We’re just doing some
fundraising in your street. Could you spare five minutes to talk about how you
can support the capybaras?” She holds up a photo of a cute animal.

Chances are that by now you know whether you want to keep
talking about the plight of the capybaras, or whether you want to
end the conversation as quickly as possible.

That’s because you now have the answer to many more questions.
What do they want? Probably money. What for? Some kind of animal. Do
I care about animal charities? Does it sound interesting? Is it worth
the time to have the conversation?

Twenty unspoken questions

Siegfried Vögele’s essential insight is that people approach a direct mail

item with roughly the same questions, in roughly the same order, as
they do a salesperson knocking on their door.

People ask themselves at least 20 unspoken questions as they go

through the process of picking up a mail item, deciding whether to open it,
deciding whether to read it, reading it, and deciding whether to respond.

That might seem like a lot of questions — but don’t forget, people think quickly,
much more quickly than they speak or type.

If you design your direct mail item to lead people through these questions and
give positive answers to them, then you have the best chance of getting the
response you want.

Filters and Amplifiers

Vögele terms anything which increases engagement with a direct mail item as
an amplifier. It’s a little “yes” that takes you on the way towards the big “YES”
of a response.

Amplifiers are anything that give clear, positive answers to the

reader’s unspoken questions.

Amplifiers might also reinforce the answer that the reader has already given,
producing a sense of satisfaction. An amplifier makes the reader more likely to
read on, and more likely to ultimately respond.

A filter is anything confusing, irrelevant or uninteresting.

It’s a little “no” that takes you on the way towards the big “NO” of your mailing
being thrown away. A filter fails to answer the reader’s unspoken questions, or
gives a boring or negative answer, or contradicts a previous answer. A filter
makes the reader less likely to respond.

Example of filters and amplifiers: “Who is this from?”

Imagine a letter with a logo on the envelope, a return address on the flap that
matches the logo, a logo on the letterhead, and a signatory who mentions their
name, job title and organisation at the bottom of the letter. All those things are
clear and consistent answers to “Who is this from?” — which is an amplifier. If
the organisation is one the recipient knows or likes or is expecting a letter from
— that’s a further amplifier. The letter is very likely to be read.

Now imagine there is one logo on the envelope and a different logo on the
letterhead, and the signature is an illegible scribble with no further details. You
have no idea who this is from, you’re already irritated with it, and you will have
to read it properly to find out. That’s a filter. This letter is already on the verge
of being thrown in the bin.

The quality of your direct mail pack, and the likely response rate, can be
expressed in the equation: Impact = Amplifiers — Filters

What are the unspoken questions?

Everyone asks unspoken questions like “Who is this from? What do

they want? Do I care about it?”

Other unspoken questions are specific to products, categories,

organisations or individual customers. “How much are they asking for
this time? Have they remembered that I sent them a cheque last month?”
might be one set of questions. “When is this up for renewal? How much do they
want? Can I still cancel with no hassle?” could be a third.

Vögele suggests brainstorming what questions your customers will have. He

observed that sales and customer services staff will know what comes up in the
real conversations that your direct mail replaces.

Planning campaigns to increase your amplifiers

Effective direct mail, according to Vögele, is direct mail with many amplifiers.
It leads your customers to find the right answers to their unspoken questions.
While much of his work is about how you design and write your direct
mail, filters and amplifiers start at the planning stage of your
campaign. Inappropriate personalisation, irrelevant offers, and inaccurate
names or addresses are all big filters you need to avoid.

Do you know your donors or customers? What motivates them to buy or give?
Can you prove it? Have you tested it? These questions are all still important.

The Roles of Envelope, Letter, Response

Form, and Enclosures
The envelope for your letter is the “first contact stage” — equivalent to
what happens when you open the door and see the person who’s knocking.

The letter itself is the “contact stage”, the start of the actual
conversation.Vögele believes that people look for answers to personal
questions like “why write to me?” “Where did they get my address from?” and
“Who signed it?” from the letter, and only from the letter.

