him the Collier atmosphere, and to educate him up on the company's business policy and technical details. Then he is given a list of assignments especially selected to fit his individual experience and qualifications. He is watched and worked with, according to his needs. Collier's believes in direction, and in being as helpful as possible. The theory is that the man is selected for his intelligence, general ability and industry, and needs only the co-operation of the management and his associates.

If the man happens to be a "cub," the aim is to suggest courses in reading on technical subjects, and to give him the benefit, by association, of the older men's experiences; also the opportunity of reading their reports, and of studying the correspondence and briefs prepared by other solicitors for clients.

The advertising office at Collier's maintains a memorandum system to help equip men with useful information. Solicitors have the advantage, too, of special material prepared by the department of research, designed to show the market possibilities in the company's publication, and the possibilities in certain territories where Collier's can emphasize its claims to special consideration.

Once a year there is a staff conference. Last year a week was spent at Briarcliff.

"We worked during the morning, played in the afternoon, and worked again until bedtime," says J. E. Jarrett, of Collier's Depart ment of Advertising. "These

conferences bring the men into harmony and give us an opportunity to 'get across' the institutional character of Collier's with addresses by heads of departments. It inspires men with bigger ideas than might be obtained from a working knowledge of their own departments.

"Common sense methods and ideas are taught and inspired; wild theories of our proposition are taboo. We stick to facts and preach nothing else. We don't indulge in 'estimates' on any point connected with the sale of Col

lier's to advertisers or agencies, because much buying of space seems to be subject to influences of this kind. We operate on the theory that a sale is not completed until the foundation for a second one is laid.

"Our greatest problem in the training of men is to keep strong selling arguments down to the minimum, so as not to confuse or overwhelm them. For instance, we indulge very little in the use of testimonial letters because we have so many of them.

"Naturally we try to give our men a well-rounded-out fund of information which can be used according to the type of the buyer and the things that favorably influence his mind, but in no case do we cheapen or lower the salesman's self-respect by furnishing to him Collier information of a low standard of appeal. We always aim to inspire our men with the dignity of business, and have them understand that we do not expect them to sell Collier's to everyone. We do expect from our men a full measure of honest service, and stand willing to support them in every conceivable way to produce a satisfactory volume of business for which we are perfectly willing to pay.

"We believe we have a type of men on Collier's who would stay with us even at some sacrifice in salary, and we would not want a type that does not have plenty of opportunities to hang up its hat in the employ of other publishers.

"And last, in this institution men are taught business as much as they are the business of selling advertising space."

SOLICITORS' REPORTS IMPORTANT IN "COSMOPOLITAN" OFFICE

In the advertising office of Cosmopolitan the training of solicitors is based primarily on personal contact. There is a weekly staff meeting, where reports are given of calls made, and prospects for the coming week discussed. Shorthand notes are taken of this conference and copies furnished to all solicitors.

The system of reports is very efficient, and the filing is done in

the advertisers' envelopes, indexed alphabetically. Competitive magazines are regularly checked up and lists made of the advertising secured by other publications but not by Cosmopolitan. This automatically brings the envelopes of these prospects out of the files, and in the weekly conference is discussed the status of each concern. Those at the conference have before them not only the last report from the solicitor, but all previous reports, and this provides a close watch on the efficiency of the solicitor. It tells whether he has talked with the advertiser, whether he calls with sufficient frequency, and whether he is making satisfactory progress.

The report system, which is too technical for me to describe in this article, is the foundation of Cosmopolitan's method of training solicitors. It brings the advertising manager into intimate contact with the work of the solicitor, and shows him how he can be helpful to the latter. It enables him to correct his mistakes.

It also impresses on the solicitor the responsibility of covering his accounts properly. He knows that if he doesn't, lapses on his part will automatically show up if some particular advertiser should appear in a competitive publication and the solicitor has not been on the job.

"We have formulated, through our promotion department, standardized forms of arguments and exhibits to cover all the objections to Cosmopolitan that the solicitor is apt to meet with in his contact with advertisers," says F. L. Wurzburg, of that publication. "On this magazine, as on any other sales proposition, the objections can usually be boiled down to six or eight reasons why a prospective purchaser has not been buying that particular brand of merchandise. We endeavor, therefore, to furnish the solicitor with the kind of ammunition that will enable him to demolish these objections, and to give the advertiser constructive reasons why our publication can serve him effectively.

"Our standardized form of solicitation is based on the answers to the twelve questions which an advertiser should ask of any publication he considers using as a medium. These questions are fundamental, and enable him to arrive at the comparative values of all publications in the market for his business. They are:

"What type of magazine is it? How does it rank editorially with other magazines in its field? How does it get its circulation? What kind of circulation is it? Do men read it, or women, or both? How does its circulation dovetail with my distribution? How is it regarded by its readers? Is its circulation in keeping with its advertising rate? How does its advertising rate compare with the rates of other magazines in its class? What does it cost to reach this same circulation through other media? How does it stand with its advertisers? What influence has it with dealers?'

"In our answers to these questions we have elaborated in many ways the points particularly emphasizing Cosmopolitan's value to the advertiser. We have made a great many investigations, and we have records of results, testimonials, and all sorts of other data bearing on these various subjects. Every solicitor has this information in his kit and also at his finger-tips. If we should send a half dozen solicitors to the same advertiser each one would use the same basic arguments, figures and information. The presentation, of course, would be different, depending on the personality of the solicitor. Our plan of standardizing our solicitation enables us quickly to determine whether a new solicitor is competent to sell our project."

BUTTERICK HAD A SEVEN-WEEKS'

COURSE FOR SALESMEN

S. R. Latshaw, of the Butterick Publishing Company, gives me some interesting material.

"I organized and conducted a school for solicitors some few years ago," he says, "but so far I know this is not a general practice among publishers.