Frank Johnson, a pioneer in direct-mail advertising who found inventive ways to grab a reader’s attention, died Tuesday in Manhattan. He was 88.
While working for Time Inc., American Heritage Magazine, or as a free-lancer, Johnson specialized in pitching everything from magazines to saving wildlife, according to news reports.
The pitch letters Johnson wrote flooded millions of homes every year, as part of a constant barrage of direct-mail that totals some 90 billion pieces a year.
Johnson was long credited with creating the Johnson Box: a paragraph before the letter’s salutation that efficiently and pleasingly synthesized the following sales pitch.
He made his success mastering the art of drawing people’s attention to something their first inclination was to throw away, the reports said.
In a New York Times obituary today Johnson was quoted as saying, “All I know is that when you look at any paragraph in the middle of a letter, some word in that paragraph should grab your attention. It should be a dirty word, or a sexy word, or exclamatory word, something that you didn’t expect.” He called such words “raisins,” the report said.
In 1966, Johnson was given the first annual National Association of Direct Mail Writers award.
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