What We Learned From a 'Wall Street Journal' Cartoonist About Successful Marketing

Stu Heinecke

No matter what their field, most entrepreneurs know what rejection feels like. You keep getting vexed by the executive assistants, your emails go unresponded to for weeks and months on end, and you've been transferred to everyone in the department but the person you need. Getting a foot in the door now requires much more effort and creativity. The gimmicks and tricks don't work anymore. So how's one supposed to get that meeting with the Mark Zuckerbergs and Warren Buffets of the world? Try Contact Marketing.


Stu Heinecke: How to Get a Meeting With Anyone

Contact Marketing is a methodology coined by Stu Heinecke, author of How to Get a Meeting With Anyone. The Wall Street Journal cartoonist and Hall of Fame-nominated marketer is turning traditional marketing techniques on their head. Contact Marketing is all about showing the human side of sales. Through highly personalized campaigns, Heinecke was able to achieve unheard of 100% response rates to high end clients. We caught up with Stu about his journey of turning his childhood passion into a lucrative lifestyle.

Stu Heinecke: How to Get a Meeting With Anyone

What was your introduction to cartooning?

As I kid, I remember writing a book of cartoons. Really, they were drawings and some captions, but there was nothing funny about them. I always loved cartooning, and—you're going to love this—my big introduction to cartooning was when my brothers and I used to sneak Playboys out of our father's dresser drawer. There were these beautiful cartoons done by Gahan Wilson, Michael Ffolkes and others. They were just incredible, so as a kid I was thinking, "How cool are these people? How do they do this?" That's probably the thing that lit the fuse for me.

Then, during my final year of college, a friend of mine who was also interested in cartooning told me about this extension course he was taking in cartooning at UCLA with Eric Teitelbaum, one of The New Yorker cartoonists. Lee Lorenz came as one of the guest speakers. Lee was the cartoon editor at The New Yorker at the time. And it just got me to think, "I can do this."

When did you make the connection between cartooning and marketing?

There was one really big moment for me. When I was coming out of college, personalization was just becoming a force in direct marketing. By then I was a member of the Cartoonists' Guild and the Cartoonists' Guild was sending us all this information about cartooning. Usually, it's about rejection slips. But one of the things they sent was a copy of an article from Folio, which said that cartoons are the best read and remembered part of anything they're in editorially. That certainly points to the fact that they have to be really powerful devices in marketing. So I wanted to mix cartooning with personalization and direct marketing. They all came together at just the right time.

For the first two assignments that I picked up, I wanted to create direct marketing campaigns for publishers, because at the time, they were the biggest, most sophisticated users of direct marketing. I reached out and I got two assignments pretty quickly, one from Rolling Stone and the other from Bon Appétit. Both of these test pieces went up against controls and beat them. It's like a rookie stepping on the field and hitting a home run twice.

Was it luck or was it science?

Well, some of it was luck. There's always luck. I was lucky to connect with them, and maybe fortunate is a better way to put it. David Ogilvy, one of the original thought leaders in marketing, used to say that humor doesn't work in marketing and advertising. All the pundits of direct marketing say the same thing: don't use humor. And I thought, these guys don't understand what's going on. They don't understand that cartoons are the best read and remembered parts of anything they're in editorially. Imagine what they'll do in a stack of mail in people's houses?

Now that those two campaigns beat controls, I wanted to spread this to the rest of the publishing world. What that meant was I needed to connect with about two dozen VPs and Directors of Circulation at these big Manhattan-based media outlets. You know, Time Inc., Condé Nast, The Wall Street Journal and Forbes—really tough kinds of companies to penetrate. In direct marketing, you used to hear, "if you can get a 1% response rate, you're doing well."

But if I got a 1% response rate to this campaign, that would be a disaster, because I'm only going to 24 people. 1% of 24 people doesn't even amount to 1! I needed to get through to all of them. Another thing that we're always told by the experts is that 100% response rates were impossible as well. But I didn't care. I was just going to mount this campaign, because I needed to break through to those VPs and Directors of Circulation. So I put together this campaign. It was an 8 x 10 print of a cartoon, each one personalized to each recipient, with a letter saying, "This is a device I just used to beat the controls for Rolling Stone and Bon Appétit. I think we should put this to the test for your titles." That little campaign for those 24 people cost me less than $100, and not only did it get me a 100% response rate, but a 100% conversion rate as well. It was worth millions of dollars, and it all came from this little, unusual campaign. I called it a contact campaign because I didn't know what else to call it. That's what started it all.

