Many business owners are able to skyrocket the number of their customers almost overnight. They can do so if they have very large marketing and promotional budgets in place. Or they either squeeze their suppliers or cut their own prices. These strategies are not possible for every business, especially of it is a small business. Most successful businesses can often outlive their competitors by bringing charm to their dealings. Since happy customers bring even more customers, this strategy can work if you are on a tight budget initially. But this requires patience – lots of it, and for long term. This is possible even today, and for any type of business - whether a brick and mortar store, a website promoting goods or the combination of both. But there are many businesses who are already busy stealing customers from their large competitors with deep pockets. They are being creative, without spending anything on advertising at all. Are you interested to find out more? They do this by understanding their customer’s psychology. They know that all their paying customers have one thing in common. People always want ore for less. This is true in every country, in every culture and in all parts of the world. This is human nature, especially of it involved money. No one likes to spend no more than is absolutely necessary – some more so than others. How you make a customer a truly happy customer so that he wants to bring his friends to your premises? Here is true story. I know it is true because this happened to me. I have been paying a regular once a month visit to my barber for many years. He runs a very successful saloon. I have been loyal customer not because he is cheap but mainly because I am accustomed to his service and I do not want to take undue risks elsewhere either. During the end of one of my visits a few months ago, as I had just paid for his services, he said: 'Would you like to take away our top of the line bottle of shampoo - for free?' He gets his own range of toiletries manufactured which he sells in his own or other saloons. But I was not quite sure why would do such a thing. OK, his margins are high, but giving away some thing free had never happened before. Being skeptic, I gently inquired what the catch was? 'Nothing, just take it away and give us feedback on what I think of it next time I am in? Fair enough, I did as told. I tried all freebies during the next month. On my next visit, he asked me how I got on with shampoo. Of course I was happy with it (after all he had been selling it successfully for years). Then he said, ‘how would you like your friends try this too? Also perhaps our service here in the saloon… for free and see what they think?’ Now, I been in marketing for a long time and understand that this is one tactic large companies use to get new customers. But he had gone way beyond that. He had made me feel 'indebted' to give out names of some of my friends who he could contact to try out his services - for free. Now what I ask you is this: if you got a call from a well known business offering you free service that you regularly use elsewhere, how likely are you to turn it down? What if your friend has referred them to contact you - because your friend can not be unhappy with their service, right? Well, unless you have a good reason to distrust your friend’s recommendation, of course. Can you see the power of referral marketing ? I know for a fact that 2 of my friends are now regularly using his services. What about the friends of his other customers? What about the friends of friends? What was the cost of acquiring these new customers? Almost nothing. They were acquired because what he offered was perceived to be of high value by my friends… free hair cut and a bag of freebies. The important word to watch here is ‘perceived value’. It cost saloon owner next to nothing. Can this strategy be used by other businesses to steal customers from their big competitors? All they need is to be creative in their own fields. Not all businesses can give away a bottle of shampoo and a free hair cut but they will need to be creative in their own businesses. The good news is – you do not need to have freebies to give away. There are solutions already available that can be given away and they do not cost you any thing at all. The great thing is that customers regard them very highly and have a high perceived value. For example, would your customers like free vacations that would normally cost them $2000 each? Or a $1000 spending spree? How about if it doesn’t cost you any thing at all?
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Many business owners are able to skyrocket the number of their customers almost overnight. They can do so if they have very large marketing and promotional budgets in place. Or they either squeeze their suppliers or cut their own ...
Peter Shukla runs a website offering business owners products that are universally perceived to be of very high value by customers. Businesses who have used his solution have seen sales rise by at least 30%. To learn more about this unique strategy, visit his website Give Away Incentives. Or go here: http://www.giveawayincentives.com
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