In the late '80s, an infomercial was shot for a product that everybody *should* have: a video designed to help parents talk to their teenagers about drugs. It was such an appealing project that everyone wanted to help with it. It was hosted by Nancy Reagan; it was nothing less than a beautifully-produced, inspiring infomercial about making America a better place for kids.
They bought the airtime and ran the show. Guess how many orders they got?
Dan Kennedy, who helped write the script, reports:
Zero.
Nobody wanted to buy a video about talking to their kids about drugs. Nancy Reagan couldn't convince 'em, Hollywood couldn't convince them, and a team of professional copywriters couldn't convince 'em.
Why?
Because it was prevention, not cure. It was too easy to think, "I'm going to mention this to the next-door neighbors, because THEIR son is waaaay out of control. My kids would never take drugs."
It's hard to sell virtue and goodness in and of itself. That's why there are so many novels about murder, mayhem, lust, betrayal and hell, and so few about goodness, hope, utopia and heaven. I'm not degrading the goodness of prevention. But if you want to sell it, it's much easier to sell it as part of a cure than trying to convince someone who's never had the problem in the first place.
I like carpet-cleaning expert Joe Polish's view of this. He insists that however hard you trumpet the fact that you can kill carpet mites and take toxins and allergens out of your house, the real reason that Suzy Jones calls a carpet cleaner is that she's got company coming and she doesn't want her friends to see the spot where Uncle Ned puked.
So Suzy's going to have the carpet cleaned before the party, not after. After would actually be prevention. Before is cure.
Original Source: Perry Marshall
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