Some businesses have seasonal ups and downs. One such business is of a lawn service provider. Business is good in summers. But during winters, no one buys lawn servicing, bringing a cash flow problem to the business. A bad summer can mean doom for the small business owner!

One lawn servicing business tried to change its winter blues by starting a winter promotion program. They sent brochures to people by mail. They explained that in summers, the lawn service providers are usually busy and so by signing a contract in winter, they would lock the service for summer. To increase the number of people who would sign the contracts in winter, they promised a bribe. Anyone who signed the contract before a certain date would receive a beautiful embroidered blanket!

This simple tactic helped the lawn servicing business over its winter lull. And it also increased their business by 40% than other similar lawn service providers get over the year!

Action summary:

°    Advertise when others aren’t advertising.

°    You don’t have to provide the product now to make the sale. You can make the sale and promise to provide the product on a later date. Getting people to sign contracts in the winter meant that the competition wouldn’t get the contracts in the summer!

°    Provide an incentive, a bonus, a bribe to people to act now!

Does your business card get your customers to take amazing pains to get to you?

Here’s the story of a restaurant whose business card really went the extra mile to drive customers to their store.

The front side of the business card said:

“Don’ t flip this over”

The back side said:

“The bad news is that you don’t take directions well. The good news is that we like rebels.

Get a FREE appetizer at [Restaurant name]“

… and then they gave the restaurant address.

I saved the business card and went to the restaurant the coming weekend for my free appetizer. The great part is, that restaurant is 20 miles away from where I stay. I traveled 20 miles specially to redeem my “business card.”

Action summary:

°    Curiosity is a great attention grabber.

°    The main purpose of a business card is to be retentive. Giving a free offer on the business card makes the person save your card. For a long long time. Is your business card retentive?

°    Make your business card into a contest. Or a raffle. Or a coupon. Add a quote to it. Or better yet: a satisfied customers testimonial. Make your business card sell.

Real estate is a fiercely competitive industry. Dozens of realtors crop up when the economy is good and real estate prices are high. It is hard to stand out of the crowd when you do the same thing that other realtors do: Sell houses. One Florida realtor named Marie used a tactic successfully that helped her leave her competition lagging way behind.

Marie wrote an 80-page book that described the various neighbourhoods in her Florida market. She added some real estate sales data that showed how hot real estate was. And she gave an enticing name to the book: “The Secrets of South Beach Real Estate.” She repackaged the data available in any realtor’s office and made it into a book. She used this book as a lead generation tool. Marie tried to position herself as the local real estate guru.

This alone would have gotten Marie new business. But she went one step ahead and used one more tactic that got loads of business her way. Marie started selling the book in tourist places. She started targeting out of town tourists. She placed her books in unusual places like behind the counters in restaurants.

Marie realized that many tourists would be curious about buying a house in Miami after they have experienced the wonderful atmosphere. So she placed the books in places where people make buying decisions on impulse. The tourists would read her book and get interested in buying a house. Either as a vacation place. Or a retirement place. And they would call up Marie for more information. Thus Marie ended up selling expensive condos and houses at high prices to a target audience no one else went after.

Action summary:

°    Writing a book or a report is a great way to improve your credibility. You can position yourself as the expert by writing an informational product. And the informational product will work as a magnet for you attracting clients while you sleep!

°    Focus on a target audience that no one else goes after. Marie didn’t only sell tons of her book, she also sold dozens of houses because she went after the tourists instead of the locals.

At the stroke of midnight on December 31st, the year on the calendar changed to 2004. It was a new year. With it, M&M thought of changing its products too. For a short period of time. All the colourful M&M candies lost all of their colour: red, blue, green, yellow, orange and brown. M&M introduced black & white candies on all the store shelves. M&M’s spokesman Jeffrey Moran said “Madonna is constantly reinventing herself. So we look at it as a way of re- energizing our brand.”

Then the bomb fell.

Unfortunately the chocolate lovers hated the reinvention. Many were outraged. Some vowed never to eat M&M’s again. When asked why he stopped eating M&Ms, one person replied, “It’s the colour that make it. I fight for the colours.”  M&M didn’t know what made their happy clients buy and eat M&Ms again and again. It was the colour. And they changed it. Which led to a decrease in the number of sales. No one was buying the candies. The store shelves were stocked with it. It was a total disaster.