A response form or card is the “concluding phase”, which answers

questions like “What should I do?” “Do I have to sign anything?” “Do I need a
stamp?”. If there’s no response device, the reader will assume no response is
needed.

Often, there will be more questions that need answers between the letter and
the response form. If you’re selling a complicated or expensive product, then
you’ll probably have a long conversation about features and benefits before
anyone replies. That’s the role of enclosures, brochures and similar. (At least, it
is if you’re aiming to seal the deal with one mailing, rather than have a
response that’s an expression of interest that you will follow up with further
information)

The First Twenty Seconds

On picking up a letter, the recipient spends up to twenty seconds
deciding whether they are going to read it properly. These are the
most important twenty seconds for you — because if everyone throws your
mailing away (or even puts it in a pile to one side to read later) then you have
no hope of getting any responses.

The key questions to answer in the first twenty seconds are:

 Who is this from?

 What do they want from me?

 What benefit is there in it for me?

 Do I need it?

 Is it for me?

[An observation: For those of us in the charity sector, we might replace these
with: “What are they asking me to do?” “Is this something I care about?” “What
can I achieve if I donate?”]

The first twenty seconds break down into three phases.

0 to 8 seconds: Opening the envelope. The recipient looks at the

envelope, reads the address, the sender, and any other information, then open
it and unfolds the contents.

9 to 12 seconds: Unfolding the contents. The recipient forms a picture of

what the mailing is about, based on the mailing contents as they come out of
the envelope and are unfolded.

13 to 20 seconds: Skim-reading the contents. The recipient sees pictures

and headlines. They look at the letter, starting at the heading, address, and
“Dear Bob,” and skip straight to signatory and the PS.
Error! Filename not specified.

The order in which the reader will read you letter! (Handbook of Direct Mail, p.186)

If the recipient has started to read your letter within 20 seconds of

picking it up, then you’re doing well!

The next stages start with reading your letter in more detail, looking at the
enclosures, possibly researching your product and discussing it with
colleagues, friends or family — and hopefully ends with a response.
 Wrapping up…
I first encountered titbits from the Dialogue Method when I was training to be
a campaign manager for a political party. But I didn’t realise it was a coherent
method until I first read about it in Mal Warwick’s “How to Write Effective
Fundraising Letters”, and then bought Vögele’s Handbook.

I found the dialogue method revolutionised my thinking about how to create

direct mail — and even 13 years later I still find myself thinking “How is
someone going to read this? Is that really the right way to phrase it
on the envelope? Are we really clear enough about the benefits of
reading on?”Hopefully you will feel the same way!

Look out for the rest of the series to find out more about how to improve every
element of your pack to be more likely to get a better response.

Part 2: Envelopes

Disclosure: Some of the links in this article are Amazon affiliate links. In the
remarkably unlikely event that anyone buys a copy of the Handbook of Direct
Mail as a result of reading this article, I will receive a trivial sum of money
which I will donate to needy capybaras (or other charities)
Some rights reserved

 Marketing

 Direct Mail Marketing

 Fundraising

 Copywriting

 Design
11 claps

WRITTEN BY

Chris Keating
Fundraiser who believes in the power of insight and learning to inspire
donors https://www.linkedin.com/in/chrisjkeating/
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Answering The Right
Questions With Your
Envelope (Secrets of Direct
Mail pt2)

Chris Keating

Feb 9 · 10 min read

Much good practice in direct mail was first described in Prof Siegfried
Vögele’s “Handbook of Direct Mail” in the late 1980s. I’m doing a series of
posts to share his insights. Check out the first post, which is all about the
approach!

Imagine you’ve picked up an envelope from your doormat. Odds are, the first
thing you do is look at the address on it, to check it’s meant for you. Once
you’ve done that, you’ll very quickly look at it to work out what it’s about.

