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This is Part 2 of the findings of an extensive series of eye-camera tests conducted by Professor Siegfried Vogele of the Institute for Direct Marketing in Munich, West Germany. The tests traced eye movements as thousands of men and women opened and read all types of direct mailings and, at the same time, studied emotional reactions by observing body and hand movements.

Once your reader opens the envelope, they take no longer that 11 seconds to decide whether to read your letter or trash it

During this 11-second preview, Professor Vogele found that the reader’s eyes fix only on pictures and headlines — never on the body copy.

The Professor’s findings demonstrated that illustrations play a greater role in determining how the recipient reads your direct mail than any other graphic device.

Before any word of text is even noted, the reader’s eyes will be pulled to photographs and/or drawings. And by understanding the affects of graphics on eye flow, we can boost response rates by directing our reader’s attention to our most powerful sales copy.
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