Stu Heinecke

What would you say is wrong with modern sales techniques?

If you listen to the experts, they're going to say, "You didn't do your homework. You need to know what I'm doing, what I'm feeling, what I'm thinking about." I think that's unrealistic. You can study my Twitter and Facebook feeds, but how would you know how I'm feeling? Or some would say, "At least find out what school these people went to and send them a t-shirt from their school or something." I don't need a t-shirt from USC. I got tired of those while I was there a long time ago. I think it's a little disingenuous.

I was just interviewing Mark Hunter, a very prominent keynote speaker and trainer on sales, on Contact Marketing Radio (my show) and [the topic was]: Is cold calling good in sales? Is the role of a salesperson dead, dying, extinct? Because a lot of people will tell you it is. And he said, "Absolutely not." If you have a solution that could help someone, why wouldn't you call? Where sales is mostly going wrong is in manipulation. A salesperson might call up and say, "Hey, Stu! How's it going, buddy? This is Jerry, remember me?" "No, I don't remember you." I think those kinds of approaches are not good.

What you really should be doing is listening, not talking. People have said, "You haven't earned the right to pitch me yet." I think you need to create some bridge of trust that's very hard to do quickly. That's actually the role of contact marketing. When I send a cartoon piece for my clients about the recipient, usually we're assuming that they'd like to see a cartoon that commemorates their success in business. If they see that it's funny and that one of the characters in the cartoon is the butt of the joke (and you can imagine that that butt of the joke is their competitors), that's something people are going to love. A lot of times the reaction is, "I really like the way you guys think." By the time you get on the phone, they say, "I don't know what you sell, but I need it. I need your thinking." I think then, you've just won a major battle. The bigger battle is making the sale.

What are some of the mistakes that people make when sending pitch emails to CEOs?

CEO is a euphemism. It's the Center of Enterprise Opportunity. As Anthony Iannarino likes to say, "reach the CEO of the problem you want to address." It's not always the Chief Executive Officer. C-level executives are busy. We know their time is tight and they're well-protected. We know that a lot of people are reaching out to them as well. How about trying it early Saturday morning or Sunday evening? That's a good time to reach out to someone directly. Their inboxes aren't as full as they are during the week and you don't have secretarial screening, so timing is a device to use.

Another is brevity. Keep it absolutely short; let's say a dozen words or less. Write it so it has the recipient scratching their head saying, "How would you do that?" Make sure you know it's of value to the person and respect their time.

Stu Heinecke: How to Get a Meeting With Anyone

Can anyone do contact marketing?

I should make a distinction here that contact marketing isn't just about cartooning. That happened to be my introduction to it. There are a lot of ways to create these connections. To write the book, I interviewed the top 100 sales bloggers in the world and asked them, "When you absolutely have to reach someone who's of great importance, and someone who's nearly impossible to reach, how are you doing it?" They shared all these different stories and techniques, and I ended up with 20 categories of contact marketing campaigns in the book. These range in cost per contact from $0 (social media, email, and so on) all the way up to $10,000 per contact. That one was a contact letter that was produced as a full-page ad and run in the Wall Street Journal to reach Larry Ellison. And it worked!

There are all kinds of gift strategies. One that you commonly hear about is "half a gift," so you send half of a gift and promise the other half when you meet. Typically, let's say it's the left shoe of a nice pair of shoes, and you bring the other shoe when you meet. There's this kind of corny message of, "I just want to get my foot in the door."

Then there are interesting ways of using events and media exposure. If you're offering someone media exposure, you've got a pretty good chance of getting them on the phone and spending some time with them. Interviews are a great way to bond with someone pretty quickly that you otherwise didn't know.

In the book, you'd find all different kinds of strategies and tactics that you can use to break through. And you don't have to be a Wall Street Journal cartoonist to pull it off.

Stu Heinecke: How to Get a Meeting With Anyone

Want to find out more about Stu Heinecke's innovative contact marketing methodology? Check out his book, How to Get a Meeting With Anyone.

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A Guide to Quiet Quitting: How the Gen Z TikTok Trend Is Actually About Setting Boundaries At Work

Quiet Quitting is the latest trend among Gen-Z TikTok that encourages setting boundaries at work

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Toni Morrison has an anecdote about her first ever job, which was cleaning some neighborhood woman’s house. The young Toni arrived home after work one day and expressed her troubles to her father. But he didn’t provide the sympathy she expected. Instead, he gave her something better — his advice:

“Listen. You don’t live there. You live here. With your people. Go to work. Get your money. And come on home.”

