Claude Hopkins
Lord and Thomas
Core Principles
customer obsession
Understand your customers by living among them. Deep knowledge of ordinary people's wants, impulses, and economics is more valuable than formal education or wealth.
Hopkins grew up poor and stayed connected to common people throughout his early career. This gave him insights into how 95 percent of customers thought and what motivated them to spend money. He credited poverty with teaching him more about human nature than any other experience.
“In millions of humble homes, the common people will read and buy. They will feel that the writer knows them. And they, in advertising, form 95% of our customers.”
Solve your customers' problems before asking for their money. Frame proposals around their needs and benefits, not your needs and advantages.
To get tire dealers to stock inventory, Hopkins didn't ask them to buy. Instead, he offered free national advertising that would display their names to customers searching for Goodyear tires. Within months, 30,000 dealers stocked minimum inventory. The dealers saw personal benefit, not just Goodyear's advantage.
“Offer to take a chance on him and the way is easy.”
Never judge what others will want based on your own preferences. Democratic societies prove daily that opinions differ radically on every subject.
Hopkins saw businessmen lose fortunes by projecting their personal tastes onto customers. He insisted on submitting all advertising to the court of public opinion through testing, never trusting personal preference as a guide for mass appeal.
“The losses occasioned in advertising by venturing on personal preference would easily pay the national debt. We live in a democracy.”
Study human psychology as fixed principles that apply across eras. Curiosity, reciprocity, social proof, and status anxiety are permanent human motivators.
Hopkins identified enduring psychological principles like curiosity and value perception that remained constant regardless of era or industry. He leveraged these in campaigns: curiosity-driven headlines ('Food shot from guns'), perceived value through pricing tactics, and exclusivity through limited offers to specific groups.
“Human nature is perpetual. In most respects, it is the same today as the time of Caesar. So the principles of psychology are fixed and enduring. You will never need to unlearn what you learn about them.”
People are self-interested. Write all advertising from the perspective of what the product does for the customer, never from the perspective of the seller.
Hopkins observed that ads written to please the seller rather than serve the buyer consistently failed. Successful ads focused entirely on customer benefits and solutions. This meant never leading with company pride or product features, but instead addressing the specific problem or desire of the prospect.
“Remember the people you address are selfish, as we all are. They care nothing about your interests or your profit. They seek service for themselves.”
finance
Conservatism and caution are foundational to long-term success. Reckless spending destroys businesses and reputations.
Hopkins credited his Scottish mother with instilling conscientious caution. This manifested in his testing approach, his small losses and large wins, and his willingness to carefully steward client money as if it were his own. This conservatism protected him during setbacks.
“Safety first has always been my guiding star. Success, saved by accident, is impossible without them.”
Reduce customer acquisition cost relentlessly through continuous testing. Even small percentage improvements in cost-per-customer compound into massive profits over time.
Hopkins built his entire practice around optimizing customer acquisition cost (CAC). He demonstrated that identical offers presented differently could reduce costs by 50% or more. For a business doing 250,000 sales annually, reducing cost-per-acquisition from $0.85 to $0.41 meant hundreds of thousands in additional profit.
“To reduce the cost of results even 1% means much. So no guesswork is permitted. One must know what is best. And he gets to the main point, our final conclusions are always based on cost per customer.”
focus
Stay within your circle of competence. Success in one field does not automatically translate to success in others.
Hopkins observed that men making money in one business often lost it trying to excel in unrelated fields, assuming one success made them super businessmen. He maintained focus on advertising throughout his career rather than diversifying into unfamiliar domains.
“Men make money in one business and then lose it in many others. They seem to feel that one success makes them super businessmen as well.”
hiring
Hire talent based on demonstrated understanding of human nature, not credentials or education. Practical insight beats academic qualification.
When Hopkins found a night cook in a shabby restaurant who had written compelling copy about meat pies, he hired him despite his lack of formal education. The cook had a rare insight into human nature and what motivated people to buy. He became one of the leading advertising men in the country.
“Let a man prove to us that he understands human nature and we welcome him with open arms.”
leadership
Teach and serve your team without direct compensation. Generosity in helping others succeed creates loyalty and advancement opportunities.
Hopkins held regular meetings with copy writers at Lord and Thomas discussing advertising principles, receiving no additional pay. He wrote numerous books setting down agency principles, again unpaid. These acts of service ultimately led to him being made president of Lord and Thomas.
“I was doing more than just serving myself. I was doing my best to teach other copy men in the agency. For that, I received no pay.”
learning
Learn from practitioners and street-level salespeople, not from theorists and academics. Real-world experience teaches faster than classroom theory.
