Get Creative in Promoting Your Business

We cannot be certain from one day to the next what the DOW will do,
who will eventually become President, or what the effects of a
recession might be over the next 12-24 months.

We can be certain though, that if we allow ourselves to feel the malaise effect from so much uncertainty, and not focus on strategic thinking about our own business - we will suffer for it.

So while we can't change the most prominent issues in our respective
countries, we can take at least one of these three steps to help ourselves stay afloat, and even prosper.

You Can Do This

I am not suggesting complicated strategies that require people like myself
or my colleagues to assist you. You can do these quite simply on your own,
as long as you drop the lone ranger and adapt to the more inclusive and
collaborative attitude.

1. Don't spend so much money advertising for new customers.

Up sell the ones you have with more of your products or services.

If you treat your customers like gold (Check here for ideas) and
respect them for spending their hard earned money with you, you customers will
want to repay you with repeat business. They will become your best ambassadors and marketing agents.

There is ladies clothing store located in the retail section underneath my condo
building. I see her everyday. When it's time to buy gifts or look for a new sweater, I am not so inclined to go to the mall. I WANT to give Marcy business, and many of your customers WANT to do the same for you. Give them a reason. Offer them new products and services. Send emails to your database and tell them what else you have to offer. Make it easy for them to do business with you.
(Offering new products or services don't have to cost you much money, if any. )

2. Package up the benefits.

You might want to call this an up sell. If a customer comes into your retail store and says YES to one purchase, even if it's worth $5, they are much more inclined to say yes to the NEXT purchase. Package benefits with purchases. Buy one, get one free is common, but you can be more creative than that.

Show customers your savvy by putting together the Italian meal in your grocery
store. Don't just sell the sauce and noodles at the loss leader counter. Place the suggestion of bread, salad fixings, dessert and wine either on a table or with a photo. Offer the package for $30. An easy dinner for 4 would look quite amazing to the after-work shopper who is trying to feed a family on a budget.

What if your business is recycling plastics? How can you package your product
with either a service you offer OR a service offered somewhere else, and benefit your customer (and perhaps another business owner)? You may have just increased your profit dollars from $28 a sale to $38 a sale. That may not seem like much, but you apply it to 100 customers, and you have an extra $1000 in profit for the same amount of work.

3. Hold an TRIPLE WIN Event

Invest in the well-being of your customers. Instead of running another print ad in the urban paper - host an event that benefits the community or your customers in particular.

These are tough times. Consider your marketing initiatives as opportunities for
the TRIPLE WIN STRATEGY. How can you expose people to what you have to
offer, and at the same time make it beneficial to those who might never be your customer?

Let's say you are Rick and Sid.

You own a mid-size building supply chain. Times are tough.
It's a recession and people don't build a lot of homes or structures when
the economy is suffering.

You host an appreciation night for your suppliers and your suppliers are
asked to bring 3 other business owners to the beer and burger event.

The big draw is the announcement that you guys offered to
supply the materials to build a small home for a single parent and her
three kids. They lost their home when her husband was killed in a
car accident.

(Yes, there is an expense to you. But you can leverage cooperative dollars, free advertising, increased exposure, and additional business into the cost and it will make you money!)

You ask all the attendees to do four things:

• a. Let you feed them
• b. Have them interviewed for articles that you would host, on behalf of these other businesses, on your online blog. Feature stories
  about each business and owner. Encourage people to check them out.
  (A newspaper may want in on the fun and offer to draw attention to the blog every week until every feature story had been covered.) Think of the free marketing you are offering your guests and traffic you will have on your site.
  b. Sign up to donate any of the other materials needed for the new home.
  c. Introduce their guests to you personally. (You then make sure you introduce those guests to at least 3 other business owners that may be good contacts for them.)

The List of potential outcomes:

• A home for a family.
• Community awareness.
• People wanting to drive across town to support the business that supported the community.
• Joint Ventures between business owners who met one another at the event.
• Media attention without paying for it.
• Renewed team spirit at work.
• Unusual business deals that arose from the new contacts you now have with the suppliers guests...

and much more.

I have used a hypothetical (sort of) story here to illustrate the point. I can tell you that I have seen clients employ the TWS over and over again to their success, and the success of others.

IT'S ALWAYS THE RIGHT TIME FOR YOU

Don't fold up your napkin and lay it down in defeat.
Don't get grouchy with your family and fall into despair.
There are always strategies you can employ to keep you afloat and even
to prosper when money seems tight and pressure is on.
Our grandparents survived the great depression.
We will survive ~ and then some!

If you have questions on how you can apply any of the three strategies mentioned above in your situation, myself or one of my team will be happy to help by answering your email question at no cost to you.

We are all in and moving through this together.

Harmony Thiessen is a THINK TUB strategist. Using her own creative intelligence and experience, combined with the expertise of a select group of experts, she offers her clients cutting edge ideas and the strategic implementation methods to help you succeed.