Thankfully, some one at the top asked: how could they salvage the situation? That question led to a contest.

M&M planted 6 packages of colour candies in the stores. And then announced a contest: “find a colour pack and win a car.” The

M&M’s learnt an expensive lesson: what makes people buy their products. After the disastrous start to the year, they made amendments and rolled out with 5 advertisements, each emphasizing the colour.contest worked extremely well in attracting people to buy the candies to win a car. The director of marketing at M&Ms, Doug Milne was quoted as saying: “the contest led consumers buy and collect Black & White candies in huge numbers!”

Action summary:

°    Find out what makes consumers buy your products. Ask them. Observe them.

°    Emphasize the core value that makes people buy your products. Maybe it’s the quality. Or the price. Or the colour. Or the size.

°    Test your new product before rolling out in huge numbers. If M&Ms had tested the black & white candies and sold it in only one city, they would have avoided the disaster.

°    Contests are a good way to increase sales. Having a contest once in a while can be profitable.

When Tammy picks up the call, Derek reminds her in a calm yet firm voice that their payment is past due. Tammy is very apologetic and embarrassed about the missed payment. Tammy apologizes, almost to the point of groveling, and asks Derek to come over immediately to collect the cheque.

Derek feels that he might have been rather strict with Tammy over the phone. He feels rather bad about her groveling. On his way over to their home, Derek buys a good bottle of wine for the couple. The wine costs him $19.95. Feeling generous, he buys a red bow and a “Thank You” card too.  Derek writes a hand written thank you note in the card: “No hard feelings. Enjoy your new home improvements and if you know of anyone else who wants work done on their home, please give them my card”

Derek than takes out 5 of his business cards, writes Tammy and Andre’s name at the back of the business cards and inserts them in the “Thank You” card.

The generous gesture costs Derek about $25. But the look on Tammy’s face when he gives her the wine and Thank You card is priceless. Her demeanor instantly changes from “embarrassed by the late payment” to “elated”.  But the icing isn’t Tammy’s thousand watt smile. Since then, Derek has received 4 of those 5 business cards back from other people who were referred by Tammy and Andre. Derek’s gross revenue is easily over $100,000 from the referrals!

 Action summary:

 °    Always act at your best. Derek could have easily been harsher when the payment wasn’t made in 30 days. But his generous act made him a hero. His generous act made him remembered. His generous act gained him 4 referrals that spent $100,000 with him.

°    Write Thank you notes. Thank you notes surprises your clients as hardly anyone else sends them. Old- fashioned politeness and respect is so uncommon these days that when practiced genuinely can be a great marketing tool.

°    Have a referral system in place. It could be as easy as giving your business cards to your satisfied clients to pass around.

Joy made a small fortune every year by organizing the trade shows. Tons of people would pay her $3 and visit the trade show. But the vendors weren’t happy. Many people would come over their booths and spend time admiring the antiques. But very few would buy. The vendors weren’t making money. And soon the number of vendors started declining.

Joy was about to throw in the towel when she met Don Alm. Don Alm suggested an idea that changed everything. The idea got more people to buy the antiques. And as a result, more vendors started buying booths.

The idea? 

Offer coupons to attendants. When the attendants bought the passes for the trade show, they were given “browser bucks.” Browser bucks was nothing but a piece of paper that looked like monopoly money. Each piece of paper was worth $3 and could be used on any purchase made from anyone in the show.

The effect the “browser bucks” had on people was amazing. The vendors had their best sales of any show they had ever attended! Now instead of just seeing and admiring the antiques, people started thinking where they could use the coupon! Sure, some used to buy marbles for $3. But many also bought antiques worth hundreds of dollars!

Browser bucks turned surfers into buyers!

Action summary: 

°    Use coupons to change peoples state of minds. Coupons will motivate them to pay attention and buy products. People don’t like to see a coupon go to waste.

°    Not everyone redeems their coupons. Over time, unredeemed coupons add up into a small fortune itself.