Hopkins rejected formal advertising education, calling it rot that would take a dozen years to unlearn. He learned instead by working in retail, going door-to-door as a canvasser, and studying how successful salesmen and street performers actually convinced people.
“If he spends four years to learn such theories he will spend a dozen years to unlearn them. Then he will be so far behind in the race that he will never attempt to catch up.”
marketing
Treat every advertisement as if you are speaking to one individual person, not a mass audience. Consider their specific desires and speak directly to them.
When a woman inquired about sewing machines, Montgomery Ward's standard practice was to send a general catalog. Hopkins insisted on creating a dedicated sewing machine catalog with prices, styles, and names of local owners. This personalized approach dramatically outperformed mass-broadcast messages.
“We must get down to individuals. We must treat people in advertising as we treat them in person. Center on their desires.”
Tell stories about ordinary processes that customers don't know about. What seems commonplace to you will amaze customers unfamiliar with your methods.
When advertising beer, Hopkins toured the brewery and was amazed by their purity processes: filtered air chambers, multiple bottle cleanings, water from 4,000 feet deep, six-month aging, and yeast developed through 1,200 experiments. Other breweries used identical methods but had never told the story. His campaign highlighting these facts moved the brand from fifth to first place.
“Tell a story common to all good brewers but a story which had never been told. I gave purity a meaning because the facts which seem commonplace to him might give him vast distinction.”
Avoid boasting and selfish appeals in all communication. Appeals based on your advantage, not the prospect's benefit, repel customers.
Hopkins observed that ads using phrases like insist on this brand or avoid imitations performed poorly because they revealed selfish motives. Effective ads that emphasized the prospect's benefit and what the product would do for them vastly outperformed self-focused messages.
“Forget yourself entirely. Have in your mind a typical prospect interested enough to read about your product.”
Create personalities for your brand rather than promoting faceless corporations. People connect with people, not abstractions.
When revamping breakfast cereal advertising, Hopkins established Professor P. Anderson as the face of the brand. Personalities appeal emotionally while soulless corporate entities do not. Making a person famous makes his creation famous.
“Personalities appeal. Soulless corporations do not. Make a man famous and you make his creation famous.”
Sample and trial offers without prior request diminish perceived value. Only offer samples to those who specifically ask for them.
Hopkins never sent unsolicited samples or promotions. Products handed out without asking are thrown away and lose respect. When people must make an effort to request a trial, they perceive greater value and are more likely to convert to buyers.
“I have never found that it paid to give either a sample or a full-size package to people who did not request it.”
mindset
Work is a game if you choose to see it that way. Your attitude and perspective about work determines whether it becomes drudgery or an engaging pursuit.
A railroad foreman taught Hopkins this lesson by contrasting his enthusiastic approach to work with his laborers' resigned stoicism. The foreman built his own home in evenings and cultivated a garden, turning what others saw as work into a game. Hopkins adopted this mindset and maintained it throughout his career.
“All the difference I see lies in the attitude of mind. If a thing is useful, they call it work. If useless, they call it play. One is as hard as another. One can be just as much a game as the other.”
Hard work and extended hours accelerate learning more than exceptional talent. The person who works two or three times as much learns two or three times as much.
Hopkins attributed his success not to superior ability but to exceptional hours. He worked 16-hour farm days as a boy, had multiple jobs simultaneously as a youth, and worked evenings and weekends throughout his business career. He learned more failures and successes, deriving insights from both.
“The man who does two or three times the work of another learns two or three times as much. He makes more mistakes and more successes, and he learns from both.”
Find work you love so deeply that you naturally devote exceptional time to it. Love of work can be cultivated like any other interest.
Hopkins came to love advertising work so much that he would skip social events to spend evenings at his typewriter, preferred weekends for uninterrupted work, and treated the profession as the most fascinating game he knew. This wasn't forced discipline but genuine love.
“I came to love work as other men love golf. I love it still. What others call work, I call play, and vice versa.”
Frameworks
Salesmanship in Print
Treat every advertisement as a salesman making a pitch to an individual prospect. Each ad should be compared to other ads on a cost-per-result basis, just as a company would evaluate a salesman's performance. Never advertise blindly without measuring and comparing results. The ad must serve the prospect's interests, remove their hesitations, and make it easy for them to say yes.
Use case: Creating advertising campaigns, evaluating marketing effectiveness, writing copy that converts
Test-Then-Scale Method
Begin with small, limited-budget tests to prove effectiveness before committing significant resources. Track results carefully. Once a small test proves successful, scale gradually while continuing to monitor results. This approach ensures you learn from small failures rather than large ones and compound successes by moving capital to winning approaches.
