Nothing Up My Sleeve....

Print advertising reminds me of a card trick.

I'm not saying marketing is magic. Or that advertising is about trickery. Far from it.

In fact, I think advertising is one of the few professions that's virtually transparent.

If you're a keen observer (think Sherlock Holmes), you can study successful advertising as your textbook. That's because there are few advertising secrets. (Don't get me wrong. I don't mean it's easy. Or there aren't "tricks" of the trade. Or that anyone can become a writer or designer. But the basics are just -- obvious.)

How can I say that? Look at any successful ad. Nothing's hidden. You don't have to reverse engineer it to figure out how it works. It's all there for the world to see.

Every successful ad stands on the shoulders of every successful ad before it. But not every ad is successful. And I guess that's what makes the learning curve so steep. Just because a company is wildly successful doesn't mean all their advertising is.

So, first you need to know what ads work. Then, you need to figure out why. Look closely. How do the images, headline, copy and layout work together? What's the message? What makes it memorable? Why does a prospect want to take the next step?

And, like a card trick, sometimes it's not what you see but what you don't see. More on that in another marketing tip...

Takeaway: What can you learn from your biggest competition's ads? From ads for a similar product? From ads in a totally unrelated industry?