Peter thought the best place to get live gigs and generate CD sales was at high-end clubs and discs. To get booked at these clubs, Peter designed his own postcards and started mailing them to the clubs. Peter did spend quite a bit of his money in getting the postcards printed. He believed that first impression has to be good and so he paid extra money to print the postcards in 4 colours.

Every postcard had a call to action too. Peter provided a phone number that the club managers were supposed to call to book him for a night. Peter mailed these postcards and within 3 days he started receiving some phone calls. He was already getting bookings. But he still had a few nights free.

So Peter took the same postcards and mailed it to the same clubs again. And 3 days after the second mailing, he received even more calls. Peter then mailed the postcards for a third time. He got a similar response this time too, even though the club managers had received the same postcard.  The 3rd mailing made sure that Peter was booked throughout the season.

Action summary:

°    Postcards is a good and a low cost way to generate leads. Its easy to send postcards. And the response can be terrific.

°    There was nothing magical about the postcards Peter sent. But it worked magic because Peter persisted. He sent the same postcard again and again until he got booked for the entire season.

The above words were written by a Florida State alumnus, Greg Goelzhauser. What a huge discrepancy in thinking, don’t you think? Greg is not willing to spend 200 bucks for his tickets because he thinks it’s insanely expensive and yet he isn’t willing to sell his tickets for 600 bucks!

Why would he act in such a manner?

The reason is quite simple. It is emotionally painful to part with something you like. Greg couldn’t justify parting with 200 of his hard earned money “just on a game.” But when he had the tickets in hand, he could not part with it even at exorbitant prices.

Action summary:

°    Remove people’s hesitation in buying by giving them a free sample of your product. Once they try your product, they won’t be able to part with it easily. If the product sample satisfies them, they will buy a lot more.

°    Try to make people feel connected with your product and your company. When people feel connected and involved with your company, they will be extremely loyal to you and it will be hard for them to part with your products even at higher prices.

Gary waited a few weeks to see how his restaurant did on different days of the week. He found out that Wednesdays were the slowest days. Gary then started a Wednesday promotion: “Bald people eat free on Wednesdays!”

A totally hairless head will fetch a diner a completely free meal. Diners with less than 50 percent of their hair get up to 50 percent off their food. It didn’t matter if diners went bald naturally or shaved off their heads. Diners paid according to the amount of hair on their heads on Wednesdays.

The news of “Bald eat free on Wednesdays” reached far and wide. Gary’s uptown restaurant and bar has received tons of free publicity because of the promotional tactic. The restaurant was featured in newspapers published in as far away places as London.

This eat-free promotional tactic doubled the business on Wednesdays and converted it from one of the slowest days into one of the fastest.  “We haven’t had a single bald guy dine alone. One hairless fellow brought five women with him,” said Arnold.

Action summary:

 °    You could start such a promotion too. Select a group of people you want to reward.

 °    And then make a special offer to them.

 °    For eg: Baby boomers can have 5% off on Tuesdays. Government employees can receive a free goodie.

 °    Then announce the offer through press releases and advertising

Joy made a small fortune every year by organizing the trade shows. Tons of people would pay her $3 and visit the trade show. But the vendors weren’t happy. Many people would come over their booths and spend time admiring the antiques. But very few would buy. The vendors weren’t making money and soon the number of vendors started declining. 

Joy was about to throw in the towel when she met Don Alm. Don Alm suggested an idea that changed everything. The idea got more people to buy the antiques. And as a result, more vendors started buying booths.

 The idea?

 Offer coupons to attendants. When the attendants bought the passes for the trade show, they were given “browser bucks.” Browser bucks was nothing but a piece of paper that looked like monopoly money. Each piece of paper was worth $3 and could be used on any purchase made from anyone in the show.  

The effect the “browser bucks” had on people was amazing. The vendors had their best sales of any show they had ever attended! Now instead of just seeing and admiring the antiques, people started thinking where they could use the coupon! Sure, some used to buy marbles for $3. But many also bought antiques worth hundreds of dollars!

Browser bucks turned surfers into buyers!

Action summary:

°    Use coupons to change peoples state of minds. Coupons will motivate them to pay attention and buy products. People don’t like to see a coupon go to waste.

°    Not everyone redeems their coupons. Over time, unredeemed coupons add up into a small fortune itself.