Use case: Marketing campaigns, product launches, business expansion, advertising spend allocation
Service-First Selling
Lead with service and value rather than asking the prospect to take a risk on you. Frame every appeal around what the prospect gains, not what you gain. Remove friction by offering trials, guarantees, and inspection opportunities before asking for payment. Appeal to the prospect's desires and aspirations, not to your business needs.
Use case: Sales pitch development, advertising copy, customer acquisition, brand positioning
Ordinary Person Advantage
Maintain deep connection with common people and ordinary customers throughout your career. Understand their wants, impulses, economies, and struggles. Apply these insights to understand how 95 percent of customers think. When you speak or write to them, they recognize you as one of their kind and respond positively.
Use case: Market research, product development, advertising appeals, business strategy for mass markets
Personality Branding
Create and feature a specific person as the face and voice of your brand rather than relying on faceless corporate messaging. People connect with people. The personality should embody the brand's values and appeal to customers emotionally. Use their name, image, and voice consistently across all marketing.
Use case: Brand building, advertising campaigns, product positioning, customer connection
Profit-Side Focus
Direct your career toward roles and activities that generate revenue and profit rather than those that manage expenses. Expense-side roles are first cut during downturns and offer limited earning potential. Profit generators can command a share of the profits they create. Stay close to money and transactions.
Use case: Career planning, role selection, internal job changes, compensation negotiation
Scientific Advertising Method
A systematic approach to advertising based on hypothesis testing, measurement, and continuous iteration. Form an assumption about what will work, test it on a small scale, measure results carefully, record findings, then either double down on winners or adjust and retest. Scale slowly from thousands to millions based on validated unit economics. This creates a compounding improvement engine where each test adds to institutional knowledge.
Use case: Any business testing advertising effectiveness, product positioning, or marketing messages. Works best when you can measure customer acquisition cost and repeat tests.
Customer Acquisition Cost (CAC) Optimization Loop
Focus all advertising decisions on minimizing the cost to acquire one customer. Test different headlines, offers, channels, and messaging. Record the cost per customer acquired for each variant. Identify the winning approach, then run new tests against that baseline to find further improvements. Compound improvements across dozens of tests can reduce CAC by 50-75%. The lower CAC goes, the more profitable the business becomes at any given revenue level.
Use case: Direct response advertising, subscription businesses, e-commerce, or any business where customer acquisition cost is measurable and repeatable.
Individual Prospect Lens
Before writing any ad or marketing copy, imagine a single prospect sitting across from you. Ask: would this headline grab their attention? Would this copy answer their questions? Would this offer convince them to buy? Would this benefit matter to them personally? Apply salesman standards, not entertainment standards. This forces clarity and relevance while eliminating self-congratulatory or award-seeking copy.
Use case: Writing headlines, ad copy, product pages, email campaigns, or any marketing communication. Ensures copy serves the customer's needs rather than the seller's ego.
Reciprocity Sales Trigger
Give something small and valuable to the prospect before asking for a sale. This could be a free sample, free trial, free information, a personal gift, or a special offer. The psychological principle of reciprocity makes the prospect feel obligated to return the favor by making a purchase. The gift must be presented as a genuine favor, not a gimmick, and should only go to prospects who show genuine interest.
Use case: Increasing conversion rates on cold outreach, catalogs, direct mail, trials, or first-time purchases. Most effective when the gift is relevant to the product and the prospect has already shown some interest.
Stories
Hopkins worked multiple jobs as a boy, opening schoolhouses, sweeping them, delivering newspapers, and working 16-hour farm days during summers. Other boys counted school as their full day, but Hopkins treated work as normal life alongside school. His mother, a widow, worked the jobs of three or four women to support her children while writing educational books.
Lesson: Hard work, industry, and multiple income streams are possible from childhood. Success is built on consistent effort over long periods, not talent or luck.
A railroad section foreman taught Hopkins the difference between work and play by contrasting himself with his laborers. The men sat around discussing railroads, earning only what they were paid. The foreman worked with enthusiasm, built his home in the evenings, cultivated a garden, married prettily, and lived in bliss. The key difference was attitude, not activity.
Lesson: Your perspective on work determines whether it becomes drudgery or a game. The same activity can be either depending on your mindset and what you're building toward.
When selling his mother's silver polish door-to-door, Hopkins achieved only a 10 percent sales rate by talking about the product. Once he began demonstrating the polish in customers' homes, he sold nearly everyone. This simple observation shaped his entire approach to advertising.
Lesson: Demonstration and trial are infinitely more persuasive than claims or descriptions. Show, don't tell.
Hopkins worked for the Bissell Carpet Sweeper Company as a bookkeeper making six dollars per week. He realized bookkeepers were expenses that companies always tried to minimize. Salesmen and profit generators earned far more because they brought in revenue. He deliberately moved into sales and advertising to stay on the profit-earning side of the business.