According to Siegfried Vögele, the following questions are likely to be running

through your mind.

 What do they want from me?

 What benefit is there in it for me?

 Do I need it?

 Is it for me?

Within about eight seconds of picking up the envelope, you’ll decide whether to
open it or throw it away — or possibly, put it to one side to open later.
If your job is creating direct mail to generate leads, sales, donations or change
of any kind, then you want your letters to be read — and for the recipient to
then act on the contents. Read on to hear what Siegfried Vögele has to say that
will help you!

A caveat: Exactly what approach works for you, your cause/product and
your audience is a question that can only really be answered by testing. Any
theory can only suggest approaches you MIGHT take. If in doubt, send half
your audience one version and half your audience the other on the same day,
and see what happens!

The “Original Letter”

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The envelope of an “Original Letter” — a plain personal letter from a real person, which is very likely to
be opened.

A real letter from a real person is what Voegele terms an “Original

Letter”.

An “Original Letter” has a plain, normal-sized envelope, and regular postage.

It’s clearly addressed to the individual, from an actual person, who has good
reason to write.
“Original letters” range from an emotional note from long-lost great-aunt, to a
boring but possibly important letter from your doctor or insurance company.
Inside an “original letter” you expect to find few, or no, enclosures.

An “Original letter”, or something that looks like one, is very likely to be picked
up off the mat and opened.

Error! Filename not specified.

The addition of the photo and the text make it obvious this is letter is advertising something. Whether it
gets opened will depend on whether it suggests the contents are worth reading.

The opposite of an “original letter” is advertising. A coloured, designed

envelope with photos or copy implies that the communication is
mainly selling something. It might be clear from the address that there’s
some kind of personally-addressed letter inside — and it’s great if there is !—
but the recipient now expects that there will be some kind of request for time
or money inside.

No, not everything should come in a plain white envelope

A common mistake about the Dialogue Method is thinking everything should

look like an “original letter” in a plain envelope.

Plain envelopes make a promise to the reader that the contents are
personal, timely and relevant. If this turns out to be right, that’s a big
amplifier. But if it’s wrong, it’s a big filter. [More about the definition of
“filters” and “amplifiers”]

If someone opens a plain envelope to find a personally-addressed letter and a

small number of enclosures, they say a small “yes”. Their guess that this was a
real letter has been proved right. This is an amplifier. All the better if the letter
is from an organisation — or even a person! — the reader actually knows.

By contrast, if someone opens a plain envelope to find a leaflet, or a letter

addressed “Dear Homeowner,” or just about something totally irrelevant —
their guess is proved wrong and they say a small “no”. They’re less likely to
respond positively!

So before you go down the “plain envelope” route for a direct mail
communication, you need to be very sure that what you’re writing about
justifies it. Did the recipient ask you to write? Are they expecting something?
Are you on the list of organisations they actually are interested to hear from?

The Blue Ink Letter

The best example of the “Original Letter” approach I know is from politics.
[Apologies for the digression from Siegfried Voegele, who doesn’t mention
politics at all, but it’s an instructive example.]

In close election campaigns, the UK’s Liberal Democrat party often send letters
to voters that look handwritten, on light blue paper, in light blue envelopes that
have actually been addressed by hand. These are usually timed to land on
doormats two to four days before the election.

Does this work? Surely, no-one thinks a politician is a real person with a real
reason to write to them?

In fact these can be very effective— but it depends on both content and

context. It works when the campaign has created the impression that the
candidate as a champion of the local community, as much as their actual
politics. Then the letter inside the envelope is written in the tone of a
neighbour writing to someone who lives down their street, not the tone of a
politician pitching for votes. By doing these things the Liberal Democrats gain
acceptance that these communications are real letters from real people, not a
cynical marketing ploy by desperate politicians.
Effective “advertising” envelopes

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An “advertising” pack with a clear benefits for readers who like capybara

If the envelope isn’t plain, then the objective of the envelope is to make

it clear why the reader should care about the contents. What’s
inside, and do they want to engage with it?

