| |
| |
|
Marketing Information |
|
|
|
What Is Better Than FREE?
Oh come on! FREE is free. Zero, zip, nada, zilch. What on earth could be better than FREE? I recently told you FREE was the most powerful word in advertising. Nothing has changed, it still is. So what is with the headline of this article? What is better than FREE? Well before I explain, let's recap a little first. FREE is the most powerful word in marketing and advertising world because at its very heart lies the secret of 'risk reversal'. If you recall, in the previous article I was encouraging you to make your offer as close to risk-free as possible. And if you do this, you will be ahead of most of your competition. --- Beyond Risk Reversal Getting over the risk associated with making the wrong choice, or making the choice and then having the product under deliver or simply not work, is a problem that every buyer struggles with. And for what it's worth, most people are more afraid of making the wrong choice and looking foolish, than they are of just making the wrong choice. So if you can negate this fear, if you stack the deck in your favour. If you can get the buyer over that hurdle, they will be one step closer to saying "yes". --- Let's Dance In any business transaction there is a silent dance that plays out every time someone offers something for sale, and someone considers buying it. Each party silently tries to maneuver themselves into a position where their risk is limited. As the seller, you can help the buyer get to that place if you assume all or more of the risk, then you will have less trouble selling your product or service. It's that simple. --- "But James, nothing in life is really free." Well, that is true to some extent. Even if I gave you something free, what it really means is that you did not have to part with any money. You paid no cash. You may still have spent time and energy on the sales process; you may have invested yourself emotionally in the prospect of owning that flashy new fangled widget. Therefore, in reality, you have 'spent' something - you spent time. And time unlike money is non-refundable. Time is finite and as the old saying goes? "Time waits for no man." So if your prospect has accepted your request to explore the possibility of buying something from you, and has even gone so far as to consider making a deal with you, what can you do to clinch it? Well you can let them know you value their time. You can show them you respect them for taking the time to meet with you. You can show them that you appreciated their consideration of your product or service. --- And The Answer Is? And so the answer to your question 'what is better than free?' is 'Better Than Risk Free' or 'BTRF' for short. Simply put, a BTRF offer rewards your customer for favouring you with their buying decision. In addition, if it does not work out - you compensate them for their efforts. Here is a concrete example: Whether you sell products or services, give the client something extra as part of the main deal. If the extra premium is free, then so much the better. To make the deal even stronger, make it known that the whole deal is 100% guaranteed and you'll refund their money if required (or whatever makes sense) and also let them know that regardless of the deals outcome, (and this is the BTRF part) they get to keep the premium item you gave them as your way of saying thank you. 'Better Than Risk Free' is better than free. Author: http://www.JamesBurchill.com - James is a freelance writer and consultant
MORE RESOURCES:
Google News |
|
|
|
RELATED ARTICLES
7 Cheap & Easy Ways To Get Prospects Here are some quick techniques you can put into place on your web site or in your advertising to gather new prospects. There is practically no cost for most of these strategies yet they have proven to be extremely effective in any number of different venues. 10 Start Up Marketing Tips This list has been compiled as a result of years of working with business owners who didn't quite lay the right groundwork when they started up, and ended up paying for it later. Sometimes, what seems like a means of saving money actually ends up costing more in the long run. Ready, Fire, Aim! You probably read my headline and thought, wait a minute, isn't that backwards? Isn't it supposed to be "Ready, Aim, Fire?"Well, a year ago I might have agreed with you. But not anymore. Private Practice Marketing: 3 More Secrets I Wish I Knew When I First Started Out Secret #4 - Get very comfortable asking for paymentOne of the easiest ways to set this up is to have very clear explanations in your intake forms about how payment works.It's your job to train your clients how to pay you promptly. Planning Your Postcard Marketing Campaign Before you create your postcard, do a little planning. Ask yourself:1. Real Estate Investing - Writing Killer Postcards to Attract Motivated Sellers! So many of you have been telling us that you're ready to get started investing, but "you can't find any deals! and what are the steps and secrets to finding great deals?" Some of you have even written asking us if there still ARE any deals left? OF COURSE there are! We find them all the time. But you ain't gonna find them looking at for-sale ads in the paper, for-sale signs in the yard, or by concentrating solely on short sales, foreclosures, REOs and agent-listed properties. How Nearly Going Broke Taught Me The Value Of Niche Marketing If you want to learn how effective Niche Marketing can be, I suggest you "don't" take the route I did.Back in 1983 I started a company offering general Electronics Subcontract Assembly services to just about anyone who made Electronic products. What Is Multi-Level And How Should It Be Worked Multi-level marketing is really a partnership. You go into business with someone that has the same interests and goals you have. How To Achieve Success With Your Own Money Making Newsletter Writing and publishing a successful newsletter is perhaps the most competitive of all the different areas of mail order and direct marketing. You can still publish newsletter through regular mail. 4 Ways to Get a Prospects Attention Fast Can you remember the last dozen advertising messages beamed at you today? Can you remember even one of them? Most people can't.This illustrates a major obstacle you need to overcome before you can successfully promote your product or service. Creating Your Future with a Marketing Plan Almost everyone who dreams of starting their own business is familiar with the fact that they should create a business plan. However, often that's where many people stop. Everybody Loves Raymond....You Should Too! Popular TV Series Provides a Powerful Marketing LessonSmall Business owners spend a great deal of mental effort and time trying to dream up the next big marketing idea for their business. I'm all for that. Stop Your Marketing Leaks Thirty percent of all the drinkable water that runs between the plant and your faucet is lost to leaky pipes. In marketing, thirty percent of our business is lost to leaky follow up. Small Business Pricing: Setting A Price For Your Product / Service The importance of pricing can not be underestimated as incorrect pricing can often result in the failure of a business. New businesses often make the mistake of either charging too little or too much for their product or service. One-A-Day Marketing Vitamins Is your business growing, or are you on a plateau in need of a boost to move up? I know that I always tell you it is best to have a positioning statement and a plan. But sometimes, you just need something to get you off square one. Have You Tried Cause Marketing? To help promote your small business or professional practice, consider tearing a page out of the corporate marketing playbook. For years big companies have partnered with nonprofits to co-promote their brands. 25 Ways To Make Your Next Direct Mail Campaign Work This list contains 25 powerful strategies to improve your direct mail results. It would be wise to use this as a checklist to ensure you've included as many as possible in your advertising. How to Get the Right Clients and Avoid the Wrong Ones If you are like most service professionals and small business owners one of your primary concerns is generating as many leads as possible. And that may be your biggest mistake, resulting in wasting time on unqualified prospects and working with too many clients you wish you didn't have to. 10 Tips to Grow Your Business Plain & Simple "Try not to become a man of success but rather to become a man of value." Albert EinsteinRecently I heard a statistic that the majority of businesses operate at 60% of their potential. Marketing Through Associations 2004 Jeffrey DobkinIf you're in direct marketing, you're continually looking for new list sources - everybody's tired of mailing to the same lists. If you're not in direct marketing and thinking about putting a mailing together, here's something a little different: take a look at marketing through associations.
|
| home | site map |
| © 2006 |