Lesson: Your role in a business determines your earning potential and job security. Moving from expense management to profit generation dramatically improves both.
Struggling on a six-dollar weekly salary, Hopkins couldn't afford his dream of eating pie daily at a restaurant costing three dollars fifty per week. He approached his employer, Mr. Bissell, during lunch and pitied his situation. Bissell rejected the appeal to struggle. But when Hopkins mentioned his dream of pie, Bissell related and offered a seven-dollar weekly salary instead so Hopkins could have pie daily.
Lesson: People don't respond to appeals about struggle or poverty they've already experienced. They respond to clear, specific desires and how you can help fulfill them.
When writing his first ads for Bissell carpet sweepers, Hopkins had an idea the week before Christmas: promote the sweeper as a Christmas gift instead of a household tool. He designed display racks and sent five thousand letters. He received one thousand orders, more mail orders than the company had ever received. This success moved him from the expense side to the profit-earning side.
Lesson: Finding a unique angle or new context for an ordinary product can dramatically increase demand and open new market categories.
Bissell had various wood finishes available. Hopkins convinced them to produce twelve different models with varied wood finishes for a limited time, letting customers choose their preference. This multiplied demand so dramatically that Bissell sweepers achieved practical monopoly status in the category, a position they maintained for decades.
Lesson: Variety and choice appeal to customers' desires for customization and individuality. Offering options can compound demand far beyond what a single offering achieves.
Observing John Powers' advertisement for a bankrupt clothing store, Hopkins saw the revolutionary appeal: Instead of hiding bankruptcy, they announced it. The headline read we are bankrupt, we owe 125,000 dollars more than we can pay, and asked customers to buy immediately to save the store. Customers flocked in and saved the business. Truth was so rare in advertising that it created a sensation.
Lesson: Radical honesty and authenticity in advertising can be far more powerful than polished claims because it's unexpected and credible.
When advertising beer, Hopkins toured the brewery and discovered remarkable processes unknown to customers: filtered air rooms, plate glass chambers, whitewood pulp filters, multiple daily cleanings, four thousand foot wells for pure water, six-month aging, and yeast developed through 1,200 experiments. He told this story in advertising, giving purity meaning that competitors couldn't claim. The brand jumped from fifth to first place.
Lesson: Ordinary processes invisible to customers contain compelling stories. What you take for granted will amaze and persuade someone unfamiliar with your methods.
Montgomery Ward's standard practice was sending a general catalog to any customer inquiry, regardless of product interest. Hopkins insisted that a woman inquiring about sewing machines receive only a sewing machine catalog with all styles, prices, and names of local owners who could be consulted. This personalized approach massively outperformed the broadcast method.
Lesson: Treating each customer as an individual with specific desires, rather than a mass audience, dramatically increases conversion and satisfaction.
Notable Quotes
“Ad writers forget that they are salesmen and try to be performers. Instead of sales, they seek applause.”
Criticizing copywriters who prioritize creative recognition over sales effectiveness
“It is not uncommon for a change in headline to multiply returns from five to 10 times over.”
Demonstrating the enormous impact of testing and refining headline copy
“Salesmanship in print is what advertising is. This is not a book. It's an experience. Experience has always been the great teacher.”
Defining his philosophy of advertising as applied selling rather than entertainment or image building
“The losses occasioned in advertising by venturing on personal preference would easily pay the national debt. We live in a democracy. On every law, there are divided opinions. So in every preference, every want.”
Warning against using personal taste as a guide for mass marketing decisions
“Tell a story common to all good brewers but a story which had never been told. I gave purity a meaning.”
Describing how he differentiated beer advertising by revealing ordinary processes customers didn't know about
“Personalities appeal. Soulless corporations do not. Make a man famous and you make his creation famous.”
Explaining why he created brand personalities like Professor P. Anderson rather than relying on corporate branding
“Let a man prove to us that he understands human nature and we welcome him with open arms.”
Explaining his hiring philosophy that prioritizes understanding people over formal education
“I have never found that it paid to give either a sample or a full-size package to people who did not request it. Products handed out without asking are thrown on the doorstep, lose respect.”
Advising against unsolicited sampling or promotional giveaways
“Forget yourself entirely. Have in your mind a typical prospect interested enough to read about your product. Keep that prospect before you. Seek in every word to increase your good impression.”
Instructing copywriters to focus on the prospect's perspective rather than the seller's
“Regardless of principles, we must always experiment. The world still has secrets to give up. We do not know everything about the complex world that we live in.”
Arguing for continuous experimentation even when possessing sound principles
More Advertising & Marketing Founders
Want Claude's advice on your business?
Our AI has studied Claude Hopkins's biography, principles, and decision-making frameworks. Ask any business question.
Start a conversation