Tract Society Secretary’s Relation to the Canvasser by H. H. Hall; E. R. Palmer

Review and Herald Publishing Association · Takoma Park Station, Washington, D. C. · Dec 13, 1906

Tract Society Secretary’s Relation to the Canvasser

By H. H. Hall; E. R. Palmer

My relation to canvassers began when I was a boy of fourteen or fifteen. At that time the State agent of Kansas, N. P. Dixon, came to our house and stayed, mind you, stayed, until he persuaded my father to go two hundred miles or more to take charge of a canvassing company. Those of you who have had to leave home for four or six months at a time know how it pulls on the heart strings, and can appreciate how we felt when my father drove away. That emphasized to my mind the responsibilities and duties of the men in charge of agents.

My actual relation to the publishing work began as a stenographer under that peerless tract society secretary, L. Dyo Chambers. The principal thing I thought about his letters to his agents then was that they were very frequent and very long, and that it was very hard to keep up with him. Since then I have learned that the frequency and length of those letters had much to do with the frequency and length of the canvasser’s report column, and the number and size of the bills I had to make out. For these reasons I have strong convictions on the proper relation of the tract society secretary to the canvasser, some of which are as follows:—

1. Keep in the closest possible touch with your State agent. He is in charge of the field. You are his assistant, and if you work entirely in harmony, his influence will be strengthened, and your burdens will be lessened. Send him copies of all important letters you mail your agents. Tell him how their accounts stand. Don’t wait until they have delivered and gone home, but do it as soon as they have opened an account. It is an excellent plan to send him a list monthly.

2. Supply the agents with the REVIEW and The Signs of the Times each week, and get them there before the Sabbath. Also, see that each one has Pointers to Success, Canvasser’s Manual, and copies of papers read before such a convention as this, for example. They will appreciate them. Keep a card list of canvassers, and note on the back of each card all the important documents mailed and important letters sent them.

3. Write them often and tell them about the progress of their fellow workers. This can be done to good advantage even though a weekly report of the canvassing work is gotten out in neostyle form. They appreciate it the more if it is sent out while still warm. I presume some one else will write on the advantages of a neostyle or a carbon letter to agents each week, so I will not speak of it here.

4. Supply each worker when he starts into the field with a few postal cards, and ask him to report at the close of each day for the first week at any rate, telling just what his success has been, how many exhibitions he has made, and the class of people he has worked, etc. It will help him to put in better time, and will keep you in close touch with his whereabouts.

5. Study the reports, for they are a photograph of the work done. If you notice orders for foreign books which are not obtainable, speak of it at once. Agents often work a whole season and report right along certain books which can not be secured, but the fact is overlooked until delivery time comes. Then they lose the orders and disappoint their customers. In writing to your agents, don’t fall into ruts, don’t begin your letters just the same, avoid worn-out forms, making general statements, etc. Get right down to the work they are actually doing. Show that you have studied their reports carefully, and that you want to assist them.

6. Above all else, give instant and accurate attention to their orders and queries. You will find it an excellent plan to file a little notice in your “tickler” of every subscription-book order placed with the publishing house, and if it is not promptly responded to, write again. Sometimes the season’s work of the agent depends upon the receipt or non-receipt of a single letter. In these days when mail cars and post-offices are sometimes burned, and mail is going astray, we can not be too careful.

7. Finally, ‘brethren, remember that your agents are the advance guard of the gospel army, and that their exposed position subjects them to discouragements and temptations that few others realize, for Satan’s wrath waxes hotter and hotter against them. Therefore, let us see that the mail, and telegraph line, too, if necessary, between them and their source of supplies and information is kept in the best working order.

H. H. HALL.

NOTE.—The preceding paper, through an oversight, was omitted from the Proceedings of the Publishers’ Convention. We are very sorry for this, for the paper is full of vital points which lie at the foundation of a tract society secretary’s success in dealing with agents by co-operation with the field missionary agent.

We trust that our workers in general and our tract society secretaries in particular will clip this article out of the REVIEW, and put it in its proper place under the consideration of this topic in the published Proceedings of the Convention. We can not afford to have this paper, based upon sound experience, omitted from the report.

E. R. PALMER,

Sec. Gen. Conf. Publishing Dept.