If you’re writing to appeal for vital funds to save the capybara, you might as
well have photos of cute capybara on the outside of the envelope, so your
audience of capybara lovers go “Yes, capybara! I know what’s inside!” and then
feel a glow of satisfaction when they find your capybara-related material inside.

This gives your audience good answers to their unspoken questions. Not only
have they correctly guessed it’s advertising (yes!) they have correctly guessed
it’s something they might be interested in!

(Of course, this assumes that what you’re writing about is actually interesting
to your audience. But if you’re not, there is almost nothing you can do that will
make your campaign a success.)

It’s certainly possible to create lavish envelopes with strong photos and bold
copy. But you don’t necessarily need to do this. Even a relatively light-touch
cue can give someone a lot of information about the contents of the envelope,
and answer their unspoken questions.

Envelope size, and postage

People also use the size of an envelope and the postage on it as a clue to the
contents.

When Siegfried Voegle was writing in the 1980s, he found that a C6 envelope
looked personal, a DL envelope looked personal or commercial, a C5 envelope
was almost always seen as commercial, and a larger or irregularly sized
envelope inevitably looked like advertising, even if the envelope was plain.

The main takeaway from this is that if you’re going down the “original letter”,
keep-it-simple, route, then you’re best placed to stick with the kind of
envelopes that are used for actual letters — DL or C6, maybe C5.

Postage also gives some clue as to the contents. The most “original” kind of
postage is of course stamps. Vögele found that stamps on a letter from an
individual or small business looked more individual, but letters that were from
a large company didn’t seem any more personal because a stamp was added.
Franked or mailsorted envelope suggests that it’s some kind of commercial or
official correspondence, though it might still count as an ‘original letter’.

That’s pretty much all Siegfried Vögele said about envelopes. However, re-
reading the Handbook of Direct Mail prompted many thoughts, and I’ll discuss
them in the rest of this post.

Is a plain envelope even possible?

It’s very difficult to have any mass direct mail with a properly plain envelope.
You’re likely to have a return address and registered company/charity details,
probably on the envelope flap. You will very probably end up with your logo
and possibly the logo of a regulator or trade body as well.

That is enough to give the audience plenty of clues about who the letter is from.
And if they have an answer to “Who’s this from?” they can probably
make an informed guess about “What’s this about?”
After all, most letters from most organisations are pretty consistent. Hotel
Chocolat are unlikely to be asking for donations, the Capybara Club are
unlikely to be enclosing tax details, and the Tax Office is unlikely to be giving
me 10% off my next chocolate order.

If your audience knows who you are, or is expecting a letter, or has found
previous letters interesting, the recipient’s expectations will act as an
amplifier. If you’re not confident about those things, then you probably need
to take particular care to highlight the benefits of opening your envelope — that
is to say, what the recipient will gain from ultimately acting on the call to action
inside.

Should we ask for money / indicate the

price on the envelope?

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Usually money is mentioned towards the end of a conversation, not in the first sentence — unless your
audience is already persuaded that buying (or giving) is what they really want to do.

Working in fundraising, I’ve often heard people suggest that we should ask
directly for money on the envelope. “Your gift today will save the capybara!”
Often, I’ve heard this from people whose background is in major donor
fundraising, who are trained to always be very clear and upfront in ‘making the
ask’.

However, think back to the principles of the Dialogue Method.

How many salespeople open the door and say “Hi, I’m Chris, and
I’m here to ask you for £10 a month for the capybara?” Not very many!
Usually the mention of money and how much comes some time into the
conversation — at the end, or at least the beginning of the end, after the
potential donor or customer has said “yes” to smaller questions. If the recipient
is asking themselves “How much is it? Can I afford it this month?” then you
have already overcome questions like “Do I need this?” or “Who will this
donation help?”

