After William Caxton started littering the Streets of London with his various and sundry handbills in the 1480's, direct marketing took off. While the good folk of the 15
th Century didn't have to contend with Adult websites and genital enhancement email spam, they did have to contend with Real Estate "opportunities" distributed through this budding new media.
William Penn--Direct Land Sales Pioneer
The first American direct advertisement, according to the Philadelphia Public Ledger, was a pamphlet published in 1681 by William Penn. It should be noted that Printing had not yet made its way across the pond, so Penn's, land scheme was imported from England, where it was printed to stimulate emigration to Pennsylvania.
Good direct advertiser that he was, Penn followed up his first piece with seven other pieces (maybe he should have invented postcards for direct marketing) between 1681 and 1690. He also took a small portion of the first pamphlet and published it as a "broadside" whatever that was...?
Following his arrival in Pennsylvania, Penn published a second pamphlet entitled: "Letter from William Penn, Proprietary and Governor of Pennsylvania in America, to the Committee of the Free Society of Traders, of that Province, residing in London." Ok, so he violated every rule of direct marketing (oops, they hadn't been invented yet) with his incredibly long title. What is noteworthy is that this pamphlet was the first to use a map to help sell. Picture is worth a 1,000 words, right?.
Unfair rumors having been spread abroad in England about Penn's Woods, in 1687 Penn published another-pamphlet, the purpose of which was to offset these rumors. Here is the first instance of using a buyer testimonial to endorse a product-in this case-a land sale.
So not only did William Penn become the first successful direct marketer in The US, but he was the first to be reported to the BBB.
In our next installment we meet Ben Franklin.
I read somewhere that around 1000 B. C. or so, an Egyptian landowner wrote what is considered by some worldwide direct marketing experts to be the earliest identifiable example of direct advertising. It was an advertisement on a piece of papyrus for the return of a runaway slave. The original was actually exhumed from the ruins of Thebes and can now be seen in the British Museum.
Whether or not the Egyptian landowner found his slave is unknown. Since we do not have the result to measure the effectiveness of the "return-my-slave" effort, I am forced to conclude that the campaign was a direct marketing failure. Direct marketing is a finitely measurable media. Measurability sets direct marketing apart from general advertising and other forms of marketing. Direct marketers can measure the response to any offer.
Later, the Babylonians would use bricks as a means of distributing direct advertising to individuals. Guess their BPS (Babylonian Postal Service) didn't have any weight regulations for third class or bulk mail. I think this is the genesis of the phrases "hits you like a brick wall" and "in your face" advertising. Interestingly, it was about this time that the first rotator cuff surgeries were performed. Apparently brick marketing also spawned the need for Babylonian HMO's.
Writing was not a common skill among the elite of the day (cave art was still big) and thus the development of direct marketing techniques was slow. In fact nothing much happened until Steve Gutenberg's (the fine Actor of Police Academy fame) Great, Great, Great, Great Grandfather-Gutenberg "the printer" invented the movable type printing press around the early 1430's. This nimble gadget-about the size of a current day USPS delivery truck-enabled Gutenberg to churn out mass-produced literature in record speed. He did Bibles in about...oh...say a year-at-a-time. Big stuff! The development of printing techniques would drive direct marketing advertising pretty much up until today.
Later in the century, in England, a printer by the name of William Caxton set-up the first English printing press in Westminster Abbey in 1471 and printed his first hand-bill around 1480. With this hand-bill, the Age of direct marketing was born...