Junk Mail

I like to read “junk mail.” It is quite revealing.

Most of what gets stuffed into my mailbox is exactly that, junk.

I don’t mean the products or services these solicitations are trying to sell. Although I could question some of the medical breakthroughs for diabetes and weight loss being offered, I am talking about the solicitation itself.

A lot of time and energy went into creating them. But they remain junk, interesting in how unsuccessful they are in hooking their prospect—in this case, me.

In the case of non-profits, it is clear that the writer simply did not know what they were doing. They were trying to create something that would get the reader to open their wallets and checkbooks and pay for the service. The letters simply don’t work.

For one thing, they don’t understand that they are selling something. It may be a shelter for the homeless. It may be a meals-on-wheels program. It may be giving livestock to the peasants in a third world country. It may even be funds to fight whaling somewhere in the world.

The point is that they don’t know how to sell. They don’t know how to create and appeal that will hook their prospect.

They don’t know the process of selling via a letter, email, or web site. Any successful sales effort involves a process, a set of stages that the successful sales person uses to move the prospect through until the deal is closed and the check or credit card or cash is in the seller’s hand.

There are expensive agencies and freelance copywriters who will charge a large amount to create these solicitations. A few are good. Most are not.

And the non-profit is left with a smaller bank account and little to show for their efforts. Yes, they may have made some money, but not nearly as much as they could if they had hired somebody who understands the process, who encourages testing of letters to see who is the most successful in raising money, or canned goods, or clothes, or pet food for the many worthy causes that are trying to create a better world.

I would like to help. I am not out to get rich. I am out to make a living writing for the greater good, whatever that might be. If you want more information how I can help, leave me a note at carter@carterwrites.com.

We can start a dialog that could benefit both of us.

Greed is Still Greed

Two recent articles in the New York Times and Wall Street Journal concerning healthcare and health insurance are quite telling about our medical community, or at least that portion that gets published.

The article in the New York Times discussed a patient who had not seen a doctor for 15 years appeared at an emergency room one day with abdominal pains. Within five days she died. She had no insurance. What was interesting was reading the comments, many submitted by physicians.

Many questioned why she had not seen a doctor for 15 years. Perhaps it was because she had no insurance and was on a limited income.

The majority, however, wondered whether any physician would be “properly” compensated. They were talking not so much about Medicare and Medicaid, but about health insurance in general. This strikes me as greed.

What happened to concern and care about the patient. Do these comments reflect that they, the physicians, got into medicine more for the money than the art of health care. I have come to wonder about many of the providers’ motives. The fact that cesarean sections peak on Friday afternoons could be telling us something about providers and when they want their time off.

The Wall Street article by Abraham Verghse on “The Myth of Prevention” is even more interesting. His argument is that with a single payer system, there will be a great deflation of income, in part from the people no longer employed by insurance companies and doctors’ offices handling the paper work.

This was pointed out to me in the late 1980s when somebody compared billing departments in a 500 bed hospital in Canada to a 500 bed hospital in the United States. The Canadian hospital had seven people filing claims to the Canadian single payer system. The US hospital had 70 people doing the same job.

In this example, the single payer system would reduce the work force by 90 percent. OK, so these clerks would be temporarily be unemployed. But they would have health insurance.

The comments to this article are also revealing. Most are from the medical community worried about reimbursement and their return on their investment. I suspect by that they are talking about their schooling and training.

Again, greed before patient care.

I question how many physicians view patients as cash cows. From my experience, I suspect that the majority do just that in spite of their protestations. They can prove it by not milking the insurance companies and patients with extra unneeded tests while hiding behind the excuse of providing better health care.

Right Speech

One of the precepts of a major religion is the right use of language. This is usually taken to mean to not lie, engage in gossip, or use words in a harmful and hurtful way. Too bad that most people do not follow this precept.

The most obvious case in the public eye is the “feud” going on between David Letterman and Sara Palin. I am a fan of neither but I think in this case Palin has a point.

I have always found Mr. Letterman to be a mean spirited, verbal bully. For the sake of getting a laugh, he treats people poorly in both deed and word. I think of Mr. Letterman’s treatment of Bill Nye, “The Science Guy” as an example. Rather than let Mr. Nye do his act, Letterman did what he could to disrupt and humiliate Mr. Nye.

The jokes about Sara Palin’s daughter were yet another example of Mr. Letterman’s lack of class and mean spiritedness. The first apology by Mr. Letterman was no better. He tried to make it funny, not taking into account the seriousness of his earlier remarks. It is not unlike Don Imus and his crack about "nappy headed hoes."

As I said, I am not a fan of Mrs. Palin. But I think she has every reason to be offended by Mr. Letterman’s remarks. Too bad that a lot of the "liberal" community could only see the "humor" and not the offensiveness of the remarks and the lame attempt at an apology.

Mr. Letterman, unfortunately, is somebody this society tends to look up to. He would not be so popular if he people didn’t find something admirable in him.

He is a symptom of something else in this country. Collectively, we have become just as mean spirited as Mr. Letterman. Don’t believe me?

Just look at the comments that appear after news articles that appear in online editions of newspapers. So often the comment threads break down into shouting matches with lots of name calling. Not productive to a true dialog that could advance the greater good.

There is too much to be done. The earth is literally beginning to bake because of human activity. People are suffering from the greed of a few individuals selling fictional “securities.” Too many people are out for themselves and not for the greater good.

I would suggest that these people learn the lessons of both right speech and “The Prisoner’s Dilemma.”

Our Responsibility

I know a fellow who owns a number of apartment buildings. He is always looking for a good deal for another building and if he finds one, simply presents his MasterCard to pay for it. Or he did until this economic financial pothole we find ourselves in.

Not his fault. He was shocked that credit had become so tight he couldn’t use his card.

He and his wife are interesting to me in that they get their information about the world from USA Today. They also vote their pocketbook. That is to say, they vote Republican and against any increase in taxes. It doesn’t matter if the people they vote for believe in other things that clearly hurt members of their family, it is all about their bottom line and the rest of society be damned.

I don’t want to think they are typical Republicans, but they seem to fit my stereotype that I have for that party’s voters.

To me, they don’t get it. They have been very successful but they don’t want to pay their dues for the privilege to live in this country. What is ironic is that they will be screaming bloody murder when their axle breaks when they go into a pothole that could not be fixed because of budget cuts. The will also be screaming bloody murder when the police cannot respond quickly enough because too many officers have been laid off. I won’t discuss how upset they will be about contaminated food that results from a lack of inspectors. Of course we get that now.

The Bush tax cuts are anti-social. If congress does nothing, they will go away next year. Not a moment too soon.

We live in a society that provides opportunities for anybody to become successful and make a lot of money. However, let them not forget that their success creates an obligation to give back. We all have that obligation, each to our ability to give back.

Even Bill Gates knows this and gives back through the Gates Foundation. Too bad my friend seems to be blind to this fact.

Don’t get me wrong. I am not saying that it is evil to make money. I am saying that we have to know how much is actually enough and exercise the responsibility to help the others we have left behind.

Question

Why should the big guys have the benefit of using expensive copywriters for their marketing?

See Carterwrites.com.