t let them become customers_.

One of the greatest mistakes in publicity is _to drop your lines where
the fish can't take your bait_.

Circulation is, as you see, a very interesting subject, but very few
people know anything about it. It would surprise you to know that this
ignorance often extends to the business offices of newspapers. I have
known publishers to continually mistake the _class of_ their readers
and have met hundreds of them who had the most fantastic ideas upon the
figures of their circulation.

While I would not be so harsh as to accuse them of anything more than
being _mistaken_, none the less their tendency to infect _others_ with
this misinformation renders it extremely advisable for _you to_ become a
member of the Missouri society--and "_be shown_."

Don't rely solely on circulation statements. You don't understand the
tricks in their making. Make the newspaper which carries your
advertisement show you the list of its advertisers. A newspaper which
prints the most advertising, month after month, year after year, is
always the best medium. This is equally true in New York, Chicago,
Philadelphia, Kenosha and Walla Walla.

The Mistake of the Big Steak

Watch out for _waste_ in circulation. Find out _where_ your story is
going to be _read_. Don't pay for planting the seed of publicity in a
spot where you are not going to _harvest_ the results.

The manufacturer of soap who has his goods on sale from Oskaloosa to
Timbuctoo doesn't care _how widely_ a newspaper circulation is
scattered. Whoever reads about his product is near to _some_ store or
other where it is sold--but you have just _one_ store.

Buying advertising circulation is very much like ordering a steak--if
the waiter brings you a porter-house twice as big as your _digestion_
can handle, you've paid twice as much as the steak was worth to _you_,
even if it _is_ worth the price to the restaurant man.

You derive your profit not from the circulation that your
_advertisement_ gets, but from circulation _that gets people to buy_.

If two newspapers offer you their columns and one shows a distribution
almost entirely within the city and in towns that rely upon your city
for buying facilities, your business can digest all of its influence. If
the other has _as much circulation_, but only _one third_ of it is in
_local territory_, mere bulk cannot establish its value to _you_--_it's
another case of the big steak_--you pay for more t