Years later, she wrote about this remarkable experience for the New Yorker and said, in hindsight, this is what she learned:

1. Whatever the work is, do it well—not for the boss but for yourself

2. You make the job; it doesn’t make you

3. Your real life is with us, your family

4. You are not the work you do; you are the person you are

What Morrison so eloquently articulated was setting boundaries. I revisited this piece during the pandemic when working from home ramped up in earnest. Back when work was one of the few things that anchored my day.

Without a physical office, the pandemic shattered the work/life balance for many people. There was no more of that physical separation that Morrison talked about. There is no coming home from work physically. There is no real life to come back to — just a manufactured commute to your laptop in your makeshift home office.

But, par for the course, Gen Z are navigating this boundaryless era using TikTok. While internet gurus promote hustle culture and constant online availability since you’re not getting face time with your managers, there’s a trend in town — “quiet quitting.”


@zaidleppelin On quiet quitting #workreform ♬ original sound - ruby


The trend arose from the depths of the pandemic. Layoffs, salary cuts, and furloughs proved that their employers did not care about their hard-working employees.

The Washington Post dubs quiet quitting as a fresh trem for an old phenomenon: employee disengagement. In many cases, it’s a response to burnout. For much of Gen Z, it’s a way of establishing healthy boundaries in the office and resisting the pressure of the rat race. After all, why work yourself to the bone for a company that just proved it’s ready and willing to let you go?

Despite the term’s negative connotations, Quiet Quitting can provide an empowering shift in thinking for employees.

For far too long, employees have been indoctrinated with a slew of toxic workplace advice. Faced with these old misconceptions and lacking job security or clear paths for advancement, Gen Z is untethering their identities from work.

Quiet quitting — therefore — might be a bit of a misnomer. These employers aren’t completely disengaged. They’re certainly not launching Flight Club-esque sabotage attempts on their employers. NO. Contrary to media panic, Gen Z understands the value of a job — the fickle market they entered ensured that. But they also understand the value of life.

They’re doing what they’re being paid for. Nothing more, nothing less.

According to Chief, a private membership network focused on connecting and supporting women executive leaders, older generations should learn from this approach.

“Gen Z has already endured the largest seismic shifts to the career landscape than any previous generation, having started their careers in the middle of a pandemic that changed office culture forever and a gig economy that makes piecing together work more viable. They’re taking both those realities and therefore demanding more autonomy and flexibility than any other generation.”

Gen Z are less attached to job titles and statuses. They’re more concerned about their lives. Sure, this can lead to problematic outlooks on money and experiences — see the “I can earn my money back” TikTok trend. But it’s better than hustling for no reward. Besides, as some Gen Z-ers put it on TikTok, the office isn’t even a vibe.

“With the ability to work from anywhere and for more than just one place, Gen Z-ers are forging their own paths that don’t rely on old patterns set by previous generations and are redefining what “career success” looks like. Gen Z can take note, as more and more leaders are similarly pursuing multiple income streams of their own through the form of a portfolio career. The way in which work looks like and where it happens is evolving.”

With less single-minded focus on one job, some TikTok business gurus advocate shutting your laptops precisely at 5 pm. And then jump onto your side hustle. Do nails or lashes on the weekend. Become social media managers for your phone. Sell soap on Etsy (again … perhaps not in the Fight Club way).

But this valorization of side hustles is not about hustle culture, either. They say job security isn’t guaranteed. Learning new skills and develop an alternate income stream/s to keep you afloat. Just make sure you’re not left in the lurch. BTW inflation is here. So every little bit helps.

But where do you start? Watching TikToks can only get you so far. Try a course on LinkedIn Learning to sharpen up your skills and learn new ones that you can turn into a verifiable side hustle — or leverage in your job search if quiet quitting leads to … real quitting.

Learn on your own time with bite-sized videos or in-depth courses. Watch them after work, before you clock in, or on your lunch break. Then, after your courses are complete, you’ll have certificates prominently displayed on your profile that prove your skills.

quiet quitting

The Future of Coffee is Melted

Why You Need Cometeer Coffee: Coffee You Can Take on the Go

Cometeer Coffee

There’s an internet trend that says that everyone has three drinks: one for energy, one for hydration, and one for fun.


