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Twenty-something years ago (when I started writing adverts aimed at teachers) selling into schools via direct mail was a doddle. If one had a half-decent product or service and wrote a semi-literate piece of advertising, one got sales. The biggest problem was that some teachers were under instruction only to buy from approved suppliers but even so the orders still came through.

Since then the world has changed. Everyone seems to think that he or she has a product that can sell into schools. From retired headteachers who now plan to use their spare hours to sell their worksheets to corporations who have seen a decline in profits in other markets and reckon that education is probably a soft touch, everyone wants to have a go.

As a result the number of advertisements that fail to bring in a decent response rate goes up and up. The cause is simple there are so many bad adverts around.

And it is this simple fact which points to the solution. If you want your advertisement to beat the trend, you have to stand out from the opposition. You have to start with the knowledge that on the day that your advert arrives with the teacher, so will half a dozen others. But if your advert stands out beyond the others, yours will be the one that will succeed.

This report takes you through the issues you need to face to ensure that your advert stands out from the crowd. There is no requirement for full colour or glossy paper indeed much of the time such factors hinder more than the help. But there are simple ways that will help you ensure that your advert will be the one that is not discarded. This report sets them out.

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