The dialogue method suggests the right thing to do is to focus on the

benefits of giving, not on the price or amount you are asking for.

Why then do some very successful major donor fundraisers get this wrong
when it comes to direct mail?

If a major donor fundraiser is ‘making the ask’ to a wealthy individual, then

much of the conversation has already happened. There have already been
meetings, calls and letters that have established the person concerned is
interested in the cause and what in particular they might wish to fund. And
they have already agreed to the appointment with the lady or gentleman from
the Development Office, knowing full well that they are going to be asked for
money.

We direct mail fundraisers have to cover much of that same ground in the
twenty seconds it takes for someone to decide whether or not to read a letter,
with perhaps ten thousand people at a time.

When might it be a good idea to ask for money on the outside of the
envelope?

Of course sometimes a prospective donor is already expecting to be asked for

money. If they’re a member of your organisation, and they know their
membership will be up for renewal. Or perhaps if they’re used to getting your
emergency appeals and they’ve seen and heard about another disaster through
the media.

In these situations, your ask is already set up. You might as well just make it.

What role does “intrigue” have?

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The question on this envelope creates confusion in the reader’s mind, rather than guiding them through
their unanswered questions.

I often hear people talk about using intrigue and suspense as a method of
getting the envelope opened.

After all, most direct mail is boring. So surely it’s a great idea to grab
your reader’s interest by putting text on the envelope text saying “What secrets
lie in this envelope?” or “What has no legs in the morning, four legs at
lunchtime, and four legs in the evening?”*

Voegele doesn’t deal with this directly, but his method is about answering
questions, not about creating them.
Your reader already has questions like “What’s this about?” on their mind.
They don’t need even more questions, and they definitely don’t need confusing
answers to the questions they already have!

Going back to the face-to-face sales analogy — how often does a salesperson
open a conversation with “Hi, my name’s Chris, would you like to see inside my
mystery box?” Not very often!**

The Dialogue Method suggests that a “teaser” envelope will work

best when the “tease” is so obvious that it’s actually selling
benefits of reading the letter and responding.

Error! Filename not specified.

If the reader already knows this is a capybara, then it’s clearer that inside is a chance to help them. For
the right audience, this might help answers questions like “What is this about?” and “Am I interested?”

If you judge your ‘teaser’ copy or question correctly, then it will help answer
questions like “What’s this about” and “Am I interested?”, even if obliquely.
After all, if I can see an envelope is from a charity I support, I probably know
it’s probably asking for money. If it’s from a chocolate company, it’s probably
selling me chocolate. Reinforcing that guess, and suggesting an interesting
answer, will act as an amplifier.
 Summing up…
If your envelope doesn’t get opened, your letter will never be read and no-one
will respond. So the eight seconds it takes for someone to decide to open the
envelope are important!

An “original letter” in a plain envelope with no signs of being a

marketing communication is likely to be read and opened. But don’t
create false promise — it may be better to use your envelope to give
clear and enticing answers to questions like “What’s inside?” and
“Am I interested in this?”

Thank you for reading this far! You can find the first post in this series about
the Dialogue Method here. And next time: The letter itself and how people read
it.

Footnotes

*Answer: A capybara

** Actually, I’ve seen this done once — at a gaming convention where it was
obvious there was some kind of game inside the mystery box!

Image Credits

Caracara standing on Capybara, Charles J Sharp via Wikimedia Commons, CC-

BY-SA Capybara in Chester Zoo, Nigel Swales via Flickr, CC-BY-SA. In
accordance with the licence terms of the photos, the graphics using them are
licenced as CC-BY-SA.
Some rights reserved

 Nonprofit

 Direct Mail Marketing

 Fundraising

 Direct Marketing

 Design
11 claps

WRITTEN BY

Chris Keating
Fundraiser who believes in the power of insight and learning to inspire
donors https://www.linkedin.com/in/chrisjkeating/
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