Hydration drinks are usually seltzer, a sports drink, or good old-fashioned water. Fun drinks can be anything from boba to kombucha to a refreshing fountain sprite. But the drink you choose for energy says the most about you. Are you a chill tea drinker? An alternative yerba mate devotee? A matcha-obsessed TikTok That Girl wannabe? A chaotic Red Bull chugger? Or are you a lover of the classics, a person after my own heart, who just loves a good cuppa joe?

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Can We Afford To Return To The Office?

Over two years into the most momentous event in our lives the world has changed forever … Some of us have PTSD from being locked up at home, some are living like everything’s going to end tomorrow, and the rest of us are merely trying to get by. When the pandemic hit we entered a perpetual state of vulnerability, but now we’re supposed to return to normal and just get on with our lives.

What does that mean? Packed bars, concerts, and grocery shopping without a mask feel totally strange. We got used to having more rules over our everyday life, considering if we really had to go out or keeping Zooming from our living rooms in threadbare pajama bottoms.

The work-from-home culture changed it all. Initially, companies were skeptical about letting employees work remotely, automatically assuming work output would fall and so would the quality. To the contrary, since March of 2020 productivity has risen by 47%, which says it all. Employees can work from home and still deliver results.

There are a number of reasons why everyone loves the work from home culture. We gained hours weekly that were wasted on public transport, people saved a ton of money, and could work from anywhere in the world. Then there were the obvious reasons like wearing sweats or loungewear all week long and having your pets close by. Come on, whose cat hasn’t done a tap dance on your keyboard in the middle of that All Hands Call!

Working from home grants the freedom to decorate your ‘office’ any way you want. But then people needed a change of environment. Companies began requesting their employees' RTO, thus generating the Hybrid Work Model — a blend of in-person and virtual work arrangements. Prior to 2020, about 20% of employees worked from home, but in the midst of the pandemic, it exploded to around 70%.

Although the number of people working from home increased and people enjoyed their flexibility, politicians started calling for a harder RTW policy. President Joe Biden urges us with, “It’s time for Americans to get back to work and fill our great downtowns again.”

While Boris Johnson said, “Mother Nature does not like working from home.'' It wasn’t surprising that politicians wanted people back at their desks due to the financial impact of working from the office. According to a report in the BBC, US workers spent between $2,000 - $5,000 each year on transport to work before the pandemic.

That’s where the problem lies. The majority of us stopped planning for public transport, takeaway coffee, and fresh work-appropriate outfits. We must reconsider these things now, and our wallets are paying

the price. Gas costs are at an all-time high, making public transport increase their fees; food and clothes are all on a steep incline. A simple iced latte from Dunkin’ went from $3.70 to $3.99 (which doesn’t seem like much but 2-3 coffees a day with the extra flavors and shots add up to a lot), while sandwiches soared by 14% and salads by 11%.

This contributes to the pressure employees feel about heading into the office. Remote work may have begun as a safety measure, but it’s now a savings measure for employees around the world.

Bloomberg are offering its US staff a $75 daily commuting stipend that they can spend however they want. And other companies are doing the best they can. This still lends credence to ‘the great resignation.’ Initially starting with the retail, food service, and hospitality sectors which were hard hit during the pandemic, it has since spread to other industries. By September 2021, the US Bureau of Labor Statistics reported 4.4 million resignations.

That’s where the most critical question lies…work from home, work from the office or stick to this new hybrid world culture?

Borris Johnson thinks, “We need to get back into the habit of getting into the office.” Because his experience of working from home “is you spend an awful lot of time making another cup of coffee and then, you know, getting up, walking very slowly to the fridge, hacking off a small piece of cheese, then walking very slowly back to your laptop and then forgetting what it was you’re doing.”

While New York City Mayor Eric Adams says you “can't stay home in your pajamas all day."

In the end, does it really matter where we work if efficiency and productivity are great? We’ve proven that companies can trust us to achieve the same results — or better! — and on time with this hybrid model. Employees can be more flexible, which boosts satisfaction, improves both productivity and retention, and improves diversity in the workplace because corporations can hire through the US and indeed all over the world.

We’ve seen companies make this work in many ways, through virtual lunches, breakout rooms, paint and prosecco parties, and — the most popular — trivia nights.

As much as we strive for normalcy, the last two years cannot simply be erased. So instead of wiping out this era, it's time to embrace the change and find the right world culture for you.

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