Australian media mogul Rupert Murdoch must have been feeling a little restless in April. When not trying to acquire his third New York City-based newspaper, he was pressuring the managing editor of his Wall Street Journal property into an early retirement. Speculation held that change wasn’t coming to the Journal as quickly as its Oz-based masters would have liked.
Given Murdoch’s appetite for sensationalist tabloids, direct marketers might wonder if an overhaul of the paper’s classic “two young men” prospecting letter is in the offing (for a version of the original, go to http://www.copywriting1.com/2007/10/wall-street-journal-letter.html).
If so, a reworking of that pitch might look like this:
Dear Reader:
On a beautiful late spring afternoon, twenty-five years ago, two young men graduated from the same college. They were very much alike, these two young men. Both had been better than average students, both were personable and both—as young college graduates are—were filled with ambitious dreams for the future.
Recently, these men returned to their college for their 25th reunion.
Both, it turned out, had gone to work for the same Manhattan energy company after graduation. But there was a difference.
One of the men was manager of a small department of that company. The other became disaffected former employee George Metesky, better known as “The Mad Bomber.” And the Wall Street Journal’s sister publication, The New York Post, gave that second young man more ink than any 50 randomly chosen college graduates.
What Made The Difference
Have you ever wondered, as I have, what makes this kind of difference in people’s lives? It isn’t a native intelligence or talent or dedication. It isn’t that one person wants success and the other doesn’t.
The difference lies in that one person reads a daily business publication, and the other skulks around Manhattan dropping explosive devices with detonators made from sugar and batteries in telephone booths and having lengthy conversations with squirrels.
Circulation among New York City’s tabloids spiked during the “Mad Bomber” period. And therein lies the new purpose of The Wall Street Journal: to give its readers knowledge—knowledge they can use around the water cooler.
A Publication Unlike Any Other. Except The New York Post
You see, The Wall Street Journal is a unique publication. It’s the country’s only national business daily with screaming banner headlines that refer to the rich and powerful by endearing names such as “Hill”; “The Donald”; and “Wacko Jacko”.
Each business day, it is put together by a staff of business-news experts, gossip columnists and celebrity psychics, just like the one President Reagan used to determine which days he should travel or conduct strategic arms limitation talks.
Knowledge Is Power. Might Makes Right. What Antitrust Legislation?
Right now, I am looking at page three of The Journal, which every day, in the finest tabloid tradition, offers a pinup photo of a Fortune 500 girl such as Wal-Mart’s Julie Roehm.
And inside The Journal there is page after page of fascinating and significant information that’s useful to you (provided your financial fortunes turn on knowing Amy Winehouse’s most recent blood-alcohol level). We cram all the in-depth reporting we can into articles designed to be read from start to finish while riding in an elevator.
If you have never read The Wall Street Journal, you cannot imagine just how useful it can be. Especially when it is folded lengthwise in thirds, which makes it an ideal flyswatter.
A Money-Saving Subscription
Put our statements to the proof by subscribing for the next 13 weeks for just $44. And one lucky reader is going to make that back 25,000fold when we launch our “BAILOUT BUXXX!!!” million-dollar sweepstakes.
If you feel as we do that this is a fair and reasonable proposition, then you will want to find out without delay if The Wall Street Journal can do for you what it is doing for millions of readers. For that matter, you will want to find out if the New York Post offers the same value for you it does for thousands of readers, many of whom not only peruse their daily edition, but sleep under it or use it to line their shoes.
About those two college classmates I mention at the beginning of this letter: they were graduated from college together and together got started in the business world. So what made their lives in business different?
The coverage each received. One was a whackadoodle. And the new Wall Street Journal is going to give him and his ilk the ink they richly deserve. Because, quite frankly, it’s the only way we can compete with our company’s tabloid television shows.
Sincerely,
[signature]
Publisher
LS:mft
P.S. It’s important to note that The Journal’s subscription price may be tax deductible. And it’s definitely free if you shoplift it. Ask your tax advisor, or your parole officer.
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